Berkhey: a village swallowed by history

Berkheide is a reserve in the dunes between Scheveningen and Katwijk on the dutch coast, well known by many nature lovers. Few people though know that the name of the area can be traced back tot Berkhey, a fishing village that was an outcast in the late Middle Ages and eventually was swept away by the end of the sixteenth century.

In the fourteenth century the Lord of Voorschoten, Gillis van Cralingen, came to the area of Wassenaar, the Netherlands. In 1396 he established the village of Berkhey in the dunes. ‘Berk’ means birch, a tree that was common in that area. ‘Hey’ means moorland, suggesting the new born village was meant for cattle breeding.

But the truth was that the Lord had planned a fishing village. Fishery was very successful these days in the surrounding villages Scheveningen and Katwijk aan Zee. Van Cralingen wanted his share. He would give anyone willing to work as a fisherman land to build a house. In exchange he demanded some of the catch and four percent of the yield. The plan turned out to be fortunate, leading to serious rivalry between Berkhey and the surrounding towns.

According to the Society Old Katwijk, the people of Berkhey were mostly heretics and scum. But the competitive situation might have lead to that assumption. From 1412, it was prohibited for people from Katwijk to settle in Berkhey or even to communicate with inhabitants of the nearby village.

Little is know about what happened to Berkhey after that. Quite a few heavy floods, like the Elizabeth Flood of 1421 and the All Saints Day Flood of 1570, swallowed parts of Katwijk and Scheveningen. It is likely to assume that Berkhey was stricken as well. The register of Berkhey fishing boats in that period recorded nine so called pincks in 1475 and only two left in 1515, a down bound trend.

Berkhey is pictured one more time in a preserved 1598 drawing of a stranded sperm whale. The village is on a french map dated 1622, but after that, history erased the unfortunate fishing village. The fact that derivates from Berkhey still are quite common today as surnames in Katwijk, supposes that the last inhabitants of Berkhey fled to the nearby village.

Rudolf Diesel: the vanishing

In early fall of 1913, german inventor Rudolf Diesel disappears during a night crossing from Belgium to England. One moment he is having dinner with two business compagnions, next he goes to his cabin for the night, never to be seen again. The official explanation is suicide, but some weird happenings after indicate something very different.

Sunday evening September 29th 1913. World peace is at geopardy, but no-one has ever heard of world war. On the belgian coast the last sunlight disappears at the horizon and the SS Dresden has just set out for Harwich. The first class passengers have joined dinner, the steam machine makes the table silver tinkle smoothly and three gentleman in a corner of the dining room just finished their main course. One of them obtained fame and wealth by inventing a revolutionary engine that will eventually replace the steam machine.
Rudolf Diesel is aged 55 and has a friendly face with glasses. His career is impressive, he is worth 2.5 million dollars (which would be around 62 million today) and about to retire. Together with his friends and business partners Luckmann and Carels Diesel is on his way to London to attend the annual board meeting of Consolidated Diesel Engine Manufacturers.

Banned from Paris
Rudolf Christian Karl Diesel is born in Paris on 18 March 1858 as the second child of german immigrants Elise Strobel and Theodor Diesel. Theodor, who was born in Augsburg, is a bookbinder in Paris, where he meets Elise, from Nuremberg. Later, he starts trading leatherware.
Due to the Franco-Prussian War, the Diesel family become unwanted in France, so they move to London. Shortly after, his parents send 12 year old Rudolf back to Augsburg, to move in with his uncle and aunt. His oncle is a maths teacher, the industrial revolution is ongoing and little Rudolf decides he wants a technical career. After highschool, he joins a technical education in Augsburg and the technical universitiy of Munich. One of his teachers there is Carl von Linde, a brilliant engineer and inventor of cooling technology, who will eventually, in the year Diesel disappears mysteriously, wins the Nobel Prize in Physics.

After graduating in 1880, Diesel returns to Paris. He comes across Von Linde and starts working for him. Three years later, he meets Martha Flasche and they become the parensts of three children. In 1890 the family moves to Berlin and Diesel gets a high position at the Linde company.

Instant succes
Working on the early cooling technique, Diesel starts thinking about alternatives for the steam machine and combustion engine. He believes the efficiency of these machines is far too low and he invents a system of ignition by pressure. As the combustion takes longer and happens under higher pressure, the output turns out to be much higher.
In 1892 he registers his invention and armament manufacturer Krupps turns out to be an investor. One year later, the first prototype runs on arachis oil. The huge machine has a 22 centimeter bore and 40 centimeter stroke. In 1895, it has an efficiency of 16,6 percent.
The next year, Diesel starts working on a revisited version, achieving 26,2 percent out of petrolium. THis machine is showcased during a 1889 exposition in Munich. According to the Grande Encyclopedie Practique de Mechanique et d’Electricité from 1910, the efficiency and simplicity make Diesel’s machine an instant success. Diesel starts making money by selling manufacturing licencies. His invention is used in generators, locomotives, shipping, factories and automotive, turning Diesel into a wealthy man by the turn of the century. In 1912, more than 70,000 diesel engines are operational worldwide.

Disappeared
However, fortune doesn’t last forever.Autumn 1913, Rudolf Diesel and two business friends take the nightboat to England, on their way to a board meeting and an opening ceremony of a new factory. Diesel doesn’t make the crossing. He doesn’t show up for breakfast and when the ferry docks in Harwich, the inventor has disappeared without a trace. The mystery get headlines all over the world. The New York Times quote one of his travelling companions, George Carels, director of Diesel’s company: “After leaving Antwerp, we had dinner together. Next, we strolled on deck, chatting and smoking. Mister Diesel was well tempered. By 10 pm, the lights of Vlissingen in view, I suggested it was time to go to bed. Mister Diesel agreed and all three of us went to their cabins.”
According to Carels, Diesel seemed to hesitate at the entrance of his cabin. He walked back to Carels, shook his hand, wished him good night and said ‘See you in the morning’. “Those were the very last words he ever spoke to me”, Carels remembers.
Next morning, Diesel is missing at the breakfast table. Carels and Luckmann go to his cabin and knock on the door. No-one answers. They open the door, only to find Diesel’s bed unslept. “The blanket was folded and his nightgown was on top. His keys were in his bag and his watch hang in a position so he could read it from his bed”, Carels witnesses. “Everything seemed neat in his cabin. I could not tell if there was money missing, since I did not know how much he had on him. But it did not look as if someone had been through his things. But since hir arrival voucher had not been handed in, we knew for shure he had not disembarked. He was not on board either, so he had to have fallen overboard during the night.”

Heavy debts
Carels repeats Diesel seemed happy and cheerful during the last night. “If it wasn’t an accident, something must have gone wrong in his mind. He never drunk much, didn’t smoke and didn’t suffer from vertigo, as far as I know.” Still, Diesel had told some friends earlier that he would sometimes go through periods of insomnia, making him walk around all night, dead tired. Business worries and extreme work stress had damaged his health.
Two weeks after his disappearance, new facts show up. His presumed wealth is doubted by german newspapers, writing that Diesel left his family with heavy debts. It is rumoured that Diesel invested his money in unsuccessful companies and some newspapers suggest this was reason for Diesel to disappear one way or another.
On 14 October 1913, Diesel’s creditors meet up in Munich. They calculate his debts around 375,000 dollar, with only 10,000 dollar assets to cover up. On top of that, his real estate is booked for much more that its actual value.

Weird article
In March 1914,half a year after Diesel’s disappearance, Münchener Abend Zeitung publishes a weird article. According to the newspaper, some letters, received in Germany, would prove that Diesel started a new life in Canada. Since the paper doesn’t concretise its story, the rumour should not be taken too seriously. But by that time, it is obvious Diesel had some good reasons to vanish. It has always been unclear wether this body was ever recovered. A dead, well dressed man is found in the estuary of the Schelde river near Vlissingen, eleven days after Diesel’s disappearance. By the shape and age, it could have been Diesel. One day earlier, near Norway, another found body is suspected to be the missing engineer’s. The sailors won’t take the body on board, because it is too decomposed. But they do take some artifacs from this body and it is rumoured that Diesel’s son Eugen recognized them. But if it is true that Diesel wanted to escape from his creditors, Eugen had a good reason to make the world believe that his father was dead.
It is also rumoured that, shortly before setting off to England, handed a bag to his wife Martha, instructing her to open it a week later. So she does after the missing, finding 200,000 marks in cash. In his agenda, Diesel marked 29 September, the day of his disappearance, with a black cross.

History became legend, legend became myth. Tolkien could have written that line on Rudolf Diesel. True, it is most likely that financial trouble moved Diesel to kill himself that fateful night on the North Sea. But it is an attractive idea to believe that he fled to Canada, from where he has watched the uprising success of his invention from a distance. Fortunately, it is impossible that he lived to see the disaster called Dieselgate.

Conspiracy theories
Every mystery cries out for conspiracy theories. Even today, there are people who don’t believe Diesel’s passing was suicide, nor that he fled from his creditors. They say Diesel was thrown overboard and that there are two possible motives for murder. The oil industry had reasons to want him dead, because the diesel engine was so economical that they feared for their business. Hardly believable, since no-one ever killed Elon Musk so far.
Slightly more believable is the theory that Diesel travelled to England to sell his knowledge to the british navy. The first world war was forthcoming and diesel engines were crucial for german submarines. The german secret service might have stopped him from selling it to the English.

The return of a dead baron

In 1876 the body of a dutch nobleman vanished in thin air. In 2015 workers discover a mysterious coffin in the garden of his castle. Is this the baron?

It is the year 1876 in Kessel, a tiny, idyllic village on a rivershore in the south-east Netherlands. Bypassing skippers recognise the town from the recently completed neogothical church and the bold, medieval castle Keverberg, that seem in peaceful coexistence. But reality is quite different. The lord of the castle and the priest are in a conflict that eventually will lead to a mystery that will be told from generation to generation during the upcoming 150 years.

keverberg castle kessel limburg netherlands — Castle Keverberg overlooking the Maas river en the late 18th century.

On Wednesday September 27th, baron Frederick Henry Charles of Keverberg is near death in his house Villa Oeverberg, a few hundred feet upstream of his castle. After only 51 years, illness and alcohol are about to end his turbulent, miserable life. In his last will, written a few days ago, it says that Baron Frits, as villagers tend to call him, blames his mother, brother and daughter for his decay, because they all turned their back on him. As a result of a dispute with the priest he has stated that he shall not be buried according to catholic rituals. Instead, he offers his body for scienific purposes to the University of Leiden, where he once studied. However, the university kindly rejects and the baron never makes it to the cemetery. What does happen to his remains, no-one knows. The body seems to have vanished in the air, those last days of September 1876.

keverberg kessel limburg netherlands castle — Keverberg Castle as it is today.

Who was Baron Frits and what turned him into the lonely, bitter man whose body disappeared during the mid-nineteenth century? Frederick Henry was born July 22th 1825 in Stonor, England, as the second child of the british Mary Lodge and the dutch baron Charles Louis of Keverberg. The father was a political hotshot. He had served under Napoleon during the french occupation and turned to King William 1 after the French were expelled. He died in 1841 and his family moved to Castle Keverberg in Kessel. At that time, Frits was a law student in Leiden and already had his first disputes with the Van Wylick-family, a powerful dynasty that Frits accused of stealing his property. Despite these fights, Frits became town councellor in 1851. Shortly after that, his mother and siblings left Keverberg to move to another castle, Aldenghoor in the nearby village of Haelen. Frits was alone in his castle, but not for long.

1857 he married Louise Villers de Pité, who gave birth to their daughter Mary Mathile a few years later. But the joy of a child could not consolidate the marriage. It was widely known that the castle was the scene to many terrible fights between the couple, eventually resulting in Louise fleading. When little Mary Mathilde was seven years old, she was taken away by her grandmother to never be brought back. The child spend her youth in several boarding schools. She even lived a while under a false name in Duesseldorf, Germany, to keep her hidden from her father. In 1859 Baron Frits lost his position in the town council, but he was not ready to let that happen. The next meeting, half past nine in the morning, he entered the room, obviously drunk, only to insult his successor. During a game of cards with some high placed friends in The Hague, Frits got an argument with a Prussian prince. Only diplomatic intervention could restrain them from a duel with pistols.

In 1869 it was priest Simons’ turn to become subject to baron Frits’ rage. Simons had the old church torn down and replaced by a new and bigger house of God. The old building had stood partly on the castle’s ground and tradition had it that this part was therefore exclusively for the habitants of the castle. This was not the case with the new church and thus the priest considered the tradition to be outdated. For compensation, Simons offered the baron the first row in church, but Frits did not accept that. He attended the first masses outside, on the exact spot where his old, private bench had been.

The priest critisized his default of catholic obligation, but baron Frits replied that he was very capable of getting to peace with God by himself. He never attended a mass again and his separation with the catholic church was definate. This was the reason why Frits did not want to be buried according to catholic tradition and therefore the cause of the mysterious disappearance of his dead body.

Villa Oeverberg Keverberg Kessel Limburg Netherlands — Villa Oeverberg, where baron Keverberg passed away.

Was he buried in the gardens of his house Villa Oeverberg? The castle’s gardens? The family tomb in Haelen? The latter was not very likely, since Frits had disputes with his relatives as well. It is said that on his deathbed he had a loaded revolver standby, just in case his mother and siblings would come to say farewell. True or not, it is a fact that in his last will it can be read that he left serious sums of money to his maid and his servant, under the condition they would succeed to keep his relatives out.

Thus, a myth was born and told from father to son to grandson. Albeid it was not really all that mysterious. The dutch writer and historian Jacobus Craandijk visited the castle in 1880 and wrote about an overgrown grave in a corner of the yard, that was said to contain the castle’s last noble inhabitant. Although that assertion could not stop the myth, it does help a lot when over a century later, June 25th 2015, workers find a lead coffin in the castle’s garden.

A month later the coffin is opened by forensic antropologue Birgit Berk. She scrutinises the remains to conclude that they belonged to a 44 to 53 year old male, 175 to 179 centimeters tall. That suits with the few things we know about baron Frits. Stains on the inside of the ribs witness of a heavy case of pneumonia, perhaps tuberculosis, which could very well be the disease that killed the baron back in 1876. The lead coffin and hardly worn (i.e. little physical labor) joints make it likely this was a wealthy man.

baron keverberg kessel coffin castle limburg netherlands — Baron Keverberg’s coffin on display in the basement of his castle.

Alltogether it is almost sure that the lost body of baron Frits is back, almost 139 years afte rit vanished. Still, we will probably never be hundred percent sure. That would need a DNA-match, but who to match with? His daughter Mary Mathilde became a nun and was buried in the convent’s cemetery, which was emptied in 1976, with all the bones thrown in a mass grave. Only Frits’ sister Elfrida’s remains can be found in a markes grave in the city of Roermond. Should she be exhumed? Perhaps it is better to spare what’s left of the mystery.

This article was published November 2015 in Quest Historie

Religious homicide at sea: the secret of KW 171

In 1915 the entire crew of a fishing boat gets insane at the middle of the North Sea. 3 men are killed by the others. What drove those men to this cruelty?

Over a century ago, the crew of a dutch fishing boat gets insane on the middle of the North Sea. Three men are cruelly assasinated by their collegues, after which the rest spend the days waiting for the apocalypse, whilst praying and singing psalms. What took posession of the crew of the KW 171, the fishing boat that history would call the fool’s lugger?

Slowly and carefully the norwegian steam vessel Jonas Reis approaches the drifting fishing boat. From the port side, the captain scrutinises the vessel under him. It is sunday September 12th 1915 on the Doggersbank, in the middle of the North Sea, about 130 miles east of Scarborough. The Jonas Reid has left Tyne the day before. Half an hour ago, the fishing boat caught the captain’s eye. It draw his attention because all sails were down at mid sea. But when they got nearer, the captain saw the sails were not just lowered, but torn apart. He immediately ordered the machine room to stop the propellor and now they get closer, the captain gets a sinister premonition.

That turns out to be right. By the time the vessel with registration number KW 171 on the hull is about 50 feet away from the Jonas Reid, the skipper perceives to his dismay a complete chaos on deck. Not only are the sails torn apart, the ship’s rigging is completely dismantled and the hatches and katrols are gone. Five or six men are spreaded on deck, answering the skipper’s look with frightened eyes. On the rear deck, the captain observes dark red spots. Blood? It takes him a while to get himself back together and call all hands on deck.

The KW 171, also known as North Sea 5, was a sailing lugger built in 1906, based in Katwijk. This dutch fishing village with a very closed character did not have its own harbour. In former ages they used tot sail on flatboats that would be pulled on the beach. After these more traditional ships were replaced by faster and therefore more efficient luggers, the Katwijk fleet was forced to divert to neighbouring harbours.

On Tuesday August 3th 1915 the KW 171 set sail from IJmuiden, 15 miles north from it’s hometown Katwijk. It was the second voyage with this 13 men crew under the command of the 39 years old skipper Nicolaas de Haas. Also on board were navigator Pieter van Duijn (28), Jacob Jonker (33), Klaas Kuijt, seaman and cook Reijn Ros, his 13 years old son Arie Ros, brothers Arie (28) and Leen (17) Vlieland, P. v/d Plas (43), P. Heemskerk (29), J. Kuijt (16), W. Huwwaard and 13 years old D. de Mol. The team got along very well and the first voyage had been a very pleasant one, according tot he skippers wife in a newspaper after the cruel event that would soon occur.

Katwijk in these years was a very orthodox religious community. The First World War raged outside and although the Netherlands remained neutral, the war cruelty did not bypass the village. Mines made the North Sea, that was the primary source of income for the fishing village, extremely dangerous to sail on and the dead bodies from submarined allied vessels flushed ashore in high numbers. The pietistic character of the local religion turned these experiences into the most fantastic fantasies. Apocalypse was near, so it was believed by many.

We know little about the five weeks following the departure of the KW 171. The lugger sailed northwest, destination Doggersbank, an area full of fish half way England and Denmark. The days probably passed as many others on Katwijk fishing boats in these days. Long hard work and beans, bacon and rice for dinner. Six days a week, for the compulsory Sunday rest counted at sea as much as at home.

The next sign of life from the KW 171 reaches IJmuiden via the skipper of KW 151 De Hoop. He tells about a meeting that he had a few days earlier on mid sea with the KW 171. A few crew had been on his vessel for a while to hand over letters and ask him to, once back in IJmuiden, send them to Katwijk. The skipper had asked them why, since they were heading back to Katwijk themselves. The answer surprised the skipper even more. “God himself destroyed Katwijk and made it vanish. We will not return to Katwijk, we are heading to Jerusalem, where God came down from heaven.” When the men climbed back in their jolly, one of them, who so far had stayed aside, grabbed the skippers arm, begging him to stay aboard with him. The skipper did not see the urge to grant his wis hand send the man back in the jolly. While the crew menbers of the KW 171 rowed back to their boat, the skipper of the KW 171 shouted tot them: “If I were you, I would go back to Katwijk. You are saying crazy things, I think you are going out of your mind!” Some time later, one of the seaman of the 171, Arie Vlieland, shouted back tot he skipper of the 151: “Cut your nets, get rid of the crap! Believe in God’s justice, for you are all doomed!”

It is obvious that by that time, things were terribly wrong aboard of the KW 171. According to the Katwijk-born author Robert Haasnoot, who based his novel ‘Waanzee’ on this history, the crew had been practicing their religion for weeks. Religion, superstition and the side effects of long time isolation at sea were a perfect breeding ground fort he upcoming evil.

There are two testimonies about the days following the encounter with the KW 151. In some details they contradict, but the whole stories are more or less the same. One of the youngest aboard, 13 year old Arie Ros, is interviewed by a newspaper, two weeks after the happening. Seaman Arie Vlieland, the evil genius of the drama, later talks tot he captain of RMS Prof. Buys, the vessel that takes him back tot he Netherlands.

The skipper of the KW 151 later tells the owner of the KW 171, director N. Haasnoot from North Sea Fishing, that during the mysterious meeting at sea, he got the impression that it wasn’t skipper Nicolaas de Haas, but seaman Arie Vlieland that was in actual command of the 171. Vlieland is known to have been an extraordinary strong man, huge and charismatic. All that made him a dominant personality. He mastered the Tale Kanaäs, a traditional, biblish way of speaking, that allowed him to manipulate his god-fearing ship mates. Katwijk had a culture of chosen ones and concerneds. The chosen ones were believers who claimed to get signs of God, what made them superiour tho the concerneds, who lacked such relevations.

Probabely madness creeped into chosen Vlieland’s mind during the voyage. According to witness Arie Ros, Vlieland said on Sunday September 5th that he felt the Holy Spirit within him. Next came four days of praying and discussing the Bible, followed by the killings. Vlieland himself stated that he wake up shortly before the first murder to talk with God, who ordered him to purify the ship from Satan’s presence. He was busy throwing overboard anything that could possibly contain demons, when Leen Vlieland and Van der Pals woke up. They claimed to have seen a red star and took that for a confirmation of Arie’s assertions. Sails, masts and ropes were thrown overboard.

Next morning, most of the crew joined the exorcism. Only Pieter van Duijn, Jacob Jonker and Klaas Kuijt refused. Their disbelief was not appreciated by Arie Vlieland, who forced Kuijt to alternating dance and stand still on deck for hours. It must have been an insane scene. “He looked as if he was posessed by the devil,” Arie Ros stated afterwards. For the crew it was reason enough to throw Kuijt overboard the next morning. When he tried to hold on to a rope, one of his mates chopped off his hand. Screaming from pain Kuijt disappeared in the water.

Or at least, that is Arie Ros’ statement. Vlieland told the captain of the Prof. Buys that they beheaded Kuijt before throwing his body in the sea, while singing psalms.

According to Arie Ros, navigator Pieter van Duijn went lower deck to beat up his father, Reijn Ros. But Ros Sr. Turned out to be tougher than Van Duijn and he kicked the latter under a bench. The rest of the crew mixed in though and beat Van Duijn with spades to death. Jonker chopped off his head with an axe.

After the murder Jonker went back on deck, where he bumped into skipper De Haas. “You have all gone crazy, do you really belive this nonsense!”, De Haas shouted, while Jonker kicked him down the stairs. De Haas locked himself in a berth, but the remaining crew dragged him out again to beat him to death with poles, brought tot hem by the young boys Arie Ros and D. de Mol. Arie Rol however said that the last two victims were stabbed to death. In both versions the bodies were thrown overboard.

On Sunday September 12th, the KW 171 was found by the Norwegian steamer and towed to Tyne. It was obvious that the whole crew had gone insane and the men were precautionary chained up on board of their own vessel.

The story of the fool’s lugger has always been unmentionnable in the Katwijk community. Although no-one else than the crew itself could be held responsible for their crimes, it seemed that the closed, religious people felt ashamed for them. During the first period after the disaster the people felt a sort of fear. Had it not been normal Katwijkers out there? If this could happen tot hem, it could happen to anyone.

That most survivors were back in town only a year after the massacre made even more difficult fort he people to get over. Also, almost everyone was related to everyone. A niece of the killed navigator Pieter van Duijn said many years later that her mother told her father off when he greeted one of the surviving crew members on the street. “Gerrit, how can you say hello to a man that killed your brother?”

The two 13 year old boys went straight back to Katwijk, the other eight were brought to mental hospitals. Within a year they were all back home in Katwijk, except for Arie Vlieland. He moved with his wife and children to Wassenaar near The Hague, where he died in 1966 at the age of 79.

And the KW 171? The lugger was restored, but no Katwijk fisherman dared to sail on it. The vessel was sold to a shipowner from IJmuiden. Registered IJM 251, it struck a mine two years later, taking eight sailormen tot he bottom of the North Sea.