History of Münster

He built his church and cloister on the right bank of the Aa, on the height called the Horsteberg: it was the monastery ("monasterium") from which Münster derives its name.

[1] In August 1532, radical Protestants under the leadership of the former Lutheran priest Bernt Rothmann and the cloth merchant and magistrate Bernhard Knipperdolling took control of all of Münster's churches, with the exception of the Bishop's cathedral.

John of Leiden believed he would lead the elect from Münster to capture the entire world and purify it of evil with the sword in preparation of Jesus's Second Coming and the beginnings of a New Age.

However, after a lengthy siege, with associated high mortality due to famine and disease, the town fell to Bishop Franz von Waldeck and his Imperial allies on July 24, 1535.

In 1780 the University of Münster (official name: German "Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität") was established, now a major European centre for excellence in education and research with large faculties in the arts, humanities, theology, sciences, business and law.

The headquarters controlled military operations in Münster, Essen, Düsseldorf, Wuppertal, Bielefeld, Coesfeld, Paderborn, Herford, Minden, Detmold, Lingen, Osnabrück, Recklinghausen, Gelsenkirchen, and Cologne.

The Bishop of Münster in the 1940s was Cardinal Clemens August Graf von Galen, one of the most prominent critics of the Nazi government.