Aš

Geobox | Settlement
name = Aš
other_name =
category = Town


image_caption = Centre

---

symbol = Aš_znak.png etymology =
official_name =
motto =
nickname =
country = Czech Republic
country_

state =
region = Karlovy Vary
region_type = Region
district = Cheb
district_type = District
commune = Aš
municipality =
part =
river =
location =
elevation = 666
lat_d = 50
lat_m = 13
lat_s =
lat_NS = N
long_d = 12
long_m = 11
long_s =
long_EW = E
highest =
highest_elevation =
highest_lat_d =
highest_long_d =
lowest =
lowest_elevation =
lowest_lat_d =
lowest_long_d =
area = 55.86
area_round = 2
population = 12814
population_date =
population_density = auto
established = 1270
established_type = First mentioned
mayor = Dalibor Blažek
timezone =

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map_background = Czechia - background map.png map_caption = Location in the Czech Republic
map_locator = Czechia
commons = Aš
statistics =
website = [http://www.muas.cz/ www.muas.cz]
footnotes =

Aš (IPA2|aʃ, _de. Asch) is a town in the Karlovy Vary Region of the Czech Republic.

History

Previously uninhabited hills and swamps, the town Asch was founded in the 11th century by German colonists.http://www.muas.cz/html/e_historie.htm] Slavic settlements in the area are not known. [ [http://www.asch-boehmen.de/d/ort/chronik/besiedlung.htm Frühgschichte ] ] The dialect spoken in the town was that of the Upper Palatinate, also known as northern Bavarian. In the adjacent Saxon Vogtland, which borders Karlovy Vary on the north, this dialect is only found in localities lying on the Czech border such as Adorf and Markneukirchen. The Upper Palatinate dialect has a stronger presence in the Bad Brambach region, where it is known as Southern Vogtlandic ("Südvogtländisch").

The first recorded rulers were the "Vögte von Weida", who gave the Bohemian Vogtland region its name. In 1281, they turned control of the region over to the Holy Roman Emperor.

1331 – Herr von Neuberg puts his town and lands under protection of Elector and king John I of Bohemia [http://www.asch-boehmen.de/d/ort/chronik/ruedesheim.htm Rüdesheimer Erklärung ] ]

1394 – Konrad von Neuburg dies without a male heir, and by virtue of Hedwig von Neuburg's marriage to Konrad von Zedtwitz, Asch passes into the control of the Zedtwitz family.

1557 – Region claimed for the Bohemian crown by Ferdinand I, Holy Roman Emperor, but remains Protestant as later Counter Reformation does not stretch this far

1775 – Asch is granted freedom of religion from Empress Maria Theresia.

1854 – A county legal code is granted to the region, ending five centuries of legal control by the Zedtwitz family.

1864 – Asch is linked to the Eger – Hof railway line.

1872 – Town status obtained, as the population grows due to a flourishing textile industry.

1910 - The population rose to 21.880, from 9.405 in 1869

1918 – At the end of the war, soldiers' council seizes power and rejects the demands of separatists from Eger for annexation to Bavaria, preferring to remain in German Austria, which is soon denied by the Paris Peace Conference

1919 - Treaty of St. Germain: the Americans, like Allan W. Dulles, have failed to persuade other powers to make at least the exclave-like peninsulas within Germany, Asch and Rumburg, legal parts of Weimar Germany. Thus the area becomes part of new Czechoslovakia, and is called Aš by Czechs [http://www.asch-boehmen.de/d/ort/chronik/cz_rep.htm Cz. Republik ] ]

1920 - on 18 November, Czech militia topples the monument of Emperor Joseph. Locals protest, and three of them get shot: 27yo Ferdinand Künzel, 45yo baker Eduard Schindler, 22yo Robert Käßmann [ [http://www.asch-boehmen.de/d/ort/chronik/chronik.htm Chronik ] ]

1921 - Czech Census: 183 ethnic Czechs, in a population of 40 000 in the district

1930 - Czech Census: 520 ethnic Czechs, in a population of 45 000 in the district

1937 – The Third Reich aligned Sudeten German Party takes over in Asch. Czech residents, mainly officials, leave

1938 – 22 September, days before the Munich agreement, a Sudeten German Freikorps declares the "Free state of Asch". In October, according to the Munich agreement, German troops officially arrive, unopposed

1939 – Population of 23,130 in the town, almost 100% German Lutherans

1945 – Occupied by U.S. Army on April 20

1945 - Czechs arrest 64 men on 7 June and abduct them to Pilsen prison "Bory", where half of them perish [ [http://www.asch-boehmen.de/d/ort/chronik/verfolgung.htm Die Verfolgung ] ]

1946 - Due to the expulsion of Germans from Czechoslovakia in 1946 by the Beneš decrees, the city's population was reduced, according to the official website ["Because of the removal of German inhabitants in 1946 As had only a half of the pre - war number of inhabitants" http://www.muas.cz/html/e_historie.htm] to "half of the pre - war number of inhabitants", suggesting the other half were Czechs at the time. In contrast, a German expellee website states that 30,327 [ [http://www.asch-boehmen.de/d/ort/chronik/vertreibung.htm Die Vertreibung ] ] have been expelled from March to October in 27 trains, leaving both town and district basically depopulated, considering that many soldiers were dead or POW at the time, and some Germans already had moved over US-occupied Germany voluntarily.

In 1949, 3000 expellees meet in far away Rüdesheim am Rhein, to protest, stating that their area never was inhabited by Slavs other than as a tiny minority.

The official website states that population shrank further in 1950 due to the establishment of the Iron Curtain and the Czechoslovakian border fortifications during the Cold War by the ruling Communists, the whole As district was included into the border zone and that is why many people moved out.

Because of the lowering number of inhabitants some houses remained uninhabited. There was lack of money for their renovation and it was necessary to demolish them.

Present day population in the town, 18 years after the end of the Iron Curtain, is at 12,000 roughly half of the pre-WW2 population.

References

External links

* [http://www.muas.cz/ Municipality of As : official website (in Czech, English, German)]
* [http://www.asch-boehmen.de/d/index2d.htm Website of expelled Germans (Germn&Czech, no English yet)]