Wauwilermoos

Wauwilermoos observation tower
Basic data
Place:	Egolzwil
Canton:	Lucerne
Country:	Switzerland
Altitude :	498  m
Coordinates: 47 ° 10 '22.5 "  N , 8 ° 1' 6.2"  E ; CH1903:  643953  /  224825
Use:	Observation tower
Accessibility:	Observation tower open to the public
Tower data
Construction time :	2016
Construction costs : 350,000 CHF Building material : Wood
Total height :	29.6  m
Viewing platform:	27.0  m
Position map
Wauwilermoos observation tower

The moorland plain of the Wauwilermoos es (the former Wauwilersee) lies in the area of ​​the Lucerne communities Egolzwil , Ettiswil , Mauensee , Schötz and Wauwil in Switzerland . Its paleolithic - Neolithic ( colloquially Old-Neolithic ) bank settlements are under cultural property protection .

history

Peat extraction

Peat has been mined in the area since the 1820s . In the middle of the 19th century the lake was finally drained and the first Stone Age settlements were found. Over 100 stone age sites are now known.

Interned prison camp Wauwilermoos

During the Second World War , a prison camp for internees was run in this area , in which interned Allied soldiers had to serve sentences for attempted escape or other offenses. The Wauwilermoos internment prison camp was, along with Hünenberg and Les Diablerets, one of three internment prison camps that existed in Switzerland during the Second World War. In addition, regular internment camps existed at least temporarily in more than every sixth place in Switzerland.

The untenable conditions were later described by numerous inmates at the time (see web links and literature), but various contemporary reports and studies hardly led to improvements.

After the commander of the interned prison camp, Captain André Béguin , was acquitted in a first trial on suspicion of espionage in 1942, he was sentenced to three and a half years in prison in 1946 for various offenses such as fraud, embezzlement, forgery of official files or non-compliance with service regulations.

Wauwilermoos prison

Since 1947 there has been a prison again in Wauwilermoos . In the half-open asylum, which was newly built in 1979–1983, prison sentences are carried out. Since 2010, the Wauwilermoos prison has also served as a deportation prison.

Refinery project

A crude oil refinery planned as a Mittelland refinery in the 1960s was not realized for political, but especially for economic reasons. The project was finally discontinued in the 1980s.

Stilt houses

During excavations in Wauwilermoos, archaeologists discovered the remains of important pile dwellings . 17,000 BC BC there were three lakes in this area, which silted up over time except for the still existing Mauensee .

Observation tower

In 2016 the old observation tower was replaced by a new wooden tower built on stilts. 30 steps lead to the viewing platform at a height of 7 meters.

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  Stairs

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  Viewing platform

literature

• An overview of the archaeological research with numerous literature:
  • Jakob Bill: The Wauwil Plain as a settlement area from the Neolithic to the Romans. In: Mitteilungen der Naturforschenden Gesellschaft Luzern, 36, 1999, pp. 49–66.
• To the warehouse:
  • Erich Aschwanden: prison camp of horror. In: Neue Zürcher Zeitung, November 2, 2015.
  • Hilmar Gernet: The hell of the Wauwilermoos prison camp. In: Luzerner Zeitung , May 20, 1995, pp. 50–51
  • Hilmar Gernet: Crimes and Suffering in the Interned Penal Camp Wauwilermoos (1941–1945) . In: Heimatkunde Wiggertal , Vol. 53, 1995, pp. 61–78. ( Digitized version )
  • Alois Hodel: «Emergency landing» - the film about the interned prison camp in Wauwilermoos . In: Heimatkunde Wiggertal , Vol. 73, 2016, pp. 153–159. ( Digitized version )
  • Peter Kamber: Shots at the liberators. Switzerland's «air guerrilla» against the Allies 1943–1945. Rotpunktverlag, Zurich 1993 (including detailed information on Commander André Béguin, especially pp. 196–228).
• Reports from internees:
  • Charles Bergmann: Wauwilermoos. Truthful records of my internment. Basel 1947.
  • Daniel L. Culler: Black hole of Wauwilermoos: an airman's story. Circle of Thorns Press, Green Valley 1995, ISBN 188777601X .
  • Wauwilermoos prison camp , on the website of the US Swiss Internees Association
  • Daniel Wyss: Wauwilermoos: Prisoner Camp in the Lucerne Central Plateau . SRF, October 27, 2015.
  • Wauwilermoos ( Memento from May 1, 2002 in the Internet Archive ), on the website of the grandson of a former internee.
• About the oil refinery and other projects:
  • Martin Merki: The refined nature was stronger than the refinery. In: Lucerne Calendar 2001, pp. 69–73.

See also

• List of cultural assets in Egolzwil
• List of cultural assets in Ettiswil
• List of cultural assets in Mauensee
• List of cultural assets in Schötz
• List of cultural assets in Wauwil

Web links

• Wauwilermoos prison
• Daniel Wyss: Emergency landing . SRF Doc of April 27, 2016
• Pfahlbausiedlung Wauwil on pfahlbausiedlung.ch
• Jakob Bill: Wauwilermoos. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland .

Individual evidence

1. ^ Georges Schild: The internment of military and civilians in Switzerland 1939-1946 . Bern 2016, p. 180-210 .
2. ↑ Peter Kamber: Shots at the liberators. Switzerland's «air guerrilla» against the Allies 1943–45 . Zurich 1993, p. 196-205 .
3. ↑ Archived copy ( memento of the original from April 11, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 

and display information about the image

360 ° panorama from the observation tower Wauwilermoos