Abraham Schacht (shaft) was the original main shaft of the Himmelfahrt Fundgrube (mine) in the 19th century. Significant ore discoveries in 1828 led to substantial developments, including extensive upgrading of the shaft. By the mid-19th century, all main mining buildings at the Abraham shaft had been modernised, and new buildings erected. The buildings already existing at the Abraham shaft, such as the crew house, the old Huthaus administration and assembly building (Huthaus), or the water-driven gin hoisting house, either continued to be used, or were replaced with new buildings. The latter included the mine forge (1834), jig washing station (1834), the hoisting house with waste heap bridge leading to the sorting house (1839), the sorting house (1842), the new administration and assembly building (1843), a new administration building (1846), and a horse-drawn ore railway, for which a tunnel was built. When, in 1886, the now expansive Himmelfahrt Fundgrube was taken over by the Saxon state, the shaft again underwent a large-scale renovation, which included converting hoisting from water power to steam power.
The shaft complex was once again used during the last mining period from the 1930s to 1968, this time as an extraction and ventilation shaft. After 1969 the steam hoisting engine and the steel head frame were removed and the hoisting house restored into its original structure of the 19th century. The preserved structures of the shaft are documenting the complete ensemble of a silver mine of the time around the middle of the 19th century.
