Roger P. The annual summer festival of the city of Darmstadt is called Heinerfest , a reminder of the historically high frequency of the name Heinrich nickname Heiner among local males. The city had been home to the capital of the Grand Duchy of Hesse for several centuries and is located at the northern end of the Bergstrasse, the road that runs south to Heidelberg along the western edge of the Odenwald Forest.
Darmstadt had , inhabitants when World War II began. With six elders and eight Aaronic Priesthood holders, this branch was quite strong. As was true throughout the Frankfurt District, adult women constituted the majority 62 percent of the membership of the Darmstadt Branch. However, the six elders may have been inactive at the time, because the branch president in June was a missionary from the United States. The first counselor, Christian Lang, became the branch president when the missionaries left on August 25, Georg Marquardt born recalled going up a staircase in the back of the building to the meeting rooms on the second floor.
On Wednesday evenings, they met againβfor MIA and genealogy classes at p. The Marquardt family lived on a small farm near Gadernheim, about ten miles south of Darmstadt. The route to church was a challenging one because public transportation did not connect the two locations directly. Members of the Marquardt family often walked the entire distance to church over country roads through the Odenwald Forest. When it was not possible to make the trek to Darmstadt, the family held meetings in their home.
The Wehrmacht called Georg Marquardt just after Poland was conquered in the fall of Following training in nearby Heidelberg, he was sent home for the winter and called up again in July Among various domestic stations was Schwetzingen, a town close to Mannheim, and Georg took advantage of the opportunity to attend the branch there.
According to his recollection,. Somebody upstairs was playing with a gun. Suddenly we heard a shot; it went through the thin ceiling and hit me just when I was about to go to bed. They transported me to the military hospital and told me not to move because the bullet hit me near my spinal cord. But when I moved a little, we saw that the bullet was lying on the floor.
