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Fort Monostor
The Fort Monostor was planned as the most enormous element of the whole belt-system and was to be established on the Sand-Hill.
The fortress bears all those marks that characterized the contemporaneous army architecture. Its shape is a closed polygon with long, straight walls and on the top of which on the breastwork the camp guns could be posted. The 8 10 metres deep moat surrounding the fortress assured the attack exemption, the moat could be raked both from the casemates of the inner and outer walls. The outer wall is slanting in the direction of the enemy, so the fortress did not have a perpendicular, by the hostile artillery vulnerable wall. The moat could be enfiladed by the fire of the smaller cannons from the coigns and by the fire of the infantry through the loop-holes.
The fortress built on the strength of Austrian principles possessed long walls on the southern and western side and on the breastwork of these 24 36, respectively 17 26 cannons could be placed. All buildings of the fortress is actually sunk under the ground since each roof of the buildings is covered with 2 3 metres thick layer of soil and this could have prevented the artillery of the enemy of shattering the buildings roofing.
The defensive system adumbrates constructors thoroughly deliberated and ready for every emergency. The casemate system lying along in the inner and outer walls of the fortress was complemented with ammunition-magazines and offices. The system could have been closed with robust beams, which could isolate the invasive enemy and at the same time the defensives could keep under fire the enclosed section. From the corner bastions the cannons scanning the moats could cast fatal fire on the invading enemy.
Into the walls of the casemates on the side of the enemy shaft (sap) initiatives were prepared in every 15 metres in order to enable the sappers to build a corridor for demolishing the firing positions of the offensive artillery. It was an important mission to scout the shafts built by the enemy as well.
The trunks got place in the breakpoints of the southern and western fosses, the cannons keeping under fire the network of trenches were in them as well as the entering the cortile was possible through them.
The northern section of the fortress in the diretion of the river Danube was developed in a different way: a classical bastion was built in it with three storeys, gun emplacements were formed for blocking the water traffic, assuring the southern flank of the Ndor-line and defencing the Danube gate of the fortress.
Approximately 10 15 artillery cannons could be placed on the breastwork extending from the Danube bastion to the west. The transportation of the ammunition for the cannons, the equipments and other material was solved with a railway pullable with human or animal power, the artillery material (cannons, ammunition and accessories) was kept moving vertically by block-and-falls and tackles evolved among the storeys. The accomodation of the operational force was installed behind the gun emplacements, the cannon materials of the field artillery were placed in the ground floor halls.
There was a great care in building the walls of the Danube bastion: similarly to the other buildings the exterior surface was covered with limestone slabs, specially reinforced at the crenelles and gun emplacements. The limestone was transported here from the mines of Dunaalms by horse tramway. The temporary brick-works were producing the bricks.
The sections between the external and internal walling were garreted by broken fragments and mortar material. This ensured a great robustness against the projectiles. We can boldly declare that the walls and the roofings were invulnerable by the contemporary artillery.
The Danube bastion was accessible from a direction of the river, respectively from a narrow strip of land between the fortress and the river, but these roads could be kept under fire from the bastions in the same manner as the Danube gate. the bastion was the soul of the artillery of the fortress.
The so called officers wing or officers building profoundly stretches into the court of the fortress. The crew space was eveloped on the paralell bank of the river Danube, from which huge windows were opened towards the court. The entrances of the quarters opened onto the corridors and on their other side embrasures for the infantry weapons were developed. A hospital ensuring room for 300 persons could be furnished in the building of the rank and file. The stable buildings were built in the northeastern corner of the fortress for the cavalry of which eastern continuation is the siding tower where architecturally remarkable halls were shaped.
The main entrance of the fortress was built on the eastern side. The outward gate is reachable amongst the earthbanks. Tho moat widens out amongst the receiving building and from this opens the main gate in front of which a pit-fall was built. The pitfall was spanned by a drawbridge and it was possible to obtain access to the corridor of the gate system through this. In the building of the main entrance a guard-room, detention-room, cantin and several other premises were created. Next to the half-trunk of the fortress a bakery was built consisting of four huge ovens, which together with the driver wells in the fortress - ensured self-sufficiency for the defensives.
According to the original plans a fortified garrison-building would have been built in the court as well. This polygonal building and the weapons placed in it would have ensured the entrance gates of the fortress and the internal sides of the building in case of the enemy manages to get into the inside of the fortress. However, for the sake of financial reasons, only the Danube bastion and the inner earthworks defending the officers wing were built.
The building complex of the Monostor Fortress was built between 1850 and 1871. Its dimension equals with the global inside area of the Old and New Fortress. During its construction sometimes a few hundred bricklayers and a few thousand workers worked on the erection of walls and earthworks. First the walls had to be built, then they had to be made dissapear from the sight of the enemy and its artillery. The this goal proposing earthworks necessitated enormous financial and human efforts. The Star-Entrechment was built in paralell with these works, which remarkably strengthened the fortress system.
After the completion of building the Fortress of Monostor the construction of the Fortress of Igmnd commenced, which was the last part of the originally planned as a closed line of defence on the right bank of the river Danube. The defensive system became completed with the newest fortress element between 1871 and 1877.
However, after building up the fortress system a substantial change began to make itself felt in the defense policy of the Monarchy. The stupendous scale development of the artillery generated new breech-loading pieces of ordnance provided with efficacious ammunition. The improvement of the gun-layer and informant instruments made possible to direct the firing of the cannons from an observational point and in this manner the so far concealed walls became shootable. the destructive grenades became more efficient and the range of the cannons (field-pieces, mortars, howitzers) increased by leaps and bounds.
All these resulted in that the Monarchy concentrated its energy to the borderland fortress systems, since these had to be reconstructed as an effects of the new battle procedures and technical elements. The exterior defense line had to be pushed out to 8 000 metres, the gun emplacements had to be placed into cuirass cupolas, the defensive buildings had to be strengthened by concrete. In Komrom this work was not done the fortress system played a smaller role because of its existence in the interior of the country -, though it is true that its strategic importance partially remained on account of the river Danube and assuring the ford. The fortress system of Komrom - along the river Danube as the principal artery of the empire - became the last bastion of the Monarchy. Its importance was made emphatic therewith just from the mutual Imperial and Royal Military were formations commanded to the garrisons (the formations of the Hungarian Royal Army were not placed in the fortress system till the end of the World War I). During the First World War parts of the Czechoslovakian and Royal Infantry Regiment Nr. 12, the Czechoslovakian and Royal Cavalry Regiment Radetzky Nr. 5 and significant fort and field artillery formations were stationed in the military station.
After the World War I Komrom in spite of the fact that the town and also the fortress system was split in halves by the river Danube as a boundary river retained its garrison town character. The Hungarian Royal Army - established in 1922 took possession primarily of the Fortress of Monostor and the so called camp of artillery from the fortresses remained in Hungary.
The troops of the Hungarian Royal Army on 6th November, 1938 as a result of the first Vienna Award marched into the opposite bank town and in this way the whole fortress system fell into Hungarian hands. In the Old Fortress and in the Star-Fort ammunition-magazines were formed, the Fortress of Igmnd and from 1942 the Fortress of Monostor became the pool of the interned Polish soldiers. Significant armed forces were garrisoned in the fortress and in the other elements of the fortress system. Amongst them the most major is the Hungarian Royal Infantry Regiment Nr. 22 conveyed from here to the eastern front line and the Gyrgy Klapka Artillery Detachment Nr. 6.
After the World War II the Soviets built the biggest ammunition-magazine of the Southern Army Group in the Fortress of Monostor. Several thousands of waggons of ammunition were forwarded from the strictly guarded objects. The leading role of the march out, the ammunition and explosive releasement and the renovation works fell to the share of the Hungarian Army.
In 2000 the Fortress of Monostor Military Culture Center Non-Profit Company brought into being by the organizations financed by state budget assumed the maintenance of the fortress. The Non-Profit Company attained a whole series of programs in time passed by and its long-term plans allude to the gradual and complete rehabilitation of the fortress. They plan that the Fortress of Monostor preserves its in Europe unique 19th century atmosphere, fits the requirements of the protection of historic buildings and assures primariness of fostering the military traditions.
The exhibition arranged in the Museum of Military History is on show from 1998, which displays the military history of the fortress from the 15th century. The fortresses of Komrom were put on the candidate list of the historic buildings of the Hungarian World Heritage on 1st December, 2000.
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