Today, cargo ships with a length of up to 140 meters and a displacement of 4,000 tons sail on the Main. In the past, shippers on the Main could not have imagined that this was possible. After all, the longest period of navigation on the Main passed without any engines. Animals or people used to pull barges upriver using the towpaths.
In today’s Main-Spessart area, the path from Kreuzwertheim to Lengfurt always ran downstream on the right side of the Main, of course, even when the ships were pulled upstream. Both in the hairpin curve at “Himmelreich” and in the tight curve of Rettersheim, the line riders were able to tow the ships on the inside curve. The towing boats were moored at the Lengfurter ferry. The horses crossed over with the ferry. The front end of the long towing line was taken across the Main at the same time, in order to then pull the ship from there.
Up to Lohr the towpath was on the left side of the Main. Then the path changed to the right side of the Lohr Main. Here it led past Gemnden, Wernfeld, Karlstadt and Veitshchheim to Würzburg. Partly the towpath was paved and the shore was without trees and bushes. They would have gotten in the way of the leash. This was attached to the top of the mast. The helmsman and another skipper held the ship from the shore. The driving boom was also used for this purpose, a long pole with a point and a hook. Downriver the ships drifted with the current.
Competition for shipping from the railroad
Then came the steam engines and in the middle of the 19th century the first paddle steamers. In 1841 the Main-Dampfschifffahrts-Gesellschaft was founded in Wrzburg. The journeys between Bamberg and Schweinfurt were discontinued as early as 1846 because of the lack of a fairway, silting up of the river bed and competition from the railways. From 1847 there were only trips between Würzburg and Mainz, but also steam tugs that pulled other ships. However, steam towing was also discontinued in 1858.
When the water was normal, the Main was only 1.20 meters deep at times, and even shallower when the water was low. There were no barrages and the current was stronger than today. The chain tugboats with a draft of only 56 centimeters were perfect for this. The Meekuh, as such a chain tug is called, hung upriver from Mainz or Aschaffenburg to Bamberg on a heavy iron chain that was laid on the bottom of the Main. Down she drifted with the current and turbine propulsion. She herself had no cargo on board, but pulled up to a dozen barges behind her, which at the time did not have their own drive.
In 1854 the railway line from Frankfurt via Aschaffenburg and Würzburg to Schweinfurt was finished. Shipping lost more and more freight shares. It was 197 kilometers from Mainz to Lohr by water, but only 113 kilometers by rail. In 1857 there were 784 ships on the Main, 30 years later only 247. The chain tugs were supposed to stop the decline of shipping.
However, Bavaria initially rejected chain shipping and preferred the railway. After long negotiations between Bavaria, Prussia and Baden, the concession from Aschaffenburg to Miltenberg finally came in 1892, and the test drive followed a year later. From 1886 onwards, three steamers operated chain towing between Mainz and Aschaffenburg.
From 1912 the chain extended to Bamberg
In 1895 operations to Lohr began. The state railway, which had previously been a major competitor to shipping, was given the letters KBKS on the sides of the steamer to set up the subsidiary “Königlich Bavarian Kettenschleppschifffahrts-Gesellschaft”. In this way, further ruinous competition was avoided. It began operations in 1898. In the same year, the section from Lohr to Würzburg went into operation. The following year it was extended to Ochsenfurt, and the next year to Kitzingen. Due to favorable operating results, the Chamber of Deputies approved the extension of the chain to Bamberg. Schweinfurt was connected in 1911, followed a year later by Bamberg.
Up until 1911, Bavaria commissioned eight ships, each 46 meters long and 7.40 meters wide, for the Aschaffenburg-Bamberg route. They were manufactured in Bigau near Dresden, then broken down into individual parts and transported by train to Aschaffenburg, where they were assembled.
When towing up the Main, barges were repeatedly uncoupled and others attached. The years before the First World War were the ones with the most towing. There were more than 250 mountain trips per year, pulling about 5000 unloaded and about 2000 loaded ships. Few ships were towed Talwrts. Most floated downstream with their cargo like a raft with the current.
The chain made a huge noise
Chain wear was a big problem. Within ten years, a mass loss of up to 30 percent had occurred. Chain breaks were the result. There was constant experimentation. In France there were ships where the chain ran over an electromagnetic chain pulley. Then a gripping wheel was developed that pushed innumerable pins onto the chain from both sides. The bolts held the chain like fingers and released it again after a bit of rotation. This technique was used on the Main for a long time.
Starting in 1924, these crumbling grip wheels were replaced by two-drum winches. The chain ran over the first to the second drum, back to the first, and so on. After wrapping around each drum three times, it was released again behind the second drum. The system worked by friction. The chain was made of 26 millimeter thick material. And she was loud. An older man from Zell said: “We heard it when they warned in Margetschche. Ratatatat, that’s how every link went. It made a terrific noise when it rattled itself up.”
Outriggers were located at the front and rear. The front one took the chain out of the river, with the rear one it could be placed back in the middle of the fairway, especially in river bends. In front there was also a crane for a search anchor, with which the chain could be fished up from the bottom. Actually, that shouldn’t happen, because in case of a chain breakage, there was the chain catcher that held the chain.
Jacks dived for the chain
When bathing, boys took the chain out of the water more often. Zeller said: “We were able to lift her, four or five boys. She wasn’t that heavy in the water. We dropped her again on command. But alas, one would have had his foot under it.” A special spectacle always took place on Main bridges like the one in Karlstadt. An old Karlstadter: “The Meekuh always turned down the chimney.” It always made a lot of smoke, especially when the heat was on.
The Meekuh, with its 130 hp, managed between four and six kilometers per hour uphill. The descent with turbines was twelve to 14 kilometers. Seven men worked a 16-hour day, reports the Elbe, with winter rest from December to February. It must have been similar on the Main. On average, 60 to 80 kilometers were covered per day. There is talk of countless accidents.
The legendary steam whistle
Its dull steam whistle gave the Meekuh its name. Der Zeller: “Before she took the curve, she always acted like a cow was screaming.” Ten dangerous sections of the Main where the chain steamer had to give a double whistle were regulated by the police. The ships and ships drifting down the valley had to turn to, i.e. interrupt the journey.
In less dangerous places, a whistle was enough. The others just had to dodge here. One of these places was apparently the curve at Karlstadter Hafen. “The Meekuh used to growl under the bridge,” says the man from Karlstadt. There was also a signal in front of the hometowns of the towed skippers. Then the journey was slowed down and relatives brought groceries and fresh laundry in boats.
The barrages initiated the end of the Meekuh. The Lower Main was canalised as far as Aschaffenburg in 1921. In 1926 further expansion began, which gradually made chain shipping superfluous. The first diesel tractors appeared. The Lengfurt barrage was built in 1937, Rothenfels 1937, Steinbach 1938, Harrbach 1938 to 1940, Himmelstadt 1939 to 40, Erlabrunn 1935. In the end only two tugboats drove on the Obermain or only at low water.
The last Meekuh scrapped
After the barrages were built in 1937, chain towing was discontinued. In May 1938 the chain was taken out of the water. After the war, the last Meekuh was used by the Vth company as a residential and office ship, was moored in the Old Port of Würzburg, later on the Mainkai, was a ship’s needs store, and was repaired and renovated in 1976. Then it served as accommodation for two bargemen at the entrance to the New Port of Würzburg. The sale to Klaus Junghans from Meien took place in 1998. He originally wanted to bring the ship home to use it as a restaurant ship in Dresden. But nothing came of it. At some point the Meekuh ended up in the blast furnace.
By the way: The floating restaurant “Mainkuh” in Wrzburg is not built on an original Meekuh float from back then.
Sources: Zesewitz, Dntzsch, Grtschel: chain shipping, VEB-Verlag Berlin 1987; Otto Berninger: Chain towing boat trip on the Main, Wrth 1987.
Reading tips: Missed the start of the series? The parts of the series that have been published so far can be found at https://www.mainpost.de/dossier/geschichte-der-region-main-spessart/
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