November 9 has been the date of several important events in German history. The term Schicksalstag (Destiny day) has been occasionally used by historians and journalists since shortly after World War II, but its current widespread use started with the events of 1989 when virtually all German media picked up the term.
There are five major events in German history that are connected to November 9:
- 1848: After being arrested in the Vienna revolts, liberal leader Robert Blum is executed. The execution is often seen as a symbolic event for the ultimate failure of the Revolutions of 1848 in the German states.
- 1918: Monarchy in Germany ends when Kaiser Wilhelm II is dethroned in the November Revolution. Philipp Scheidemann proclaims the Weimar Republic from a window of the Reichstag. Two hours later Karl Liebknecht proclaims a "Free Socialist Republic" from a balcony of the Berliner Stadtschloss. Der 9. November (The Ninth of November) is the title of a novel by Bernhard Kellermann published in Germany that told the story of the German insurrection of 1918.
- 1923: The Beer Hall Putsch (8–9 November) marks the emergence of the Nazi Party as an important player on Germany's political landscape.
- 1938: In the Kristallnacht, (9–10 November) synagogues and Jewish property are burned and destroyed on a large scale. More than 1,300 Jews are killed.
- 1989: The fall of the Berlin Wall ends German separation and starts a series of events that ultimately lead to the German reunification and the Fall of Communism in eastern Europe. November 9 was considered as the date for German Unity Day, but as it was also the anniversary of Kristallnacht, this date was considered inappropriate as a national holiday. The date of the formal reunification of Germany, 3 October 1990, therefore, was chosen as the date for the holiday instead.
- The establishment of the SS in 1925 is sometimes mentioned as having taken place on 9 November as well.
Famous quotes containing the words november, german and/or history:
“Necessity makes women very weak or very strong, and pent-up rivers are sometimes dangerous. Look to it!”
—Mary Worthington, U.S. women’s magazine contributor. The Lily, p. 183 ( November 1856)
“Frankly, I do not like the idea of conversations to define the term “unconditional surrender.” ... The German people can have dinned into their ears what I said in my Christmas Eve speech—in effect, that we have no thought of destroying the German people and that we want them to live through the generations like other European peoples on condition, of course, that they get rid of their present philosophy of conquest.”
—Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945)
“The disadvantage of men not knowing the past is that they do not know the present. History is a hill or high point of vantage, from which alone men see the town in which they live or the age in which they are living.”
—Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874–1936)