The first preserved written mention of the settlement dates from 1785. It represents the highest-situated part of Jáchymov, located along road II/219 towards Abertamy, about 4.5 kilometres from the town itself. The original names of the settlement were Werlsberg, Wernsberg or Wörlsberg.

The settlement originated as a miners’ colony towards the end of the first half of the 16th century in connection with the St. Barbara mine. Its name referred to the hill Wernsberg above the right bank of the Eliáš stream, on which the settlement was established. In 1785 it is first documented in writing as a separate locality belonging to Jáchymov, to which it remained administratively attached throughout its existence. Further references appear only during the 19th century.

It was a typical Ore Mountains dispersed mountain village covering about 0.52 km², with a greater concentration of houses only along the road from Jáchymov to Abertamy. In 1847, Sommer’s Topography of the Kingdom of Bohemia states that the settlement consisted of 20 houses. According to cadastral maps from 1842, however, five of these belonged to the Eliáš mine, which was administratively included under Werlsberg.

At the beginning of the 20th century, Werlsberg reached its maximum size with 33 registered addresses and around 220 inhabitants. This number included eight houses at Hřebečná on the road to Mrtvý rybník, referred to as New Werlsberg and numbered 21–28. The settlement then consisted of Werlsberg with 16 houses, the Eliáš mine with 6 houses, New Werlsberg with 8 houses, the forester’s lodge at Mrtvý rybník with 2 buildings, and the Werner mine with 1 building. At the end of the 19th century, a school was opened here and continued to operate during the First Czechoslovak Republic.

After 1945, the expulsion of the German population led to a dramatic depopulation of the settlement, which was further transformed by the beginning of uranium mining. In 1948, Werlsberg was renamed Vršek and the Barbara mine became part of the Jáchymov mines. A large mining complex gradually developed here, including a roughly 17-metre-high headframe with engine house, transformer station, administrative building, ventilation station, compressor plant connected to the central TURBO compressor station, workshops, warehouses and a radiometric sorting facility (RASS) imported from the Soviet Union, which automatically detected radioactive ore and separated it from waste rock.

A prison camp formed an integral part of the mine. The forced labour camp Vršek–Barbara was established in October 1949, abolished on 25 February 1951, and the site was transferred on 1 June 1951 from the Ministry of National Defence to the Ministry of Justice. In the summer of 1951, the Barbora camp was created here at an altitude of about 1004 metres, making it the highest-located camp of the Jáchymov uranium mines. Due to harsh climatic conditions and a strict regime, it was considered one of the harshest and most feared camps. It consisted of an administrative building and three prisoner barracks with an initial capacity of about 450 inmates, later apparently expanded to more than 800. The camp was closed on 30 March 1957 and the buildings were subsequently adapted for civilian mine workers.

After the mine closed, the site was used by the military. Units stationed here included a radiotechnical unit and Military Unit 5849, a non-commissioned officers’ school for medical instructors. The military remained until 1975, when the unit was transferred to Uherské Hradiště.

After the army left, the buildings were abandoned until 1991, when most were demolished. The last remnants disappeared in 2008. Today only the sealed Barbora shaft, the gatehouse and terrain remains of buildings survive, along with the present-day Pension H, adapted from a former mining building. On the opposite side of the road there was a waste heap of about 450,000 m³, most of which has recently been removed and used as aggregate, especially for forest roads.

Only a single house from the original residential settlement has survived and is now used for recreation.

The Barbara mine lay at the Barbora–Eva vein junction. In total, about 1,725 tonnes of uranium were extracted here. In 1955, the shaft reached a depth of 428 metres with nine levels. The most extensive level was formed by the Devil’s Adit, originally a silver adit from the 18th century. Other levels connected the mine with the Eva, Jiřina and East Abertamy shafts.