Mr C Hinecap
23rd Jun 2004, 05:11
I thought this worthy of the esteemed company.......
Cross of RAF pilot's son crowns rebuilt church in Dresden
The Church of Our Lady in Dresden, once one of Europe's finest baroque buildings, was restored to glory yesterday almost 60 years after it was destroyed by Allied bombers.
A cross and orb built by the son of an RAF pilot who took part in the attack was lowered on to the Frauenkirche following the 10-year, £90 million restoration. The church has been rebuilt from scratch in one of the most ambitious reconciliation projects involving Britain and Germany.
Alan Smith, a craftsman at London firm of goldsmiths Grant MacDonald, spent eight months building the cross and orb in stainless steel and copper to the original 18th century design. His father, Frank, flew a Lancaster in the 1945 raid.
"My father used to tell me about the horrors and the suffering of Dresden," Mr Smith said. "He did not want it to be forgotten. By working on the cross I've come closer to my father and it's my way of saying goodbye to him and fulfilling his wishes."
Mr Smith and his 80-year-old mother joined other VIPs at the ceremony, including the Duke of Kent, and around 300 British guests. Many were from Coventry, which was also intensively bombed and is now twinned with Dresden.
Old Dresdeners wept and cheered as workers eased the crown and orb inch by inch on to the church's tower with a crane. Bells pealed across the city to signal their success.
The Duke of Kent, the patron of the Dresden Trust, a British initiative established to raise money for the reconstruction, said its crowning was a sign of hope for a "free, peaceful and united Europe". It should stand as a reminder of the "painful and difficult past" shared by Britain and Germany.
British businesses contributed hundreds of thousands of pounds to the project. Most of the rest of the money was raised by charitable foundations.
The blackened stones of the Frauenkirche, built in 1743, lay for decades where they had fallen in 1945 as a reminder of the horrors of war.
Of the million bricks which make up the reconstructed church around 8,000 are original, their blackness marking them out from the pale new stones.
Cross of RAF pilot's son crowns rebuilt church in Dresden
The Church of Our Lady in Dresden, once one of Europe's finest baroque buildings, was restored to glory yesterday almost 60 years after it was destroyed by Allied bombers.
A cross and orb built by the son of an RAF pilot who took part in the attack was lowered on to the Frauenkirche following the 10-year, £90 million restoration. The church has been rebuilt from scratch in one of the most ambitious reconciliation projects involving Britain and Germany.
Alan Smith, a craftsman at London firm of goldsmiths Grant MacDonald, spent eight months building the cross and orb in stainless steel and copper to the original 18th century design. His father, Frank, flew a Lancaster in the 1945 raid.
"My father used to tell me about the horrors and the suffering of Dresden," Mr Smith said. "He did not want it to be forgotten. By working on the cross I've come closer to my father and it's my way of saying goodbye to him and fulfilling his wishes."
Mr Smith and his 80-year-old mother joined other VIPs at the ceremony, including the Duke of Kent, and around 300 British guests. Many were from Coventry, which was also intensively bombed and is now twinned with Dresden.
Old Dresdeners wept and cheered as workers eased the crown and orb inch by inch on to the church's tower with a crane. Bells pealed across the city to signal their success.
The Duke of Kent, the patron of the Dresden Trust, a British initiative established to raise money for the reconstruction, said its crowning was a sign of hope for a "free, peaceful and united Europe". It should stand as a reminder of the "painful and difficult past" shared by Britain and Germany.
British businesses contributed hundreds of thousands of pounds to the project. Most of the rest of the money was raised by charitable foundations.
The blackened stones of the Frauenkirche, built in 1743, lay for decades where they had fallen in 1945 as a reminder of the horrors of war.
Of the million bricks which make up the reconstructed church around 8,000 are original, their blackness marking them out from the pale new stones.