In 830, Waldmohr had its first documentary mention in the
Lorsch codex as
villa Moraha – “village on the boggy brook”. In 1449, the village passed into the lordship of the Dukes of
Palatine Zweibrücken and remained under their rule until the duchy itself was swept away by the events of the
French Revolution in 1794. Under
French rule, Waldmohr became the seat of the like-named
canton in the
Department of
Sarre, thus beginning the village's history as an administrative seat. After the French
occupation ended, the
Palatinate passed to the
Kingdom of Bavaria, with Waldmohr retaining its function as the cantonal seat for 57 villages between
Kirkel and
Glan-Münchweiler. It lost its place as such only after the separation of the Saar after the
First World War. In 1920, Waldmohr was assigned to the
Bezirksamt of Kusel and downgraded to a
Bezirksamt branch location. In 1946, it was grouped into the then newly founded
state of
Rhineland-Palatinate, and in 1971, when it became the seat of the
Verbandsgemeinde of Waldmohr, it regained some of its lost glory.
Antiquity The
barrows that go back to middle
Late Hallstatt times (about 550 BC) on both sides of the
Rhineland-Palatinate-
Saarland boundary in the Kuhwald (“Cow Forest”) visibly bear witness even today to early settlement, and after
archaeological digs at two of them in 1995 and 1996 they became an attraction for those interested in history. The old highway is still today recognizable along almost its whole length, and much broader than an ordinary country path. In various descriptions from the 14th to the 16th century, it is called the
Mohrerweg or
Landstraße von Mor nach Erbach (“Highway from Mor to Erbach”), with
Mor or
Mohr in each case referring to Waldmohr (the prefix
Wald— simply means “forest”). Long-settled villagers still speak today of the old
Homburger Weg (Erbach lies near Homburg, and is today a constituent community of that town), while in Erbach, it is seen as the
Waldmohrer Weg. This east-west road link is of
Roman origin, if not even older. After the Romans withdrew in the early 5th century, the region was almost empty of people, and only once the
Franks had come to take the land was it slowly settled once more. In this time, the
Bliesgau was grouped administratively into
Francia.
Middle Ages The placename
Moraha was used for centuries more, even after the name
Waltmore had had its first documentary mention in 1418. From 1190 to 1441, a knightly family named “von Moran” was mentioned as being among the
vassals of the Counts of Homburg. Several times, the counts pledged the village and court of
More, or at least parts thereof, for example, between 1383 and 1410 to the
Counts of Veldenz, and once again to the same noble house between 1449 and 1475. In 1312, forty farmers were living in Waldmohr. From 1475 to 1815, the
Schultheißerei of Waldmohr belonged to the Duchy of
Palatine Zweibrücken. As early as 1404, Waldmohr was mentioned as being the seat of a lower court.
Modern times In 1535, the
Reformation was introduced, after a parish had existed since at least 1219 according to records. The existence of a
school in Waldmohr is mentioned for the first time in a 1564 Visitation report. In 1605 came the first mention of an actual schoolhouse. In 1609, the village had 225
Reformed inhabitants at 42 “hearth places” (for which, read “households”). Waldmohr did not fare well in the
Thirty Years' War, when troops burnt it down in 1622 and destroyed it utterly in 1635. In 1688 and 1689, the village was once again beset and burnt down in the
Nine Years' War (known in Germany as the
Pfälzischer Erbfolgekrieg, or War of the Palatine Succession). From 1679 to 1697, Waldmohr – along with the whole region – found itself under
French rule. In 1701, a new schoolhouse was built. In 1704, the Eichelscheiderhof had its first documentary mention, as did the Waldziegelhütte in 1749. Between 1752 and 1757,
Duke Christian IV had the Eichelscheiderhof stud farm built on the site of the estate of that name. It was built in the shape of a small palatial residence with its gateway into the horseshoe-shaped complex. In 1765, near the old village church
auf der Fels (“On the Cliff”), the new
Evangelical church was consecrated. In 1775, a directory of
Reformed parishioners (for Waldmohr only), not counting shepherds, menservants or maidservants, listed 54 men, 71 women, 91 boys and 89 girls. The parish belonged until the establishment of the
Oberamt of Homburg in 1781 to the Inspection of Zweibrücken, to which the village also belonged administratively. From 1798 to 1815, Waldmohr was seat of the like-named
canton in the
Department of
Sarre, and seat, too, of a
mairie (“mayoralty”), belonging to which were Waldmohr,
Jägersburg,
Kleinottweiler, Höchen,
Frohnhofen,
Breitenbach,
Altenkirchen and
Dittweiler. Besides Waldmohr, the canton also included
Kübelberg, Schönenberg, Sand,
Miesau, Elschbach, Scheidenberg (Schanzer Mühle),
Ohmbach and
Brücken. The canton belonged to the
Arrondissement of Saarbrücken. An 1812 record mentions a cantonal
prison in Waldmohr. In 1813, Waldmohr had 683 inhabitants.
Recent times Beginning in 1816, after
Napoleon’s downfall and the
Congress of Vienna, Waldmohr belonged to the
Kingdom of Bavaria, within which it was once again seat of the like-named canton, but now within the
Landcommissariat of Homburg in the
Rheinkreis (the
Palatinate under Bavarian rule). The Canton of Waldmohr now contained 57 villages, estates and mills. That same year, the village was given a
magistrates’ court. In 1824, the common schoolhouse was built on Bahnhofstraße (“Railway Station Street”). A new steeple was dedicated in 1831 on the occasion of the
Silver Jubilee of
King Maximilian I Joseph's coronation. In 1834, the municipality founded
Catholic education. Completed in 1850 was the town hall, which also housed the court, which from the very beginning caused a space problem. Only in 1901 could the municipality open its own courthouse – today a community centre – and at the same time a forester's office across the street. In 1855, a
post office was set up in Waldmohr, in its own building. In 1873, the Waldmohr municipal health insurance fund took up its healthcare function, and was only dissolved on 31 December 1913 by the
Reichsversicherungsordnung (“
Imperial Insurance Order”), whereupon it was taken over by the general health insurance fund.
Journalism began in Waldmohr in 1892 with the publication of the first edition of the
Waldmohrer Zeitung (meaning simply “Waldmohr
Newspaper”), and in 1895, the first master forester for the Waldmohr forester's office region was named. In 1916, electric light came to Waldmohr, after gaslights had replaced petroleum lamps in 1905. The Waldziegelhütte, on the other hand, had been electrified in 1914, the same year that a motorized bus route began running from Waldmohr to Bexbach, Oberbexbach and the Frankenholz mine. A
telephone exchange was built on Bahnhofstraße in 1928. From 1920 until the Saar's reintegration into Germany in 1935, after
Adolf Hitler and the
Nazis had swept the
Weimar Republic away and instituted the
Third Reich, Waldmohr was a
border village. One consequence was that Waldmohr was split away from the
Bezirksamt (equivalent to
Kreis – district) of Homburg to which it had belonged, and a branch location of the
Bezirksamt of Kusel was therefore set up in Waldmohr for all municipalities that had likewise belonged to the now
occupied Bezirksamt. In 1927, a branch location of the Kusel labour office was also located in the village. With the approach of the
Second World War, the first fortifications began to appear in Waldmohr's municipal area in 1938. This was part of the
Westwall, commonly known in
English as the
Siegfried Line. There were
tank trenches,
dragon's teeth,
bunkers and road barriers, all installed by
Organisation Todt. In the autumn of that year, more than two thousand soldiers (horse-drawn
artillery) were posted to the Kuhwald. Until 1995, a big horse's drinking trough recalled this event. Organisation Todt built the Siegfried Line's second Main Battle Line (
Hauptkampflinie, HKL) in and around Waldmohr, with more than 30 bunkers (although 70 had been planned). On
Kristallnacht (9–10 November 1938),
SS commandoes from outside the village perpetrated great destruction at
Jewish villagers’ homes, particularly at Dr. Salomon's (dentist) and Dr. Levi's (general practitioner), among others. In 1944, more fortifications, trenches, dams and road barriers were laid out, along with so-called Tobruk bunkers. During the war, bombs fell on Höcherstraße and Glanstraße (streets), as well as in the surrounding countryside, causing deaths and damage to houses. After the war, from 1946 to 1960, Waldmohr once again became a border village as the Saar was once again
occupied by the victorious
Allies. Shortly after the 1948 currency reform, though, new businesses were coming to the municipality and setting up industrial operations. In 1958, the labour office branch and the municipal revenue agency were housed in a new office building on the street then called Hauptstraße (“Main Street”, but now called Saarpfalzstraße, or “Saar-Palatinate Street”). In 1960, a 70-hectare commercial-industrial park began to open up in the Kuhwald and on the heath. In 1964, a modern school with a
gymnasium and a small indoor
swimming pool was opened. In 1971, the
Verbandsgemeinde of Waldmohr was founded, with Waldmohr itself as the administrative seat. Besides Waldmohr, the new
Verbandsgemeinde comprised
Dunzweiler and
Breitenbach. In 1980, the municipality celebrated its 1,150-year jubilee by dedicating a new marketplace and the new village centre. On 6 October 2020, Waldmohr received town rights from the government of Rhineland-Palatinate.
Population development Waldmohr was as early as the
Middle Ages one of the bigger villages. In 1312, forty farmers were living there. According to Tilemann Stella, it was 43 in 1547. In 1609, the village had 225
Reformed inhabitants in 42 households, according to a church protocol. The population was greatly reduced in the
Thirty Years' War, leaving only six subjects (families) in Waldmohr in 1655 (seven years after the war ended). Nonetheless, the number of families rose again quickly, but then the
Nine Years' War wrought further decimation. A 1675 record reads “Waldmohr, burnt down, 16 families”. During the 18th century, growth became continuous, although by now, a few families were
emigrating. In 1696, there were 24 “hearth places” (households; 1 clergyman, 1 schoolteacher, 15 farmers, 1 cooper, 1 cabinetmaker, 1 shepherd, 2 maids, 3 menservants and 3 day labourers). In 1718, 42 residences were counted in Waldmohr; by 1760 this had risen to 70. In 1813, in late
Napoleonic times, Waldmohr had 683 inhabitants. Old documents convey to the modern reader only a few villagers’ names, and indeed until the early 15th century, usually only first names were recorded. An “immigration patent” issued by the Duke of Zweibrücken after the 1648
Peace of Westphalia was meant to raise the region's population after the wartime devastation. Only a second such patent issued in 1698 by
Duke Karl XII met with great success, bringing many families from
Switzerland to Waldmohr (Munzinger, Agne, Hollinger, Sandmeyer, Danner, Gerhard, Bächle, Blum, Burckhardt, Klein, Keller, Cloß, Jakoby, Kurtz). According to the original 1845 cadastral survey, it seems that destitution (division of inheritance, hunger, early death) and the
1848/1849 political upheavals were the main forces driving people to emigrate from the region. Many names are accompanied by notes such as “out of the country – in the land of America”. Nevertheless, in the latter half of the 19th century, ever more people were coming to Waldmohr, even with the fee for becoming a local citizen having been set at 102.85 marks in 1878. During the building of the
Nordfeldbahndamm – a
railway embankment – between 1902 and 1904, several
Italians were employed who settled in the village. The two world wars exacted a heavy toll in blood, particularly the
Second World War, which claimed many victims. With the separation of the Saar from the rest of Germany after both world wars, many customs officials and their families came to Waldmohr. Both in
Weimar times and after the Second World War, miners’ families moved to the
Ruhr area or the
Aachen mining region either out of need for work or for better wages. In the 1940s and 1950s,
ethnic Germans driven out of Germany's former eastern territories came to settle in Waldmohr. Only the location of industry and opening of valuable building land over the past few decades, however, coupled with good infrastructure development over that time, has led to steady population growth through migration, mainly from the
Homburg area,
Neunkirchen and the
Glan valley. Also, quite a few Turkish families came beginning in 1971. After the
Soviet Union's downfall, many ethnically German families from
Kazakhstan and
Kyrgyzstan – former
Volga Germans and
Black Sea Germans – came to the village. The commonest names in the village these days are still Bächle, Bauer, Becker, Blum, Braun, Burkart/Burkhardt, Ecker, Emich, Hoffmann, Jung, Kampa, Keller, Kiefer, Klein, Krupp, Leibrock, Lothschütz, Maurer, Metzger, Müller, Rapp, Schäfer, Schmidt/Schmitt, Schneider, Schwarz, Simon, Trumm, Wagner, Weber, Weiß/Weis/Weiss, Wolf, Wunn and Zimmer. The following table shows population development over the centuries for Waldmohr, with some figures broken down by religious denomination:
Municipality’s name As early as
prehistoric and
protohistoric times, the Waldmohr area was settled, as
archaeological finds (such as blades, small
lacrymatories, remnants of
smelting ovens) and
barrows bear witness. The first documentary mention dates from AD 830 and is found in a document from
Lorsch Abbey, the
Lorsch codex (also known as the
Reichsurbar,
Codex Laureshamensis; kept at the State Archive in
Munich), in which the three royal estates of
Lutra,
Nannenstuol and
Mörahha are named (the last one corresponding with the second syllable in “Waldmohr”). The name's meaning comes mainly from the
Old High German terms
mor for “wetland” (
Old English had the same word, and the
English “moor” and the
German Moor are both still used today) and
ahha for either “brook” or “water”. A few researchers, however, derive the
mör part of the name from the
Latin mora, which can mean either a stay or a rhetorical pause (a royal estate as a rest stop?). The word
ahha crops up a number of times in Old High German poetry from
Carolingian times, spelt with only one H, thus
aha, and always means “water”. Over the centuries, the village called itself, using various spellings,
mora,
Mohra,
More,
Moir,
Mohr and
mor or
Mor. Only in 1418 did the name
Waltmore crop up. The name, later
Waltmor,
Waltmohr,
Waldmoor,
Waldtmohr and eventually Waldmohr, only became generally customary in the 17th century; the prefix was meant to distinguish “Mohr” from other, nearby, similarly named places such as
Kirchmohr, Niedermohr and
Obermohr, among others. ==Religion==