Schloss Pfullingen

Pfullingen, The county of Reutlingen

The so-called “Untere Burg” was another residence of the Remp family in Pfullingen and was mentioned in sources dating back to the 14th century. It was the first building to stand where the Schloss Pfullingen is located now. In 1487, Caspar Remp sold his properties in Pfullingen, including the castle, to Count Eberhard V of Württemberg, but retained a lifelong residential and right of use. During the reign of Count Christoph the Schloss Pfullingen was remodeled into a rectangular four-wing complex. Another addition was the arched bridge crossing the river Echaz, which still exists today.

After the Protestants were defeated by the Habsburgs in the Battle of Nördlingen in 1634, the Archduchess Claudia of Austria claimed, among other things, the so-called “Pfandschaft Achalm.” Pfullingen became the center of power and the Schloss Pfullingen its official seat. In 1648, Württemberg was able to regain the “Pfandschaft Achalm” as part of the Peace of Westphalia. Whilst it was heavily used during the second half of the 17th century, the castle obtained a new function when Pfullingen and other nearby cities like Ober- and Unterhausen or Honau separated from Urach in 1699. It became the Oberamt and was merged with the Oberamt Reutlingen in 1806. In the 1820s, the castle was sold into private ownership. The north wing got demolished in 1835. In 1845, the castle got an entirely different purpose and was developed into an asylum for the mentally ill by Frederick Flamm, a surgeon from Eningen. His son, Otto Flamm, expanded the Pfullinger Schloss so far as at the end of the 19th century it had become its own self-sufficient settlement within Pfullingen. It had its own church, workshops, a bakery and a butcher’s shop as well as a bowling alley, a spring water supply and gardens. Then, around 600 patients were treated there. Consecutively, the First World War and the resulting poor financial situation led to the asylum being closed in 1922.

Not shortly afterwards a shoe factory took over, which was later sold to the Lederfabrik (leather factory) J. J. Schlayer. During the Second World War, it was mostly reliant on forced labor carried out by Polish and Russian prisoners of war, which is the reason why the French turned it into a camp for displaced persons after the war had ended. It got dissolved in 1955 when Pfullingen had already bought the castle for 850.000 Deutsche Mark, which amounts to about 435.000 EUR or 443.000 USD. In the 1960s parts of the original building were demolished to make room for a school. Among those were the asylum’s gardens and the storage for vegetables and such dating back to the middle-ages. Today, the Schloss Pfullingen is home to some social clubs and a kindergarten as well as the city’s music school.