Grötschenreuth Castle

In the 14th century, a hammer mill was first mentioned in Grötschenreuth. Grötschenreuth and the hammer mill located there was a Leuchtenberg fief in 1362. In 1387, the Grötschenreuth hammer lord Otto Heyden, together with several other hammer lords, founded the first hammer union. In the 14th and 15th centuries, a Schienhammer (i.e., a hammer mill that produced its own iron by smelting ore) was in operation in Grötschenreuth, which was later replaced by a wire hammer. In 1400, Grötschenreuth was mentioned as an accessory to the knight's fief of Siegritz with two hammer mills (Hammer Hopfau and Hammer Grötschenreuth). In 1467, Landgrave Friedrich V granted the village and the hammer mill to Nikolaus Pfreimdner. The hammer mill at Grötschenreuth was sold in 1579 to Christoph von Rotschütz, a margravial Brandenburg bailiff at Hohnberg. Hans Georg Steinhauser acquired the village of Grötschenreuth and the hammer mill in 1605, which was described as "lying desolate". This was also the last mention of the Grötschenreuth hammer mill. On February 16, 1637, Margareta Salome von Steinhauser, the only daughter of Hans Georg, who died in 1636, married Johann Paul Weikmann, son of the Erbendorf town clerk Justus Paul Weickmann. The Hammerschloss remained in the Weikmann family until the 19th century. A document from 1849 states: namely in Gretschenreuth a wire hammer, namely the most famous in Bavaria with 27 works.

The manor house of the former wire hammer is a two-winged, two-story, plastered solid building with a hip roof, a dormer, and a roof turret. The core of the building dates from the 17th and 18th centuries. It was renovated in 1804. The plaster articulation with pilasters on high plinths with strip rustication and belt courses was restored between 1991 and 1993. The ensemble includes the Chapel of Our Lady (the so-called Loreto or Drahthammer Chapel). The chapel was built between 1745 and 1750 by Pastor Johann Michael Pfreimbter and the squire Johann Christoph von Weickmann on Grötschenreuth. In 1771 and 1796, the chapel was destroyed by fire and redesigned in the Gothic style between 1844 and 1856. Today, it is a plastered and three-sided closed solid building with a saddle roof and a pointed arch, neo-Gothic jamb portal from 1858. It is unusual that the chapel does not have a tower. The castle is privately owned and cannot be visited.