Mid-nineteenth-century hard coal shaft with surviving 1910 pithead buildings serving as a ventilation installation for the Rydułtowy colliery complex.
Szyb Erbreich is a historic hard coal shaft located in Czernica, associated with the former Kopalnia Charlotte — the predecessor of the present-day Kopalnia Węgla Kamiennego Rydułtowy-Anna. The shaft was first sunk between 1851 and 1853, taking its name from the royal senior mining councillor Erbreich who held office at the time. Its initial depth of 91.8 metres was increased to 113 metres in 1874.
At the end of the 1890s a replacement shaft, Erbreich II, was begun some 100 metres to the north, and a comprehensive rebuilding of the surface complex was carried out in 1910, producing the steel headframe, brick winding-house, and pithead buildings that survive to the present day. The shaft ceased primary coal extraction in 1924, subsequently serving for materials transport, personnel movement, and ventilation before being converted to a dedicated ventilation role. It now operates as Szyb Powietrzny I Czernica, serving the Kopalnia Rydułtowy-Anna complex.
The 1910 surface buildings are recognised as technically and architecturally significant industrial heritage.
Kopalnia Charlotte was founded in Czernica in 1806 on the estate of Friedrich von Sack, and from those origins grew what would eventually become the Kopalnia Rydułtowy-Anna. Coal had been known in the Czernica district since at least the late eighteenth century, when Prussian geological surveys identified workable seams in the Rybnik area.
Szyb Erbreich was sunk between 1851 and 1853. It took its name from the royal senior mining councillor of that designation who held authority over the district at the time. The original shaft was 91.8 metres deep and was equipped with a winding machine of 12 horsepower; the shaft tower was of masonry construction. In 1874, the shaft was deepened to 113 metres. A railway spur reaching the shaft was completed in 1854, the year after construction began, as part of the regional line connecting Nędza and Sumina to Czernica; the line came into official operation on 1 January 1855, and a horse-drawn Rossbahn of one kilometre length connected the shaft directly to the railhead.
Towards the end of the 1890s, new owners — a group of Austrian investors who had purchased the mine in December 1889 and incorporated it into the enlarged Neue consolidirte Charlotte operation — began sinking a replacement shaft approximately 100 metres to the north of the original, designated Erbreich II. This new shaft was built with a masonry lining rather than the timber lining of the earlier one. After reaching 113 metres it was fitted with a steel headframe, a brick winding-house, and a steam-powered winding engine of 60 horsepower housed in a separate building. In 1910, the entire surface complex at the Erbreich site was comprehensively rebuilt: a new steel headframe was erected, along with new pithead buildings and a new winding-engine house. These structures, which survive to the present day, are considered fine examples of early-twentieth-century Upper Silesian industrial architecture.
In 1924 the shaft ceased to operate as a primary extraction point for coal. Thereafter it served for the transport of materials and equipment underground and for personnel movement and ventilation. Over time the ancillary buildings in the vicinity were demolished and the winding machinery and cage equipment removed. The pithead complex of 1910 remained standing.
Kopalnia Charlotte passed through several ownership changes and name transitions across the twentieth century. After the Second World War the mine was renamed Kopalnia Rydułtowy. In 1975 it became part of the administrative unit of Wodzisław Śląski and was renamed Kopalnia Węgla Kamiennego Rydułtowy w Wodzisławiu Śląskim, reverting to the Rydułtowy designation in 1991 when Rydułtowy regained its independent municipal status. In March 2004 it was merged with the neighbouring Kopalnia Anna of Pszów to form Kopalnia Węgla Kamiennego Rydułtowy-Anna, now belonging to Polska Grupa Górnicza.
Szyb Erbreich — in its post-war incarnation as the Erbreich II infrastructure — now serves as the ventilation shaft designated Szyb Powietrzny I Czernica within the Kopalnia Rydułtowy-Anna complex. The surviving 1910 surface buildings are listed among the industrial heritage sites of Upper Silesia featured on the Śląski Szlak Zabytków Techniki and are noted for their architectural quality. The site is accessible for external viewing but is not open to the public.