Wenceslaus mine

The Wenceslaus Mine (Wenceslaus-Grube, also Wenzeslaus-Grube) was a bituminous coal mine in Mölke, now part of Ludwikowice Kłodzkie, in Lower Silesia. It belonged to the Neurode (now Nowa Ruda) coal district and developed into the largest colliery in the Neurode field before the First World War.^[1][2][3] The mine is chiefly remembered for the carbon-dioxide disaster of 9 July 1930 at the Kurt Shaft near Hausdorf (Jugów), in which 151 miners were killed.^[4][5]

Coal mining in the Hausdorf–Mölke area predated the formal development of the Wenceslaus Mine. A Hausdorf coal working was drained by an adit in 1752, and another pit was opened in 1754 by means of a 20 m shaft. Attempts to improve drainage and ventilation with a further adit were abandoned during the Seven Years' War in 1760.^[6]

Under the revised mining ordinance for Silesia and the County of Kladsko, Wenceslaus at Hausdorf appears among the district's legally recorded coal mines by 1768–1769.^[6][3] In 1769, it was one of only four active coal mines in the Neurode district; together these four mines employed about 35 people and produced roughly 1,400 t of coal annually.^[3]

During the 19th century, the Wenceslaus Mine grew from a small adit-and-shaft operation into one of the principal collieries of the Neurode field. A fragment of the mine's seam map reproduced by Zygfryd Piątek shows the Wenceslaus seam being worked above the adit level at +460 m through the adit and the flat shafts Theresie, Bohr and Rudolph.^[3]

By 1858, Wenceslaus was one of ten remaining coal mines in the district and among the four that already produced more than 10,000 t annually.^[3] In 1865, the mine was operated by the Gewerkschaft Wenzeslaus, which later expanded its holdings by acquiring smaller mines in Strausseney and by opening new shafts elsewhere in the Neurode field.^[3]

Technical modernization accelerated toward the end of the century. Like the other major mines of the district, Wenceslaus adopted steam-powered hoisting, improved shaft construction and more systematic underground haulage.^[3] By 1910, a modern coal-preparation plant was in operation at the mine.^[3]

By 1912, Wenceslaus had become the dominant colliery of the Neurode district. It had seven shafts, of which two were used for hoisting, and had reached a hoisting depth of 350 m.^[3] In that year it employed 2,283 workers and produced 564,966 t of coal, more than the combined annual output of the district's other three principal mines except Ruben and far above the output of Rudolph and Johann Baptista.^[3]

Piątek describes the Wenceslaus Mine as the outstanding mine of the district in 1914, with an annual production of about 564,000 t, roughly one and a half times the combined output of the other Neurode mines.^[3]

On 9 July 1930, a carbon-dioxide outburst occurred in the Kurt Shaft workings near Hausdorf. The disaster killed 151 miners and became one of the worst mining catastrophes in the history of the Neurode coalfield.^[4][5] The event received national attention in Germany; the Reichstag formally recorded an expression of sympathy on 10 July 1930.^[4]

The mine was shut down on 28 January 1931 amid financial difficulties following the disaster.^[7][5] By October 1931, contemporary reporting described the pit as already idle and noted efforts by local miners to save it through their own funds.^[5]

After negotiations involving Prussian and Reich authorities, the mine was restarted on 29 July 1933 by the miners' Betriebsgemeinschaft Wenceslaus-Grube.^[8] The renewed operation did not solve its long-term economic problems. According to the contemporary administrative record discussed by Horst-Alfons Meißner, full production was maintained only until 31 March 1939, after which the winding-down phase began and final closure followed later that year.^[8]

• 1930 Hausdorf mining disaster

• Eufrozyna Piątek; Zygfryd Piątek: Der Steinkohlenbergbau bei Neurode (Nowa Ruda) in der vorindustriellen Periode. In: Der Anschnitt, vol. 41 (1989), no. 6, pp. 205–212.
• Zygfryd Piątek: Der Steinkohlenbergbau im Neuroder Land von der Mitte des 18. Jahrhunderts bis 1914. In: Der Anschnitt, vol. 57 (2005), no. 2–3, pp. 80–90.