Figure 1.-- Here are the children at the Morsum school in 1918. Many of the boys wear either sailor suits or suits with Schiller collars. One boy seems to have an Eton or large white collar. I think this is only part of the school. |
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Here is a 1936 class of German children taken in Morsum, Schleswig-Holstein. This was a contested province on the northern border with Denmark. These boys and girls seem to be about 12 or 13. The boys all wear jumpers or long-sleeved knitted shirts with short trousers and long stockings. Some boys wear boot-like footwear. We do not know the name of this school. But it looks to be a small primary school. As was common in village schools, it was a coeducational school. The boys with crosses were probably killed in World War II.
The school was located in Morsum, Schleswig-Holstein. This was a contested province on the northern border with Denmark. Although little little known today, the small Danish-German Duchies of Schleswig-Holstein at the base of the Jutland Peninsula once figured prominently in the history of northern Europe. The Duchies were contested by the Danish Crown and various German monarchs. The eventual resolution of that conflict in the 19th centuries had major consequences in the 20th century.
Prussia with Austria fought Denmark over the province--The Danish War (1864). It was the reason that Danish-born Queen Alexandria (Edward VII's wife) detested Germans. And it was the beginning in a change of British attitudes toward the Germans.
A German reader provides us some information about the village of Morsum/Morkum. "Now just some remarks to the small village "Morkum" on the island of Sylt off the western coast of Schleswig-Holstein.
It is a pleasant holiday resort village and very old. It was a village already founded in the 9th century! The village has a fascinating web site with many historical images of everyday life in
Morsum, including some school portraits and documents. In part 1 there is a picture of a group of people going for church for a marriage, two
children are at the front of the brial procession (about 1927). Some pictures down is a family
photo with three children, I suppose two boys, of about 1930. Some more photos down
relatives from Morsum people in the US (Karl Christiansen). Change to part 2. There are farmers' picture, also with children/boys. In part 3 at the end there are two nice photograph, the "Abtanzball", boys and girls dancing, 1964; this is a local event for youngsters."
We do not know the name of this school. But it looks to be a small primary school. As was common in village schools, it was a coeducational school. An American reader writes, "You are probably correct that this is a primary school, but some of the boys look old enough to be in secondary school.
I'm not sure just what the cut-off age was. Are boys in German secondary schools always fourteen or older?" I am not positive about Germany. Schools in Europe or more compicated than in America and our 1-12 grade system. I think what happeneded in Germany is that all of the children went to school together for the first 4 years. That was called Grundschule/Volkschule. Then the clever or well-to-do kids went to secondary schools while the other children stayed in the primary school until about 14 years of age. Hopefully our German readers will provide a more informed assessment.
The people living along the German Danish border spoke a rather similar sialect--Friesisch. Thus the dialect of the northern German islands and Danish are not much different. Interestingly this is the dialect also soken in the northwestern Netherlands. It was the dialect spoken by mang of the Anglo-Saxons tht invaded Britain after the departure of the Roman Legions. Thus it developed ingto Old English--the foundation of the English language. The people in Schleswig-Holstein also commonly married across the German-Danish border, reinforcing language trends.
The village website shows the school building of about 1920. The next photograph shows the school in 1918. There were 39 pupils, boys and girls, forming class 1, I suppose grades 1 to 4. There follow (to the right) two photos from the school children outside on a walk in the countryside. We also see the school about 1936 (figure 2).
Georg Lauritzen was a particularly good student at the school. We see many interesting photos.
We see Georg as a little boy and as an older boy with his friends. He is one of the boys in the schoolportrait here. One picture shows him in a suit with a Hitler Youth pin. There is no picture of him in his HJ uniform, but we see him in his Luftwaffe uniform. He survived the War and surrendered to the British rather than the Soviets which probably saved his life. We see his "Entlassungs-Zeugnis", This allowed him to go on to change to a secondary school in nearby Niebüll--a "Aufbauschule" for good pupils coming from rural village. Most of the children at the Morsum school did not go beyond the village primary school. Notice the entry, Gehört dem Deutschen Jungvolk an",i.e. (member of the German
Jungvolk). This was the juvenile or Cub division of the Hitler Youth. In NAZI Germany, membership in the HJ was important in obtaining a place in secondary schools and later university. There are more details in his site. He transferred to a Gymnasium--a further indication that he was academically bright. He finish school with the "Mittlere Reife".
The available pgotographs show only a part of the school. We are not sure just which classes are involved. We see a part of the school in 1918 (fugure 1(. The boys and girls in the 1936 portrait seem to be about 12 or 13 (figure 2). Only a few of these children went on to secondary school and to do so they had to go to another town.
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We have two views of the school and we can see the changes in fashions over time.
Here are the children at the Morsum school in 1918. Many of the boys wear either sailor suits or suits with Schiller collars (figure 1). One boy seems to have an Eton or large white collar. The younger children are at the front and the older children at the back.
The boys all wear jumpers or long-sleeved knitted shirts with short trousers and long stockings. Some boys wear boot-like footwear.
It is clear that most of the boys support their long stockings with Strapsleibchen, sleeveless undershirts with long garters attached to the bottom edge (notice the third boy from the left in the front row whose right stocking sags a little bit near the hose supporter attachment exposing a little bit of bare skin). The second boy from the left also has a bit of skin exposed because his left stocking comes a little short of the hem of his shorts where you can just make out the clasp of his hose supporter on the side. But one boy (first row, extreme left) supports his stockings with round garters rather than a Leibchen with supporter straps. This method was discouraged both by health authorities because of the restriction of blood vessels and by mothers who didn't approve of the appearance, but boys sometimes liked round garters because they seemed less feminine and didn't have clasps or buttons to come undone during stressful physical activity. One of the interesting features here is the footwear. Most of the boys wear the standard hightop shoes of the period, but two boys (front row,
extreme left, and fifth from the left) wear boots that come up over their calves and have a little notch at the top front, rather like American cowboy boots. Such boots may have been favored because of
muddy roads and fields in rural parts of Germany. Most of the girls at the back seem to wear the familiar pigtails so common in Germany. The girls undoubtedly wear long stockings with Leibchen as well although we can't see their legs. Note that the boys' short trousers are in most cases quite brief, thus necessitating stockings that cover the entire thigh except in the exceptional cases noted above. Black stockings seem to have been favored in this town although some of the boys wear brown
stockings. We don't see the beige stockings that were also common during the 1930s in Germany.
Notice the number of girls who had ther hair dine in braids.
World War II began 3 years after this portrait was taken. The boys would not have been old enough to serve when the War began. They would have been old enough for Reich Labor Service (RAD) about 1940 and that that would have meant war work. They would have been old enough to serve after that, epecially as the NAZIs lowered the draft age to form the Volksstrum as the Allies closed in on Germany in 1944. A reader writes, "The crosses on the chests of three of the boys are additions to the photo, placed there by someone who wanted to single out the three boys, probably for purposes of identification." A German reader tells us, "These kind of crosses on the boy's chests remind me more of a cross to indicate death. Maybe they they died young as soldiers in World War II." We suspect that this was the case as there are no crosses on the girls. We have noted the same convention in old U.S. photograophs, although often Xs rather than crosses are used. The village website confirms that the boys with crosses were killed in the War.
The school is still operating. The school has a nice Web site. It is, however, only in German and about the modern school. It does not have any historical information about the school. It is now called "Grundschule". In 1937 it was probably called a "Volksschule". It is for grades 1 to 8 (now
2007 probably 1 to 10). It has at the moment 54 pupils, 30 girls and 24 boys.
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