Horchheim gate attachment

Remains of the Horchheim gate fortifications at the Ehrenbreitsteiner Hafen in Koblenz

The railway viaduct, the north access to the Pfaffendorfer bridge on the Pfaffendorfer side

The Horchheim gate fortification was part of the Prussian fortress Koblenz and belonged to the Niederehrenbreitstein system . It was built in 1864–1867 to secure the Pfaffendorfer railway bridge. After the partial razing in 1927 and further modifications to the Rhine bridge in the mid-1930s, only small remains of the gate fortifications in what is now Koblenz 's Pfaffendorf district have survived.

history

After the construction of the Pfaffendorfer railway bridge with its bridge towers in 1862–1864, it was to be included in the fortification of Koblenz along with the Ehrenbreitsteiner port adjacent to the north. To this end, the Horchheim gate fortifications with a casemated battery and a fortification line with a crenellated wall between the bank of the Rhine and the Glockenberg plant were built on the new Rhine bridge . With the extension of the right-hand Rhine route towards Cologne , the Pfaffendorfer railway bridge was branched off to the north in 1869. The viaduct cut through the Horchheim gate fortifications.

After the First World War , this complex, like the other fortress works in Koblenz, had to be softened in accordance with Article 180 of the Versailles Treaty . However, the destruction was kept comparatively low. Only the caponier , a hollow crossbeam and the railway passage including powder magazine 2 were planned for the maintenance of the remaining parts, in the opinion of the Koblenz Entfestungsamt, aesthetic reasons, as the landscape wanted to be preserved in the immediate vicinity of the Rhine. Work on the fortification began on April 19 and was reported as finished on August 30, 1927. The main building including the horse stable, a semicircular tower that was leased to the Pfaffendorf community, the railway viaduct, which was rented for storage and living space, and the two bridge piers have been preserved.

Since the Reich had only exercised rights of use here, the site was returned to the Reichsbahn in 1930 . The entire area was extensively redesigned in 1935/36 as part of the conversion of the Pfaffendorfer Bridge to a road bridge, during which the remains were largely removed. Some of the quarry stones obtained in the process were reused for the new construction of the bridge connection. The viaduct, the connection to the port and the remains of the powder magazine 1, which were discovered in 1990 during the construction work for the Glockenberg tunnel at the so-called bottleneck , but could not be preserved due to the severely damaged building structure, have been preserved.

On October 1, 2008, the ramp leading from the north to the Pfaffendorfer Bridge, which leads over the former railway viaduct, was closed to traffic due to the acute risk of collapse. After the damage had been temporarily repaired, this area was released on November 27, 2009. Since the Pfaffendorfer bridge itself is also damaged, a completely new construction of the Rhine crossing is planned for 2017.

construction

The Horchheim gate fastening was essentially composed of a three-story casemated gate battery, a connecting wall with a watchtower (round tower) to the port, two powder magazines and a caponier on the connection line to the Glockenberg plant . The connection to this work was made by means of a stairway connection with a ditch in front of it, the so-called devil's staircase . There was a moat in the middle of the staircase. From 1869 the northern route to the right Rhine stretch ran on a viaduct through the fortification.

Monument protection

The remains of the Horchheim gate fortification are a protected cultural monument according to the Monument Protection Act (DSchG) and entered in the list of monuments of the state of Rhineland-Palatinate . They are located in Koblenz-Pfaffendorf on the Pfaffendorfer Bridge .

The remains of the Horchheim gate fortifications have been part of the Upper Middle Rhine Valley UNESCO World Heritage Site since 2002 .

literature

• Matthias Kellermann: The Prussian fortress Koblenz and Ehrenbreitstein. On the history of the fortifications on the right bank of the Rhine , 3rd edition, Koblenz 2014. ISBN 978-3-934795-63-1 .
• Klaus T. Weber (dissertation): The Prussian fortifications of Koblenz (1815–1834) . (Series: Kunst- und Kulturwissenschaftliche Forschungen) 2003, ISBN 3-89739-340-9 , p. 260.
• Rüdiger Wischemann: The Koblenz Fortress. From the Roman fort and Prussia's strongest fortress to the largest garrison of the German armed forces , Koblenz 1978 (note: outdated in many ways, but still the best representation for an overview).
• Ulrike Weber (edit.): Cultural monuments in Rhineland-Palatinate. Monument topography Federal Republic of Germany. Volume 3.3: City of Koblenz. Districts. Werner, Worms 2013, ISBN 978-3-88462-345-9 .

Web links

Commons : Horchheimer Torbefestigung  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

1. ↑ See Koblenzer General-Anzeiger No. 8, 11./12. January 1936, page 1, 2nd sheet: The demolition work on Horchheimer Tor .
2. ↑ See Rhein-Zeitung No. 253, October 31/1. November 1990, page 25: vault and abutment discovered and no. 214, 14./15. September 1991, p. 17: Use of the vault completely impossible .
3. ↑ Brückenstraße will be released again on Friday in: Rhein-Zeitung , 25 November 2009
4. ↑ Pfaffendorfer Bridge: New construction instead of renovation? in: Rhein-Zeitung , October 5, 2013
5. ↑ Wischemann, Fortress Koblenz, page 72f.
6. ^ General Directorate for Cultural Heritage Rhineland-Palatinate (ed.): Informational directory of cultural monuments - district-free city of Koblenz. Mainz 2020, p. 32 (PDF; 6.5 MB).

Coordinates: 50 ° 21 ′ 8.9 ″  N , 7 ° 36 ′ 27 ″  E