Former left-bank Ruhr colliery shaft installation in Duisburg-Baerl whose listed steel lattice headframe over Schacht VIII, designed by Fritz Schupp and Martin Kremmer, survives as a landmark on the Route der Industriekultur.
Zeche Rheinpreußen was a hard coal colliery founded by Franz Haniel, the first mine to sink shafts on the left bank of the Rhine. Schacht VIII — also known as Schacht Gerdt, after the historic locality of Geerdt — is a ventilation and materials shaft located in Duisburg-Baerl beside the Haus-Knipp railway bridge. Sinking began in 1941, or according to some sources 1943, and the shaft was brought into service in 1945 to serve the ventilation needs of the extended Rheinpreußen workings in the northeast field.
An expansion programme between 1955 and 1959 converted the shaft for personnel transport and materials handling. The steel lattice headframe erected over the shaft during that programme, designed by the architects Fritz Schupp and Martin Kremmer, remains standing today. In 1971 Schacht VIII passed to the Verbundbergwerk Rheinland, and in 1990 the Binsheimer Feld around the shaft was transferred to the Bergwerk Walsum, which used it as a ventilation and materials shaft until the colliery's closure on 27 June 2008.
The shaft was abandoned and backfilled in 2004. The headframe, the Kaue, and the concrete ventilator diffusers were entered into the Denkmalliste der Stadt Duisburg (no. 603) on 11 June 2010. The headframe is a station on the Route der Industriekultur Themenroute 7 (Rheinische Bergbauroute) and is accessible on Sundays between May and October.
The history of Zeche Rheinpreußen begins in 1851, when the Ruhrort industrialist Franz Haniel submitted exploratory drilling applications for coal fields at Homberg on the left bank of the Rhine. After five unsuccessful boreholes the sixth struck a coal seam at 175 m depth on 17 May 1851. Haniel applied to the Bergamt Düren for a concession of 167.5 km², though the authority granted only 93.5 km², applying the Code Napoléon rather than Prussian mining law as the justification for the unusually large area.
The concession — the field Rheinpreußen — was formally granted to Franz Haniel in 1857, making this the first coal-field grant for the left-bank Rhine. Sinking of Schacht 1 by the Senkschacht method began in 1857 on a Haniel family estate near the Rhine. Severe quicksand and water inflows plagued the works from the outset; a quicksand inrush at 94 m in 1861 crushed the cast-iron lining.
Franz Haniel died in 1868 without seeing successful production; his son Hugo took over and the Gewerkschaft Rheinpreußen was founded in the same year. Sinking of Schacht 2 alongside began in 1866. Schacht 2 reached the Carboniferous at 128 m in 1872; the first and second levels were set at 246 m and 310 m in 1875, and a Malakowturm was erected over Schacht 2 and coal winding commenced from it in December 1876 — the first coal from the left bank of the Rhine.
Schacht 1 finally reached the Carboniferous at 132 m in 1877, after seven successive interlocking Tübbing sections had been required to deal with the quicksand. A Malakowturm was begun over Schacht 1 in 1878; production from Schacht 1 began in 1884. By 1919 Zeche Rheinpreußen was the largest colliery in the Ruhr.
The colliery grew throughout the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries through successive shaft installations on both sides of the Rhine. Schächte 4 and 5 were begun in 1900 in Moers-Hochstraß and Moers-Utfort respectively. In 1903 the Grubenfeld Rheinland was separated from the main field and the Gewerkschaft Rheinland founded.
In 1922 sinking of Schacht 6 in Moers-Repelen began, this shaft later becoming part of the Schachtanlage Pattberg. The maximum workforce of 12,001 was reached in 1962 and maximum annual output of 4,736,519 tonnes in 1966 with 9,363 workers. In 1968 the Zeche Rheinpreußen was incorporated into the Ruhrkohle AG.
In 1971 Rheinpreußen was merged with Pattberg/Rossenray into the Verbundbergwerk Rheinland. The main Rheinpreußen operation was closed in 1990. Schacht VIII (Gerdt) has a distinct history within this wider setting.
As the underground workings of Zeche Rheinpreußen expanded northwards and eastwards into the Binsheimer Feld and beyond, the need arose for an additional ventilation shaft to improve air circulation in the northeast workings. This shaft was sited in Duisburg-Baerl, immediately beside the Haus-Knipp railway bridge over the Rhine, and took the name Gerdt from the former community of Geerdt — which, together with Uettelsheim, Meerbeck, and Homberg, had once belonged to the parish of the village of Halen, itself swallowed by Rhine floods in the winter of 1596. Sinking commenced in 1941 (or 1943 according to some sources); the shaft was brought into service in 1945 serving the ventilation of the Rheinpreußen 5/9 installation.
Between 1955 and 1959 an expansion programme fitted the shaft for personnel transport and materials handling. As part of this programme the steel lattice headframe was erected to a design by Fritz Schupp and Martin Kremmer, the Essen- and Berlin-based architects who had earlier designed the Schachtanlage Zollverein 12 in Essen. In 1962 the shaft was used to open up the Binsheimer Feld from the 450 m and 650 m levels, and in the same year an underground connection was made between the 5/9 field and the Pattberg field via the 650 m level.
After the formation of the Verbundbergwerk Rheinland in 1971, Schacht VIII became part of that combined operation. In 1990 the Binsheimer Feld and Schacht VIII were transferred to the Bergwerk Walsum, which used the shaft as an outgoing ventilation shaft and for energy and materials supply. Schacht VIII was abandoned and backfilled in 2004.
The Bergwerk Walsum itself finally ceased coal production on 27 June 2008. After closure of the shaft, the steel lattice headframe, the Kaue, and the concrete ventilator diffusers were entered into the Denkmalliste der Stadt Duisburg as monument number 603 on 11 June 2010. The headframe is accessible on Sundays from May to October and is a station on Themenroute 7 (Rheinische Bergbauroute) of the Route der Industriekultur.