Kopalnia Węgla Kamiennego Pstrowski
The coal mine Pstrowski (Polish Kopalnia Węgla Kamiennego Pstrowski; German Hedwigswunschgrube ) is a disused coal mine north of Zabrze , Poland .
history
As the illustration on the right shows, all mines in the north of Zabrze had the name Pstrowski since 1975 , but only a small part of this huge mining area of 66 km² was associated with the name Hedwigswunsch from the start .
The other pictures show the merger of the mines in the north of Zabrze up to the unification of all plants under the name Pstrowski .
Hedwig's wish
The three mine fields in Biskupice, a district of Zabrze, "Gute Hedwig", "Bertawunsch", "Anna-Maria II" and "Hedwigswunsch" belonged to the Ballestrem family , but were initiated by the industrialist August Borsig and his son Albert consolidated into the Hedwigswunsch mine in 1855 and leased to the Borsigs on a long-term basis (until 1932). In previous years, extensive test bores had been carried out in the fields mentioned and were awarded to Count Ballestrem in 1854/55. The aim of the lease by August Borsig and his son was to create an industrial center in Biskupice based on local raw materials.
The mine had an entitlement of 3.47 km² and was opened up from 1856 through the two shafts "Luise" (Teufbeginn 1856; 257 m) and "Albert" (Teufbeginn 1864; first name "Doppelschacht"). Due to considerable problems when sinking the shafts, production only reached 115,553 tons in 1864. In 1876, the “August” (245 m) shaft was added. The coal was initially delivered to neighboring smelting works and other customers.
On February 25, 1897, a mine fire spread in the colliery, as a result of which a group of experts investigating the fire died. Although several construction sites were cordoned off, the fire smoldered for a whole year. It was only after the fire had gone out, numerous modernizations and the replacement of wooden fixtures with fireproof ones, that production could be resumed.
The colliery with the neighboring Ludwigsglück mine , which had also initially belonged to Ballestrem's possession and had also come to the Borsigwerke, was also weather-wise. First for the backfilling with sand, later also for the extraction of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd level, the "Arnoldschacht" was added in 1911 with a depth of 170 m.
At that point the situation was as follows:
- Conveyor shafts were
- Albert with 260 m (double funding; cable ride; moving weather shaft) and
- August with 244 m (rope ride; moving in)
- further day shafts
- Luise 260 m (extending weather shaft)
- East 281 m (moving out)
- Arnold (212 m) and
- Euling 260 m.
Because the partition of Upper Silesia in 1922 cut off numerous iron and steel works from their coal base, which is now in Poland, Hedwigswunsch was able to meet the increased demand by increasing production. In 1929 the mine employed 2,930 people (2,883 of them underground) and its annual production was 1,700,674 tons.
In 1931 the mine had 16 steam engines with a total output of 3977 HP, 8 steam turbines with a total output of 4027 HP, 310 electric motors with a total output of 9528 HP, 6 compressors with a capacity of 39,140 m³ per hour. After production had increased to 1.7 million tons by 1929, the difficult global economic situation in the phase from 1929 to 1933 resulted in a significant downturn and a slow recovery in the following years.
In 1931 the brothers Ernst and Konrad Borsig sold “Borsigwerke AG” to “Schering AG”, which already owned numerous mines, coking plants and chemical factories in Lower and Upper Silesia. On September 1, 1932, the Ludwigsglück and Gleiwitzer Grube mines were added and formed part of the “Borsig-Kokswerke GmbH”. Until 1938, however, the Ballestrem heirs remained the owners of the mine; only then did they finally sell the mine to Borsig-Kokswerke.
During the Second World War, the mine continued to belong to the Borsig coke works based in Zabrze and, in addition to the hard coal mining, also operated lead mining. In 1943, 2,778 people were employed and 1,667,252 tons were extracted.
CHP Jadwiga
From 1945 to 1948 the mine was called Jadwiga before it was named on May 1, 1948 in honor of Vincent Pstrowski. The role of Pstrowki, who also worked as a miner on Jadwiga, is controversial. Some see in him a person who has massively increased the productivity of the mine, others claim that through him the plan requirements for the miners have been increased immensely and that he has thereby contributed significantly to the exploitation of his own class.
CHP Pstrowski
Because the colliery had clearly been “worn out” during the war years, extensive investments were necessary immediately after the restoration of Polish sovereignty. So the seam 620 was excavated underground and a new lamp room and a new processing facility were built above ground . They also started to extract the coal from the pillars of safety that had been left standing.
From 1962 onwards, coal extraction was largely automated, both in terms of cutting and loading. Despite this mechanization, production fell to 610,000 tons in 1972.
After the "Franticzek" shaft had already been slammed into the Rokitnica mine on January 1, 1953 and depletion of the stocks became apparent, it was merged with all other mines in northern Zabrze on January 1, 1973 under the name Pstrowski . As a result of this merger, the largest mine in Poland was created with an area of 75 km² and 13 shafts. The “Gigant” shaft, sunk in 1953 on the Rokitnica site, became the central shaft. The bottom was 1,160 meters.
The closure of the mine
When the mine suffered a loss of 99.3 billion old złoty (equivalent to about 2.45 million euros) between May and December 1993, two commissions were set up to assess the economic future of the large mine. They found that all thick and also the middle seams of Group 500 had been mined and that the remaining layers were only between 1 m and 1.5 m thick.
The numerous social obligations that the colliery faced proved problematic. In 1989 she owned over 6,000 apartments, 7 kindergartens, 8 day nurseries, 2 sports halls, 2 swimming pools, a theater, 3 stadiums and the like. v. a. m. As important as this commitment was, it was a burden on the mine’s overall balance sheet through “unproductive” expenses.
Despite these responsibilities, the decision was made on April 1, 1994 to shut down the mine. The shutdown was completed on June 30, 1997.
Funding figures
1862: 1,200 t; 1872: 279,800 t; 1913: 1.03 million t; 1929: 1.70 million t; 1938: 1.69 million t; 1975: 3.3 million t; 1979: 2.29 million t; 1985: 1.2 million t
Remarks
- ↑ The idea for this sequence of images is taken from the work of Zbigniew Barecki (p. 4). It differs from the template in some points.
- ^ Reclaw. Przemysł górnego Śląska. P. 173
- ↑ . P. 194.
- ↑ Yearbook Oberbergamt, p. 195.
- ^ Reclaw. Przemysł górnego Śląska. P. 175
- ↑ Yearbook Oberbergamt, p. 175.
- ↑ This section is a summary of the chapter "Likwidacja Kopalni 1994-2000" from the work of Zbigniew Barecki. P. 10 ff.
swell
- Zbigniew Barecki: Zakończenie eksploatacji węgla przez skonsolidowaną Kopalnię “Pstrowski” w Zabrzu . PDF file and transcription into a text file without images on the Internet at http://docplayer.pl/11294121-Zakonczenie-eksploatacji-wegla-przez-skonsolidowana-kopalnie-pstrowski-w-zabrzu.html (last accessed October 16, 2016)
- Jerzy Jaros: Słownik historyczny kopalń węgla na ziemiach polskich . Katowice 1984.
- Kurt König: The coal mining in Upper Silesia from 1945–1955 . Scientific contributions to the history and regional studies of Eastern Central Europe. Published by the Johann Gottfried Herder Institute. Marburg 1958.
- Damian Recław: Przemysł górnego śsląska na dawnej fotografii . Muzeum w Gliwice, 2015.
- Bernard Szczech: Kopalnia Hedwigswunsch (Jadwiga) . The report in Polish can be found on the Internet at http://www.zabrze.aplus.pl/dzielnice_zabrza_zabrze_biskupice_koncern_borsiga.html (accessed on December 20, 2015)
- The Silesian Mines 1938 . Published by the Prussian Mining Authority in Breslau. Publishing house NS-Druckerei, Breslau.
- Yearbook for the Upper Mining District Wroclaw . Phoenix Publishing House. Katowice, Breslau, Berlin. 1913. Digitized version at http://www.dbc.wroc.pl/dlibra/publication?id=3349&tab=3 before (last accessed on May 5, 2015)
Web link
- 43 Flötz maps (sic) of the Upper Silesian coal basin . JPG files showing field boundaries, seams and manholes after the inventory from 1902 in excellent quality. These cards were made by the “Verlag von Priebatsch's Buchhandlung. Breslau ”published.
Coordinates: 50 ° 19 ′ 51.9 ″ N , 18 ° 50 ′ 2.5 ″ E