Mine consolidated Cornelie

On December 2nd, 1858, the pit “Glücksrad“ merged with some other pits to a consolidated mine called “Cons.Cornelie“. Before the merge, it was an independent mine and had profitable outputs at times. The mine opened up its lodes of iron stone using some small surface shafts and three galleries which developed the working areas situated at a lower level than the winzes. One of these galleries was the Middle Wheel of Fortune. This is where you are standing now. The gallery was developed with hammer and pick as well as by gun powder blasting. For this, blast holes were drilled by hand into the rock.
Looking upslope above the gallery you can see three marked piles. They show the way of three fault pits (opencast mining) which are in contact with the gallery. The shaft of the first fault pit extends below the level of the gallery. In front of the gallery there was a little building. You can clearly see its site in front of the gallery mouth. Perhaps it was used as a mine building, a little storeroom for tools and ore. A slab (picture), which was found in the gallery, shows wear marks of hammer and pic (top mark) and a borehole (bottom mark), the remains of a hand-made drill blast hole.

You can walk for a few metres into this gallery. At the third frame (on your right) there is a light switch. If you press it the first metres after the old gallery mouth will be illuminated. Have fun on the tracks of mining! Good Luck!