Mining near Hain-Gründau

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Pits near Hain-Gründau
General information about the mine
Heilwigis Hain mine Gründau.jpg
Halden of two shafts of the Heilwigis mine
other names Heilwigis, Gruben am Kreischberg, Gruben Fuchshecke, Gruben Wolfsgraben
Information about the mining company
Start of operation before 1400
End of operation circa 1867
Funded raw materials
Degradation of copper
Geographical location
Coordinates 50 ° 15 '9.2 "  N , 9 ° 7' 37"  E Coordinates: 50 ° 15 '9.2 "  N , 9 ° 7' 37"  E
Pits near Hain-Gründau (Hesse)
Pits near Hain-Gründau
Location pits near Hain-Gründau
Location Hain-Gründau
local community Gründau
District ( NUTS3 ) Main-Kinzig district
country State of Hesse
Country Germany

Mining area (outlined in blue)

Mining on copper and, to a lesser extent, on silver took place near Hain-Gründau in a broad area at the foot of the Großer Reffenkopf north and northwest of the village. There were numerous documented mining periods between (at the latest) 1400 and the 19th century, which were interrupted by numerous breaks in operation.

Deposit

The deposit contains 30 to 50 cm thick seams of copper lettuce and copper shale and contains copper - arsenic - sulfides ( tennantite , enargite , silver- bearing ), copper- iron sulfides ( copper pyrites , bornite ) and arsenides ( lollingite , arsenic pebbles ).

The geological profile near Hain-Gründau is composed of the Großer Reffenkopf and the Kreischberg, which forms the western flank, as follows (from top to bottom):

Layer thickness rock
25 m fine-grain lower red sandstone
60 m lower red sandstone, crumbly slate
15 m Lime marl , clay slate
20 m greenish gray, also yellow marl slate
3 to 5 m Zechstein limestone, dolomitic
1 to 3 m bituminous marl shale, thinly layered
0.3 to 0.5 m black-brown copper laths, with a higher lime content copper slate
underneath Zechstein conglomerate

1400 to 1500

Copper mining in Hain-Gründau was first mentioned in a document in 1400 - together with copper mining in Hailer further south . The town register of the town of Gelnhausen records that the noble family Wickern von Selbold operates mining and the Schandelmühle (today: Wackermühle in Altenhaßlau) had been converted into a smelter.

The mining operations soon came to a halt, but was likely to resume. It was not until 1490 that news came out, when Archbishop Berthold of Mainz assured all active mines in and in front of the Spessart mountain freedom.

1610 to 1656 - Counts of Ysenburg and Büdingen

Shaft extraction in the 16th and 17th centuries

From 1610 at the latest, Count Wolfgang Ernst I von Ysenburg operated mines in Hain-Gründau and in neighboring Hailer . In 1610 the first smelter was already in operation near Hain-Gründau, which melted down not only local copper ores but also those from Cleeberg in the Taunus (Silbersegen mine near Espa ). The exact location of the hut is unknown, Köbrich reports that it stood between Hain-Gründau and Gettenbach , near the old mill in Lage . From 1615 the managers ( Steiger and administrators ) from Ilmenau , Schmalkalden and Mansfeld were recruited, the miners and huts came from the surrounding area. With the beginning of the Thirty Years' War in 1618, the copper prices fell and mining was no longer profitable, the rulers of Ysenburg kept the company going for a few years, although it did not make a profit. Count Wolfgang Ernst died in 1633. In addition, the Hessian War reached Hain-Gründau in the years 1633 to 1635, which led to severe devastation and dramatic losses among the population. Around 1635, a plague epidemic struck the region, causing devastating loss of life. War and plague caused over 60% of the region's residents to die. As a result of all three events, mining ceased in the mid-1630s. The war events lead to the destruction of the place, which is why it had to be rebuilt in another place 8 years after the end of the war (see: The Thirty Years War and the destruction of the village ).

Starting in 1656, the site was rebuilt. At the same time, after a long break, there was an attempt to start mining again. This was unsuccessful because too high investments should have been made.

1680 to 1700 - First Ysenburg trade union

From 1680 interest in mining reawakened. In 1682 and 1683 the Counts of Ysenburg-Büdingen initiated extensive investigations, prospecting and experimental excavations were carried out. In 1697, the high investment costs and the low success meant that the counts no longer wanted to bear the financial risk alone. The Ysenburg union , consisting of 16 trades , was founded, which also operated the mines in Sommerkahl .

From 1699 two shafts reached the copper seam at a depth of 24 m, partly in the old man . Three miners from the region and a Steiger from Saxony did the work. The degradation was done by crooked neck work . The ores encountered turned out to be of good quality, so that the Kurmainzische Bergmeister Johann Georg Wild - who also managed the mines in Sommerkahl, undertook to visit and monitor the plant regularly. In November 1699, Peter Becker from Hanau was the second expert tester to visit the plant and also found it to be promising. The thickness of the ore is not very great, but the ores can be melted easily. Finally, in April 1700, the Saxon smeltery manager Georg Siegfried Trier from Ilmenau was brought in as the third external expert. He drove into the pits at Hain-Gründau and at Hailer and found the deposits to be good and recommended mining. He agreed to take over some of the Kuxe himself and manage the plant.

Melting furnace in the 16th and 17th centuries

Georg Siegfried Trier also provided the plans for a new smelter, this time directly east of Hain-Gründau. The smelting house to be built had a width of 42 shoes and a length of 56 shoes (about 14 m by 19 m), the furnace had a footprint of 35 times 8 shoes ( layer ), the hut went into operation in 1700.

1700 to 1702 - Second Ysenburg trade union

On July 1, 1700, the second Ysenburg union was granted a formal mining privilege; the individual provisions were based on the mining law of more important mining regions . The union had exclusive prospecting and extraction rights in Hain-Gründau and Hailer, and for all other places in the county they had a preferential right to metals and minerals over other people interested in mining. The pit was named after Count von Ysenburg-Meerholz Zum Georg Albrecht , and Steiger Schürbaum took over the supervision. The mine in Hain-Gründau was operated together with the mine in Hailer, 10 to 15 miners were employed on both mines . The smelting of the ore turned out to be technically very complex, as it was only possible to process the copper ore with expensive additives . The additional construction of a Saigerhütte for the extraction of cooked copper would have been necessary. The trades no longer wanted to finance this. As early as November 1, 1700, a contract was drawn up with the Trier mine manager, in which he undertook to sell the black copper elsewhere at minimum prices, and to pay an advance of 1,000 Reichstaler .

Trier mine manager immediately ran into financial difficulties, as the sale of the copper did not go as planned and the high advance could not be obtained. For these reasons, he tried his (former) superior to interest the Saxon mining captain Georg Christoph von Utterodt zu Scharfenberg on Schwarzhausen and Schmerbach in the mines. He visited the pits in 1701 and promised to lease them for 6 years from January 1, 1702, to finance all necessary buildings and to pay 325 Reichstaler annually for each furnace in operation. A short time later, probably in the autumn of 1701, negotiations stalled as he demanded new conditions that the Ysenburg counts refused to accept. There was permanently no agreement, so that the shafts and tunnels fell into disrepair in the years to come. Trier mine manager repeatedly offered his services, but it was unsuccessful.

1709 to 1713 - Leipzig trade union

In March 1709, Graflich Hanauische Bauverwalter Otto carried out a two-week melt test on the hut near Hain-Gründau. He used copper ore from the mines near Bieber . The result was found to be good.

From the summer of 1709, a union from Ilmenau applied for the loan of the mines at Hailer and Hain-Gründau.

In 1710, a newly founded union was commissioned by Count Ernst Casimir I zu Ysenburg-Büdingen-Büdingen and Georg Albrecht zu Ysenburg-Büdingen-Meerholz with the dismantling; it was not the trades in the offer from the previous year that were used, but Johann Wilhelm Dunckler, his son, Andreas Otto Mahn, and other people were named, most of whom probably came from Leipzig. High costs, renewed problems with smelting and disputes over smelting issues brought the business to a standstill as early as 1713 or 1714.

1716 to 1750s - temporary operation

From 1716 the smelter began to deteriorate. There were some applicants for mining, including a. from Frankfurt am Main (Christian Metzger, who also had shares in Silbersegen mine ), research work was carried out and new ore sites were reported. Documents from this period are largely missing. Operation took place around 1728, as can be seen from another deed of lending that expressly mentions the operation in Hain-Gründau. In the period from 1717 to 1746, the church records repeatedly mention individual residents with job titles that indicate active mining. How continuous it was and how great the business interruption is is not known.

1758 to 1773 - Third Ysenburg trade union

Not until 1758 did we find out more details, a third Ysenburg union was founded. Under the direction of the Hanau miner Johann Heinrich Cancrin, the father of Franz Ludwig Cancrin who was later also involved, and the mining administrator Otto Christoph Pauly (from Bieber), 17 shafts were sunk in the following five years , and at least one tunnel was excavated . Pits were operated on the Kreischberg (later referred to as the noise mountain), in the Wolfsgraben and on the Fuchshecke - all located north and northwest of Hain Gründau at the foot of the Reffenkopf. The average ore extraction was 3,200 quintals per year. The copper content of the ore recovered varied considerably between 1.5% and 8.5%.

The Hain-Gründauer ore was productive, from 157 quintals of ore 13¾ lot of silver , one quintal 61½ pounds of copper, three hundredweight of 79¼ pounds of lead were extracted; Funded from 17 shafts

As late as 1758 Cancrin carried out various enamel tests on the hut in Bieber, the hut in Hain-Gründau had long since fallen into complete disrepair. He came to the conclusion that the construction of a new smelter on site would not be economically viable, which is why all ores should be transported to Bieber to be smelted there. On June 24, 1759, a contract was signed between the Hain-Gründauer trade unions and the Bieberer Hütte, and the count's house and several of its officials took part in a new trade union. Regular operation takes place in the following years. The Seven Years War (1756 to 1763) did not bring mining to a standstill, but it did hinder it. A mine report from 1763 describes a tunnel in the "Craißberg" (= Kreischberg, later referred to as the noise mountain - on the western flank of the Reffenkopf), which had been driven 40 laughers (approx. 80 m) into the mountain. The ore there was four inches thick . A shaft also belonged to this tunnel operation. At that time, 3000 quintals of copper slate had already been extracted from the tunnel. Also elsewhere, in the "Im Wolfsgraben" pit, many thousands of hundredweight of copper slate have already been extracted. The copper content of both operating points is given as 4.5 to 5 pounds of copper and 3 solder of silver per hundredweight of copper shale. A tuscher produced 4 to 5 quintals of ore per shift. By 1768, 17 shafts had already been sunk.

In this year 1763 the mood between the counts in Büdingen and the mine operators Cancrin and Pauly began to darken. The counts complained that even after five years of successful operation, still no smelter had been built in the county and the ores still had to be shipped abroad to Bieber. In addition, the mine operators had neither paid the agreed tithe nor submitted a statement. They replied that the quality of the ores from Hain-Gründau did not allow them to operate their own smelter - they could only be used as a supplement to other ores. Only a mixture of one third of ore from Hain-Gründau with two thirds of ore from Bieber can be melted. The poor meltability of the ores also means that they have to sell the ores considerably below their value and therefore have to inject more than 1,800 guilders out of their own pockets. For this reason, they requested the remission of tithing.

As the quality of the ore improved at greater depths, Pauly proposed new investments in order to be able to mine the better quality ore with deeper shafts. Years of discussion followed, new smelting samples and around 1765 even the mayor of Hain-Gründau was ordered to stop all ore exports. However, this did not last long. In the meantime, the mistrust was deep and in 1767 the Count's House commissioned an external appraiser to test the ore quality. He reported that the ore could be smelted without surcharge.

Pit manager Cancrin died in April 1768 and his son took over the management with Pauly. In view of the years of disputes about the level of the copper content, the fusibility and allegations of fraud in ore deliveries, his son Franz Ludwig Cancrin did not want to continue the mine operation. In 1769 he began to offer all the mines for sale in secret. There were no interesting offers, so that in 1773 Franz Ludwig Cancrin put the mine up for sale in the "Europäische Zeitung". This was quickly noticed by the count's house and aroused great displeasure among the counts. There were allegations that Cancrin's father and Pauly had been overexploiting the entire enterprise to help the hut in Bieber. The Grafenhaus hastily hired an external expert who found only one of the former 20 shafts open, all the others had collapsed or filled up . The expert recommends that the mine operators withdraw the work. It is not known whether this happened. It is certain that from 1773 onwards all mining came to a standstill. In the 15 years of operation from 1758 to 1772 45,593 quintals of copper slate were mined, other estimates assume 167,896 quintals.

1770s to 1860s - last mining attempts

Another dismantling took place at the end of the 1770s, but there are hardly any traces of this in publications. It is only reported that regular and conscientious dismantling in shafts and routes took place until 1780. 12 to 16 men were employed in the scimitar company. Since most of the interesting copper shale ores lie below the Gründau river level and therefore no water- dissolving tunnel is possible, it is not worth operating. A pumping Art would have been necessary, but was not used.

New interest in the mines is only passed down from the year 1791, when the Saxon miner Gottlieb von Riedlofsky worked out an appraisal for the resumption of operations.

Only in 1855 there was new news, mountain manager Thomas Cobley from Butzbach applied for a coupon to be issued for the old mines. The responsible mining authority in Thalitter is positive.

As a result, Cobley will create two tunnels and four shafts. The test results are consistently positive. On May 8, 1857, Thomas Cobley and Wilhelm Julius Brewer (from Düsseldorf) were awarded the name "Grube Heilwigis", the name derives from an ancestor of the Ysenburg nobility, actually Helwig von Ysenburg - mentioned in a document around 1276 ". Under The work was continued under the company name "Vogelsberg-Spessart Mining Company." In August 1857, 30 men were working on the mine, and the work was stopped in May 1858. Since then, no further work has been carried out. The mine fell into the open and was not reopened until 1867 awarded (to Balthasar Emmerich from Gießen), of which no mining activity is known.

Current time

The copper-bearing layers of the Hain-Gründauer Zechstein formations with lead, nickel, bismuth , cobalt, iron, zinc, gypsum, limestone, rock salt and barite attracted many professors and students on excursions to the remains of tunnels and shafts in "Im Wolfsgraben" in the 20th century "," Kreischberg "and" Auf der Fuchshecke ".

Nowadays only a few traces of surface mining have survived. There are no building remains, but there are still pings of collapsed tunnels and shafts, for example: on the Kreischberg from the Heilwigis pit, well-preserved, up to 5 m high heaps with pits ( location , location , location , location ), as well as broken tunnel mouth holes ( location , Location ). Furthermore, the older pits at Wolfsgraben (approx. Location ) and Fuchshecke pits ( location ), which are hardly recognizable in the area .

The Laurentiuskirche, located near Hain-Gründau, was extensively rebuilt around 1610 (including a new bell tower, new baptismal font), exactly at the time when mining passed from union to princely hands. According to Slotta, it stands to reason that the church renovation is connected with the renewal of the mining activities of the Counts of Ysenburg - the Laurentiuskirche was or became a mountain church. There is no clear evidence of this.

Another messenger of the old mining is the silver exploitation thalers made from the ores of Hain-Gründau and Hailer , which are still preserved today and minted in 1618 .

literature

  • Klaus Freymann: Metal ore mining in the Spessart. Dissertation, Mineralogical Institute of the University of Würzburg, 1987, published by Geschichts- und Kunstverein Aschaffenburg e. V., 1991. ISBN 3-879-65054-3
  • Rainer Slotta: Technical monuments in the Federal Republic of Germany. Volume 4 / II Metal ore mining, German Mining Museum Bochum, 1983, pp. 396–401.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ C. Schumacher, F.-P.Schmidt: Kupferschieferexploration in Osthessen and Northern Bavaria . In: Erzmetall . tape 38 . Weinheim 1985, p. 428-432 .
  2. ^ Carl Köbrich: Hessian ore deposits. 1. The non-ferrous ores . tape 1 . Darmstadt 1936, p. 90 .
  3. ↑ Wacker mill, Main-Kinzig-Kreis, in: Historical Gazetteer. Historical local dictionary for Hessen. In: Landesgeschichtliches Informationssystem Hessen (LAGIS).
  4. ↑ a b Rainer Slotta: Technical monuments in the Federal Republic of Germany. Metal ore mining. Ed .: German Mining Museum. tape 4 / II . Bochum 1983, p. 396 .
  5. ↑ a b c d Carl Köbrich: Hessian ore deposits. 1. The non-ferrous ores . tape 1 . Darmstadt 1936, p. 92 .
  6. ^ Johann David Köhler: Weekly historical coin amusement: in it all kinds of remarkable and rare thalers, ducats, show pieces, other strange gold and silver coins. Issued: May 25, 1735 . C. Weigels, Nuremberg 1735, p. 167 ( google.de ).
  7. ^ A b Klaus Freymann: The metal ore mining in the Spessart . Dissertation, Mineralogical Institute of the University of Würzburg, 1987. Ed .: Geschichts- und Kunstverein Aschaffenburg eV 1991, ISBN 3-87965-054-3 , p. 45 .
  8. ^ Gerhard Hundt: On the history of copper slate mining near Hain-Gründau in Hessen . In: Journal for the mining, metallurgy and saltworks in the Prussian state . tape 82 , 1934, pp. 201-207 .
  9. ^ Klaus Freymann: The metal ore mining in the Spessart . Dissertation, Mineralogical Institute of the University of Würzburg, 1987. Ed .: Geschichts- und Kunstverein Aschaffenburg eV 1991, ISBN 3-87965-054-3 , p. 47 .
  10. ↑ a b c Carl Köbrich: Hessian ore deposits. 1. The non-ferrous ores . tape 1 . Darmstadt 1936, p. 91 .
  11. ^ Klaus Freymann: The metal ore mining in the Spessart . Dissertation, Mineralogical Institute of the University of Würzburg, 1987. Ed .: Geschichts- und Kunstverein Aschaffenburg eV 1991, ISBN 3-87965-054-3 , p. 51 .
  12. ↑ a b Carl Köbrich: Hessian ore deposits. 1. The non-ferrous ores . tape 1 . Darmstadt 1936, p. 93 .
  13. ↑ a b Karl Weinel: In Hain-Gründauer Erde there is a hodgepodge of metals - until a few years ago, a hut produced high-quality products from lime . In: Gelnhäuser Neue Zeitung (GNZ) . 3rd September 1994.
  14. ^ Heinrich P. Goebel: Copper and Silver in the Gründautal . In: Between Vogelsberg and Spessart (=  Gelnhauser Heimat-Jahrbuch ). 1986, p. 98 ff .
  15. ^ Heinrich P. Goebel: Kupfer und Silber im Gründautal (republication of the article from the Gelnhausen Heimat-Jahrbuch 1986) . In: Grindaha (annual edition of the Gründau eV history association) . tape 21 . Gründau 2011, p. 104 ff .
  16. ↑ a b c Carl Köbrich: Hessian ore deposits. 1. The non-ferrous ores . tape 1 . Darmstadt 1936, p. 94 .
  17. ^ Klaus Freymann: The metal ore mining in the Spessart . Dissertation, Mineralogical Institute of the University of Würzburg, 1987. Ed .: Geschichts- und Kunstverein Aschaffenburg eV 1991, ISBN 3-87965-054-3 , p. 69 - 71 and Tab. 16, p. 371 .
  18. ^ Carl Köbrich: Hessian ore deposits. 1. The non-ferrous ores . tape 1 . Darmstadt 1936, p. 95 .
  19. ↑ a b Carl Köbrich: Hessian ore deposits. 1. The non-ferrous ores . tape 1 . Darmstadt 1936, p. 96 .
  20. ^ August von Klipstein: Attempt at a geognostic representation of the copper slate mountains of the Wetterau and the Spessart . CW Leske, 1830, p. 55 - 56 ( google.de ).
  21. ↑ a b Rainer Slotta: Technical monuments in the Federal Republic of Germany. Metal ore mining. Ed .: German Mining Museum. tape 4 / II . Bochum 1983, p. 400 .
  22. ↑ Erwin Meyer: Mineral treasures in field names - supplements to the measuring table sheets (continuation from vol. 39, 1953) . 1953, p. 79 ( uni-giessen.de [PDF]).
  23. ↑ JW Chr. Steiner: Archives for Hessian history and antiquity . Ed .: Historical Association for Hesse. tape 1 . Darmstadt 1835, p. 445 ( google.de ).
  24. ^ Carl Köbrich: Hessian ore deposits. 1. The non-ferrous ores . tape 1 . Darmstadt 1936, p. 97 .
  25. ↑ Parish "Auf dem Berg" (Ed.): Chronicle of the Laurentius Church . Gründau ( yumpu.com ).
  26. ^ Rainer Slotta: Technical monuments in the Federal Republic of Germany. Metal ore mining. Ed .: German Mining Museum. tape 4 / II . Bochum 1983, p. 401 .
  27. ^ Johann David Köhler: Weekly historical coin amusement: in it all kinds of remarkable and rare thalers, ducats, show pieces, other strange gold and silver coins. Issued: May 25, 1735 . C. Weigels, Nuremberg 1735, p. 161 - 167 ( google.de ).