The bunker

The bunker lies right in the centre of Minden. Today, its walls protect the population from the bunker beats that usually test the old walls' resistance to knocking on Saturdays. Parties, events and a varied stage programme have long since established the location in northern German nightlife.

History:

War powder magazine no. 1, built in 1819, is located in the courtyard of high bastion VI - safely nestled between the Schwichow fortified bastion and the Königstor ravelin. In the event of a siege, it had to hold the powder supplies from the peace powder magazine no. 1, which was built outside the fortress for security reasons. The highly explosive powder stores were always kept outside the densely populated city fortresses, as was the case in Minden. Each time the fortifications were reinforced, the powder supplies were retrieved from the external depots to the casemated war powder magazines behind the main rampart. The supply in powder magazine no. 1 was up to 1,000 hundredweights of gunpowder, which was stored in wooden barrels.

The core of the magazine building consists of a solid brick, elongated barrel vault, which lies under a massive gabled roof and is supported on each side by four buttresses. At the front end is a small entrance sluice with angled access. To protect against the greater penetrating power of projectiles from rifled guns, which were developed and introduced in the armies around the middle of the century, the fortress construction authorities surrounded the older magazine building with a second wall shell and a massive earth embankment in 1869-71. The air jacket between the walls served to keep the building and the powder stores dry.

The powder kegs were stored in two storey levels on a wooden structure. Powder magazines were usually constructed away from the main rampart. This was to prevent the rampart system from breaking open in the event of an explosion.
The magazine building is now the only fully preserved part of the former ramparts; tall trees have now grown on the earth fill.