Isted Lion - Berlin

Berlin

In 1864, war returned to the region, culminating in the German victory in the Battle of Dybbøl. In the following peace settlement, Denmark surrendered both Schleswig and Holstein, leaving the monument on the German side of the new border.

Following the occupation of Flensburg by German forces, German nationalists attacked the monument and tried to topple it. They succeeded in removing the tail and part of the lion's back but failed to destroy the statue due to the intervention of German authorities.

The Prime Minister of Prussia, Otto von Bismarck, ordered the monument to be dismantled, and its parts were originally stored in the courtyard of the Schleswig Estates in Flensburg. In 1867, the lion and the four reliefs were moved to Berlin at the order of Generalfeldmarschall Friedrich Graf von Wrangel.

The reassembled lion was erected in the Zeughaus (Arsenal) in Berlin on February 9, 1868. Following the transformation of the arsenal into a military museum in 1875, the lion was transported to the Cadet Academy in Lichterfelde, and erected there in April 1878. The lion remained there for more than 60 years.

In 1874, a zinc copy of the monument was erected in Berlin in a public park, Schweiz, near the Colonie Alsen association of war veterans. This monument was paid for by banker Wilhelm Conrad. A path leading up to the statue was fittingly dubbed, Straße zum Löwen, i.e. the Road to the Lion. On the copy, the reliefs of the four Danish officers were replaced with a single image of the German officer Prince Frederick Charles of Prussia, in effect reversing the meaning of the original monument. In 1938, the Danish press reported the existence of the copy of the historic monument, and at roughly the same time, the zinc copy was moved to Heckeshorn near the Wannsee, where it remains today. This location is close to the building housing what would later be known as the Wannsee Conference. The statue in Berlin was repaired in 2005.