Why anyone fortified a mountain pass
Prussia kept Silesia after the Silesian Wars, but Austria never accepted the loss and an attempt to retake the province looked entirely plausible. The shortest route in from Bohemia ran over the Srebrna Pass, a saddle at 586 metres between the Owl Mountains and the Bardo range. Closing it was a priority for Frederick II.
Construction ran from 1765 to 1777 to a design by the Prussian engineer Ludwig Wilhelm Regler, revised by the king himself. The works were spread over two hills above the pass, at 686 and 627 metres, and amounted to six separate forts.
Between four and four and a half thousand labourers worked for twelve years, and the bill came to more than one and a half million thalers. It was raised through a special levy that Silesians remembered by a name best translated as the Srebrna Góra affliction.
A town inside the donjon
The core is a ring of bastions and tenailles around a central donjon of four towers joined by curtain walls. The structure measures some sixty metres across and the walls run to more than ten metres thick. Its roof is the best viewpoint over the Bardo mountains for some distance around.
Casemates fill three levels inside. The fortress was meant to hold out through a long siege without resupply, so it had storerooms, an armoury, a chapel, a prison, a hospital, a bakery, a brewery and craft workshops, with provisions calculated for three to five months.
There was room for over three and a half thousand soldiers, 264 guns and mortars, and nine wells cut into the rock, the deepest dropping several dozen metres.
One test, in 1807
The fortress was never captured, and seriously tested only once. In the summer of 1807, during Prussia's war with France, Bavarian and Württemberg troops of the Confederation of the Rhine moved against it. The garrison under Colonel Bogislaus von Schwerin repelled the assault of 28 June, and the Peace of Tilsit closed the campaign days later.
Its best years were already behind it. After 1800 it lost its influential backers, and advances in artillery made works of this kind obsolete quickly. Through the 1830s and 1840s the casemates served as a prison for political opponents, among them Wilhelm Wolff and the writer Fritz Reuter.
The order to abandon the fortress came at the start of 1860. The last soldiers left in 1867, and for a few years afterwards the forts were used as a proving ground for artillery and explosives.
Ruin, resort, prison camp
In the later nineteenth century the Prussian authorities worked out that visitors were worth more than salvaged stone: demolition was halted and the forts opened up. Around 1900 a rack railway reached the pass between them, long since closed, though its viaducts still stand in the valley. After the First World War a restaurant opened inside the main fort.
The Second World War ended all that. The forts on the two outer hills housed Oflag VIII B, a punishment camp for Polish officers, from December 1939 to September 1941. More than three hundred men were held here, including Rear Admiral Józef Unrug, who had commanded Poland's coastal defence in 1939.
On the night of 5 May 1940 nine officers broke out through the walls. Three of them made it across several countries to Syria, where the Polish Carpathian Rifle Brigade was forming; the other six were recaptured.
What is open today
After 1945 the site decayed and was stripped. Clearance began in 1965 on one of the forts, another followed in 1969, and in 1974 a firearms museum opened inside the donjon. A good part of the complex is now open, generally with a guide: casemates, courtyards and the viewing terrace.
The fortress became a Historic Monument of Poland by presidential regulation on 14 April 2004, having entered the register of monuments back in 1961. The village of Srebrna Góra below the walls also makes a reasonable base for walking in the Owl Mountains.
Getting there
- By car — Srebrna Góra lies on the road from Ząbkowice Śląskie towards Nowa Ruda, about thirty kilometres from Kłodzko; there is parking in the village and at the pass.
- Without a car — train to Ząbkowice Śląskie or Dzierżoniów, then a bus to Srebrna Góra.
- On foot — marked paths climb from the village to the forts, a steep half hour.
- On a longer walk — the fortress sits on the ridge routes of the Owl Mountains, within reach of Wielka Sowa.
Before you go
The casemates stay cold all year, midsummer included, so bring a jacket whatever the weather outside. Surfaces are stony and slippery in places, which makes proper shoes worth the trouble.
Allow around two hours for a guided visit, or half a day if you want the outer forts as well. Entry is at set times, which means waiting in high season, and less of the site is open outside the summer, so check before you travel.
The view from the top of the donjon repays the climb, but low cloud is common in these hills and can reduce it to nothing. If the panorama matters to you, keep a spare day.
How to get there and practical info
- Location
- above the Srebrna Pass in the Owl Mountains, by the village of Srebrna Góra, Lower Silesian Voivodeship
- What to see
- the donjon and its casemates, the two outer forts, the terrace looking over the Bardo range
- Age
- built 1765–1777 to a design by Ludwig Wilhelm Regler
- Status
- Historic Monument of Poland since 2004, on the register of monuments since 1961
- Time needed
- about two hours with a guide, half a day including the outer forts
- Without a car
- train to Ząbkowice Śląskie or Dzierżoniów, then a bus to Srebrna Góra
- Accessibility
- a steep approach, stone stairs and uneven floors in the casemates
- Current opening times and tickets
- official website of Srebrna Góra Fortress
When to go
The slopes come out from under the snow and the place is empty before the season starts. The pass can still be cold and windy.
Most of the site is open and most of the groups turn up, particularly at weekends. The casemates stay cold regardless.
Autumn colour across the Owl Mountains and the clearest views from the donjon. Days are short, so climb in the morning.
Snow and quiet, but the approach often ices over and less of the fortress is open than in summer.
Other sights in Kotlina Kłodzka
Straight-line distances from „Srebrna Góra Fortress" — calculated from real coordinates. By road it is often further.
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