cycle trail ‚hammer mills & mills‘

Kirchenweiher

A vanished hammer mill

There is conjecture and individual evidence that a hammer mill, which produced sheet metal, existed not only in the local districts, but also in the immediate vicinity of Grafenwoehr.

The location was at the church pond, which was created in the Middle Ages by damming the Creußen. Today, the former location can be found on the Creußen north of the footpath through the Sandfurth at the height of the chapel „Altes Kircherl“.

The name „Kirchenweiher“ (church pond) refers to the old church, first mentioned in a document in 1484, one of several predecessor buildings of today’s chapel in Pressather Straße, which were once located not far from the current site. Likewise, the predecessor settlement of Grafenwoehr – called Hertwigshof – is assumed to be located around the church.

Regarding the hammer mill, teacher Schenkl writes in the town chronicle at the beginning of the 20th century that this area was still called „Hammer“ in the vernacular for a long time. In the tax cadastre of 1774, the parcel is named as „Uf dem Hammer“. In the original cadastre of 1839 it is described as „Im Kirchenweiher“.

A hidden reference

Today called „Sandfurth“, the divided Creußen once formed a small island. This looks very similar to an old factory ditch. The hammer mill „Grafenwöhr am Weiher“, still mentioned there in 1527 and 1550/60 in Dirk Gotschmann’s book on Upper Palatinate ironworks, was probably destroyed or abandoned before the Thirty Years‘ War (1618-1648).