EVA APFELBAUM MINE
Introduction
The Eva Apfelbaum Mine, also called “Eve’s Apple Tree”, was situated near the settlement of Werlsgrün, today’s Zálesí near Jáchymov. The site belonged to the wider Jáchymov ore district, one of the most important mining regions in Bohemia since the 16th century. Although never among the largest mines, its history reflects the broader development of mining in the area.
History
The Jáchymov preacher and chronicler Johann Mathesius mentions the mine in his work Sarepta, describing finds of unusually strong silver wires “as thick as a goose quill and half an ell long”. Such discoveries testify to the richness of the local veins during the peak of Renaissance silver mining. In 1801 the state bought, among others, shares in this mine and became its sole owner, in line with the contemporary centralisation of mining administration. The mine gradually lost importance and was closed around 1850. The inhabitants of Zálesí who had worked there either moved away or returned to cattle breeding and forestry work.
The locality gained new importance after the Second World War. Geological exploration in 1947 indicated the presence of uranium ores, and the old workings were therefore renewed and reopened as the Eva Mine. After 1950, prisoners from the Eliáš and Mariánská camps were forced to work here as part of the system of Jáchymov labour camps connected with uranium production for the Soviet nuclear programme.
Description
The mining complex represented a typical heavily guarded uranium operation of the early 1950s. The metal headframe was about 21 metres high. Ore sorting took place in a wooden building with a ground plan of roughly 20 × 15 metres. The fenced area formed an irregular pentagon approximately 400 × 400 metres in size. The fence was about three metres high, double, and made of barbed wire; a roughly five-metre-wide shooting zone lay between the fences and outside them. Seven guard towers with searchlights stood around the perimeter, two of them additionally equipped with a light machine gun. Lighting was provided by poles with approximately 200-watt bulbs placed at regular intervals.
Reuse
After uranium mining ended, the area underwent reclamation and the traces of intensive extraction were gradually removed. The abandoned buildings were taken over by the District National Committee in Most and converted into an outdoor school facility. Former workshops became classrooms, the engine house above the shaft was rebuilt into a gymnasium, and the former prisoners’ barracks were adapted into dormitories, a kitchen and a dining hall. The facility remained in operation until the early 1990s. Today only fragments of the original buildings survive.
Photo gallery: (Author: https://www.facebook.com/pwrdbynature/) available here: https://mipalfi.rajce.idnes.cz/Jachymov%2C_Dul_Eva/
