Pre WWI Berlin

[Nick]

Continuing the current theme on the BBC website, another interesting snapshot of a European city pre outbreak of war. Historically it is refreshing to see an article which is pre WWI as so often Berlin's history is associated with the Weimar and Nazi era.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-25635311

[Mervyn Mitton]

August Bebel comments - shown at the end of the articles - were just so true. Bad leaders are the cause of

so many Countries troubles. The pictures show a lovely City - but as they point out, the citizens could never

have imagined the events of the next 50 years.

I visited Berlin in 1965 - driving-up the autobahn and being frequently stopped for the car to be searched and

mirrors put underneath to see if refugees were hiding. The City was in the process of being re-built, however, much

of it was still in ruins from the bombing. You have to think - all so pointless and needless...........

[IrishGunner]

Berlin is my most favorite city of Europe. Probably because I was posted there 83-86 and explored almost every nook and cranny of West Berlin and many in East Berlin. I've been back many, many times over the past 30 years and have enjoyed watching it's genesis. But I still wonder what it must have been like at the turn of the century.

[TacHel]

But I still wonder what it must have been like at the turn of the century.

Me too... Walking the streets of Wiesbaden and seeing all of the history undamaged by war, I can only imagine all that was lost for ever in Berlin, Dresden...

[Dave Danner]

Here is some of the earliest color film ever produced, from the 1913 wedding in Berlin of Viktoria Luise of Prussia to Ernst August, Duke of Braunschweig. A lot of Garde-Kavallerie and the Schlossgarde-Kompagnie. When I was in Germany last year, I saw this also in a documentary about Germany on the eve of war. There was also some other B&W footage and a recording of the declaration of mobilization, which may be the only sound recording of the Kaiser.