Pauluskirche, Lutheran church in Duesternbrook, Kiel, Germany

Pauluskirche is a church located in Duesternbrook with a prominent 55-meter tower rising from a 22-meter hill that creates a striking silhouette on the skyline. The structure serves as a navigation landmark visible from the Kiel Fjord and is even marked on nautical charts.

Construction took place from 1878 to 1882 when it was built as a garrison chapel for the Prussian naval base at Kiel. The building transitioned from military use after 1918 to become a parish church serving the local community.

The church holds memorial tablets for naval losses from 1849 to 1913, including actions in the German colonies. A grey marble plaque beside the entrance names four crew members of the airship L 1, which crashed in 1913. In the north aisle, a 1965 Heiligengeist parish memorial commemorates military and civilian victims of both world wars.

The church grounds are reached by car via a relatively steep driveway branching off Kirchenstraße between house numbers 7 and 9. The north portal offers step-free access, and wheelchair-accessible toilets are available in the neighbouring parish house, the Paulus-Pavillon.

The surviving 1659 bell, cast in Frankfurt/Oder, came to Kiel from the Hamburg bell cemetery after 1945, not after World War I. It weighs 590 kg, measures 115 cm across and sounds the note gis'. Two further bells were cast in 1964 by F.W. Schilling in Heidelberg, weighing 904 kg and 420 kg.