Holiday in the North Sea -
Come to Baltrum!

Watery Grave

Near the "Bibelkreisheim" (building for Bible group) in Ostdorf on Baltrum you will find a grave, alone in the dunes. Here lies Hendrik Dirk de Boer.

In older days there was a "doodpaal" ("death pole"), made of Brazilian hardwood, nowadays you will find a memorial stone; the weather-beaten sign says:

About this grave the islanders tell the following story:

During the low tide a Dutch captain, called "Jan de Boer" by the locals, was waiting for the high tide on the mud flats outside Baltrum. His ship was the "Jaltina", a sailing ship, with a flat bottom, a mast and on both sides swords that was mainly used on the "Wadden" (that part of the Northsea that consists of shallow parts with mud flats) It happened often, that with an east wind ships were stuck for days in the flat "Wadden", because a strong wind would blow or push the water out the Northsea and because the ships were often sailing with heavy loads. That's why skipper "Jan" de Boer had to go to Baltrum, to get new supplies.

When he came on the island, he demanded white bread and genever. The inhabitants could not meet his demands since they were very poor, so they offered him black or rye bread and goat's milk instead. The Dutchman was furious and expressed that he would not want to live on such a miserable heap of sand, well, he would not want to be buried there either, for that matter!.

As a result of the low water level his ship could not continue its journey in the following days either and completely unexpected captain "Jan" de Boer died.

His crew members asked the islands, if they would allow them to bury the dead captain on the island cemetery. But the islanders had not forgotten the things the deceased had said about their island: "He would not even want to be buried on the cemetery of Baltrum..." The islanders see the unexpected death of the captain as a sign of God's punishing justice and refuse to give him a Christian burial on the island cemetery. That is the reason why "Jan" de Boer's people were allowed to bury their captain in the solitary dunes.