MARIASORG MONASTERY (MARIÁNSKÁ)
Introduction
According to tradition, a chapel dedicated to St Adalbert once stood here. It may have been founded earlier during the colonisation efforts of the Teplá Monastery, which had been settling this area since the 13th century. In the second half of the 15th century, a hermit named Jan Niavius settled near the chapel. He is said to have prophesied that a great and wealthy town would arise nearby, later decline, and then rise again to glory.
At the beginning of the 16th century, the town of Jáchymov was indeed founded not far away and became a prosperous and famous mining centre thanks to its silver mines. When the mines were exhausted, the town began to decline. The citizens then remembered the prophecy and, hoping to fulfil its second part, asked the Prague Archbishopric in 1691 for permission to build a church. The applicants were the Jáchymov builder Jan Schmidt, the mining official Salomon Müller, and Jan Schulter. They located the original hermitage of Niavius and planned to build a temporary chapel on that very site.
Ownership disputes between Jáchymov and the Ostrov estate complicated matters. The owner of the Ostrov domain, Generalissimus Ludwig Wilhelm I, claimed the land, but lost the legal dispute. In 1692, a temporary wooden chapel was built. Into it, Anna Lucia Maderová, daughter of the Jáchymov reeve and judge David Weidner of Planá, donated a miraculous statue of the Virgin Mary. The statue soon gained a reputation for miracles, and on 2 July 1694, the Feast of the Visitation of the Virgin Mary, the first pilgrimage from Jáchymov took place. Four pilgrimages per year were permitted, provided they did not interfere with the pilgrimages to Chlum sv. Máří or with church services in Jáchymov.
In 1699, construction of the church was completed, and on 8 September it was consecrated by the Jáchymov dean Anton Wagner. The miraculous statue was ceremonially transferred into the church. The following year, the tertiary of the Order of St Jerome, Brother Eusebius Kolitsch from Hřebečná, built a hermitage beside the church. On 30 May 1728, he was attacked by robbers and, after refusing to hand over church money and liturgical objects, was burned alive in his hermitage. His gravestone marked f. EK 1728 was placed in the nave of the church.
Development of the pilgrimage site and monastery
In 1729, the Jáchymov town council built an inn for pilgrims on the site of the burned hermitage. Because of the remote location, care for pilgrims was insufficient, and maintenance of both the inn and the pilgrimage church was demanding for the town. Conflicts also arose among religious orders, as Franciscans from Kadaň, Piarists from Ostrov, Capuchins from Sokolov and various mendicant orders were active there.
Therefore, in 1751, the Jáchymov councillor Felix Ignaz Grimm approached the Capuchin Order with a request to take over the church and its facilities. The provincial superior Father Seraphin of Ziegenhals submitted a request to the Prague Archbishopric on 16 November 1752, and on the same day the town also petitioned the ruling queen Maria Theresa. After some delay, Jáchymov received imperial permission to restore the church on 19 January 1754, and on 28 May the Prague consistory granted approval to the Capuchins. On 28 July 1754, the church and inn were formally handed over to the Capuchins. They received 4,000 guilders from the town treasury and were promised annual supplies of grain, beer and firewood.
In 1755, the Capuchins arrived at Mariánská and began building the monastery and the convent church. Curiously, the foundation charter (the agreement between the Capuchins and Jáchymov) was not signed until 24 September 1760. Five years later, construction of the monastery, costing 30,000 guilders, was completed. That same year, the temporary residence was converted into classrooms for a public school — even before compulsory schooling was introduced. In 1766, the coat of arms of Jáchymov, carved by the miner and sculptor Matouš Schmiedhuber, was placed in the pilgrimage church as a symbol of the town’s spiritual authority over the site.
During the reign of Joseph II, the monastery nearly faced dissolution, but the emperor recognised the Capuchins’ work as useful and allowed it to remain. In 1781, the church tower was repaired, replacing the original two small turrets with a single one; the work was carried out by the tinsmith Štěpán Ott from Nejdek for 300 guilders. In 1791, pilgrimages from Jáchymov were restored after having been banned between 1780 and 1790. Since 1769, the pilgrimages had also been linked with a local fair.
Between 2 and 8 August 1854, celebrations marking one hundred years of the church were held. Festive pilgrimages took place, two sermons were delivered daily before the church, and about 8,000 people confessed here. In 1883, when the church floor was repaired, charred bones in a decayed coffin were discovered. The remains were reburied in front of the altar of St Florian beneath the original stone marked f. EK 1728, after the grave had been rebuilt by the town council.
After World War II
The Capuchins cared for the monastery and the needy until the end of World War II. After the war, the German monks were forced to leave, but the remaining brothers continued pastoral service in the monastery and surrounding villages until 1949. In September 1949, the monastery was permanently closed, beginning a dark chapter in its history.
By then, Mariánská had become part of a guarded zone. The last two Capuchins — Father Optat and Brother Prokop (according to other sources Jaroslav Kvíčala and Jindřich Basler) — were arrested for allegedly hiding weapons. The accusation proved fabricated, as they were soon released; it merely served as a pretext for closing the monastery. Only a few items of equipment were saved, most importantly the miraculous statue of the Virgin Mary, which was transferred to Nové Zvolání near Vejprty, as the Jáchymov parish showed little interest in it. The Capuchins moved to Sokolov, where they later became victims of Operation K.
Members of the National Security Corps (SNB) moved into the monastery buildings, and prison cells were created in the cellars for punished officers. Gradually, however, the complex turned into one of the harshest prisons and interrogation centres in Czechoslovakia.
After uranium mining in the region ended around 1960, the monastery became a storage facility for machinery belonging to Škoda Ostrov. In 1965, the dilapidated complex was demolished by blasting, officially because it “no longer served its purpose.” After the demolition, one of the displaced natives visited the site and found the wrought-iron cross from the roof turret in the rubble. Considering it a worthless piece of metal, he took it to Austria, where in 1966 it was installed on the façade of the Church of the Mother of God in Maria-Sorg in Greifenstein.
Description of the monastery complex
The monastery stood at an altitude of 793 metres above sea level on a gentle slope above the Reinbach (Eliáš Brook). It was arranged around a square courtyard: the north side was formed by the original pilgrimage church of the Visitation of the Virgin Mary, the east side by the Capuchin convent church, and the south and west sides by the hospice and monastery buildings.
Pilgrimage Church of the Visitation of the Virgin Mary
A simple Baroque building without a tower, plastered in yellow. The façade was about 12 metres wide, with the main entrance in the centre. Above the door was a stone bearing five connected crosses, said to have come from Niavius’s hermitage. The Capuchin church adjoined it on the east side. On the gabled roof stood an octagonal roof turret.
The nave measured 17 × 9 metres and was covered by a barrel vault divided into three bays. The floor was paved with granite slabs.
On the main altar stood the miraculous statue of the Virgin Mary in front of an altarpiece of the Assumption of the Virgin. On both sides were doorways leading to the convent church, above which stood life-size statues of St Joachim and St Anne. Behind the altar was a view of Jáchymov and a painting of the Fourteen Holy Helpers.
Two side altars from 1764 were dedicated to St Adjutor and St Felix. A third side altar displayed St Florian and St John of Nepomuk; in front of it lay the grave of the hermit Kolitsch.
Convent Church of St Francis
A simple church oriented to the south and built at a right angle to the pilgrimage church. Its northern façade projected about five metres beyond the pilgrimage church and had a similar height, while the southern side was attached to the convent. A hexagonal roof turret stood on the gabled roof. The rectangular entrance portal was located in the centre of the northern façade.
Although the exterior appeared as one structure, it contained the church, a sacristy and, above it, a repository with staircase. The interior measured 16.5 × 7.5 metres and had a barrel vault.
The main altar on the southern wall carried a painting of St Francis receiving the stigmata; the upper part showed the saint in chains. A side altar was dedicated to St Anthony. In the granite floor, a stone slab with the inscription ANNO 1765 was set in the centre.
Other buildings
The convent and hospice formed a single rectangular building with a ground-floor arcade. The Capuchins’ cells were on the first floor, while rooms for pilgrims and the pilgrims’ inn were on the ground floor.
The monastery under the National Security Corps
After closure, the complex was handed over to the SNB as part of the Mariánská camp. Initially, disciplinary cells for police members were set up here, but later the premises were converted into interrogation rooms for the SNB and the State Security (StB). Prisoners who had escaped or attempted to escape from uranium mines and labour camps were also held here. Among inmates, it became one of the most feared places in the entire Jáchymov mining region.
A shooting range was installed in the nave of the convent church (angel statues reportedly served as targets), while the pilgrimage church was turned into garages for SNB vehicles and later for the Interior Guard of the Ministry of the Interior. In 1951, a central kennel for 300 guard dogs was built in the monastery grounds. Baroque carved pews and wooden parts of altars were even used as firewood.
Interrogation cells were located in the monastery basement. A feared method involved tying prisoners to doors or bars so that their feet barely touched the ground, sometimes for dozens of hours; in worse cases, prisoners were nailed directly to doors. Prisoners were beaten with rubber cables and suspended for hours or days. Witnesses described unconscious inmates hanging on bars, their clothes covered in blood and bodily fluids. Many detainees were accused of attempted escape, often on the basis of fabricated reports from informers. (After Ludvík & Bureš, Černá kniha minulosti.)
Local recollections also speak of former prisoners returning decades later, showing scars from being nailed to church gates, or confronting former guards.
After 1954, interrogation practices were somewhat restricted, though not fully abolished. Following the closure of the Mariánská camp and abandonment of the monastery after 1960, the buildings served as a storage depot for Škoda Ostrov until their demolition in 1965.
Photo gallery:
https://mipalfi.rajce.idnes.cz/Klaster_Marianska_MariaSorg/
