1. Map of Sønderho from 1797 with signatures for buildings, harbour, cornmill, church and beacons

At the end of the 1700s the first exact maps over Denmark, measured by trigonometric methods, were

published by the Royal Scientific Society. You can see a section of a hand drawn manuscript map from 1797 of the southern part of Fanø. In 1804 the final map (number 5) over “Koldinghuus and Riberhuus Counties” was published in a beautifully copper engraved version, where the northern part of the Wadden Sea from Ho Bay to Rømø including the islands of Langli, Fanø and Mandø are shown. Unfortunately, the scale is reduced, and some exciting details are therefore lost.

2. Sand drift forced many people from their houses

Sønderho fishing hamlet was in the 1700s and into about 1850 exposed to a persistent and overburden sand drift. Vast dunes moved over the island from the North Sea coast towards settlements on the islands south-eastern parts. The wandering dunes moved at a speed of several metres per year and developed gradually parabolic dunes in the form of a horseshoe with a high centre part and two trailing edges. Year after year the sand from the wandering dunes overwhelmed and destroyed houses, the church, and homesteads. The sand covered meadows and farmland, and in the end, something must be done to save the rural environment and life. The people must either fight or leave. Most decided to stay and try to stop the sand by different means with help from the Government. Cattle and sheep were banned from grazing in the dunes and heathlands, marram grass was planted, and seaweed was applied to damp the most exposed open dunes. The Government bought up land for tree planting. After a long fight, by the mid 1800s the dunes were subdued and under control. Just south and west of Sønderho you can see a beautiful heathland covering the dune landscape.  

3. Storm surges – an eternal threat

In the Wadden Sea, storm surges represent an eternal threat. On Fanø people living in Sønderho (“Sønderhoninger”) had from early days tried to protect their families, livestock, and homesteads against the flood. The first dikes along the seafront were built by using eelgrass (Zostera marina), but obviously such dikes were weak, and couldn’t resist the incoming sea. To restraining some of the wash away the Parish, some years ago, raised money to build a big seaweed dike in front of the southern part of the village. It measured a length of about 600 ‘Alen’ (380 metres), 6 ‘Alen’ broad (3,75 metres) and 3 ‘Alen’ (1,9 metres) high, for the work they used several cartloads of seaweed. Further a ditch was dug along the dunes. However, within 2 years it was all destroyed by the sea and the Parish couldn’t afford to rebuilt it. (Pastor Foss, 1791).  

4. The smack – one of the oldest type of vessels in Sønderho

A smack is a traditional fishing boat with two masts of which the main mast is the tallest. The first ships in Sønderho were fishing boats and later flatbottomed cargo ships for the local Wadden Sea trade. The oldest seagoing ships in Sønderho were second hand vessels mostly bought in Holland. Many of the first ships built at Kalvekrog shipyard (See no. 19), were mostly Dutch vessels like kuff, smack and hoy.

After some time, bigger and more oceangoing ships joined the fleet as merchant ships. The two masted brigantine became popular. Among the last ships in Sønderho were the tall barks, some built with iron hull. But they were all launched from foreign shipyards. The bark ships closed Sønderho’s tall ships time as full-rigged ships were never seen in Sønderho.  

5. Sønderho – known for its hedges of Duke of Argyll’s teaplant (called box thorn)

The Duke of Argyll’s tea plant belongs to the nightshade (Solanum) family. The flowering lasts from June to September where you may find the light purple regularly flowers in the axillas. In some places in West Jutland the plant is also called “løbetorn” as it will spread by running offshoot. In Sønderho also called stikpiller (suppository). The name allude to the horn bend branches like hemp agrimony or stag sumac hjortetrøst or hjortetakstræ. Duke of Argyll’s teaplant does well on dikes where the soil is a mixture of grass turf and composed seaweed. That’s why it became widespread in Sønderho that is known for its 200-years hedges of the Duke of Argyll’s tea plant. You could simply call Sønderho, the village of Duke of Argyll’s tea plant, so strongly stamp the plant it’s mark on the place, as the judge of a Danish District Court wrote in a report from 1806.

6. Many a “Sønderhoning-seaman” were kept as prisoners

During the Danish-English wars (1807-14) many of Fanø’s ships took part in the grain-trade to the starving people in Norway. In this dangerous trade, several ships were lost or captured as prizes by English warships. Detained seamen from the prized vessels were often innocent Danish-Norwegian seamen taken as prisoners and had to suffer a gruesome time in the infamous “prisoner”, condemned men-of-wars (mostly ships of the line) anchored in south British ports, or in land-based jails. No matter where, the prisoners suffered behind locks and bars in rat-infested cells closely guarded by military personnel. On the prison ships the food was worse than you may think. Some jails on land were called: open parole camps. Here imprisoned merchants and ships officers were often treated better, but at their own expense. Some Danish inmates received allowance from Denmark. In the Norwegian author Henrik Ibsen’s epic poem Terje Vigen from 1861 he paints a picture of the time of war about a Norwegian fisherman and sailor Terje Vigen who in an open rowing boat sailed to Skagen (Fladstrand) to get grain for his starving family but on his way back to Norway he was taken by a British corvette and spent five years as a prisoner. When he finally got home, he found his wife and child had died.           

7. Shipmaster Thomsen’s silver button forced the British to take flight

On 28 June 1809 a British frigate was observed off the south coast of Fanø. The frigate cruised on a tack from the south, bound for Sønderho, and anchored two nautical miles off the village. During the summer night six launches (ships boats) were unloaded from the frigate and rowed for Sønderho to destroy the village and take possession of the resident’s ships. This incident became a long-lived narrative in the resident’s memories. Skipper Peder Thomsen was second-in-command at the battery on Kræmmerbjerget (a tall dune) at the entrance to Sønderho. He knew that the Admiralty recently had issued an order to economize on the ammunition and only fire at imminent danger. Peder Thomsen was a wealthy skipper with silver buttons on his coat. When the British launches came closer to the entrance, Peder Thomsen cut off a silver button and loaded it into the gun barrel together with the cannon ball. Then the gun crew knew that they could be sure that the shot would be a direct hit. Then he let off the gun with the memorable words: Ready: A victory in the name of God and the Kings name, let one go on my bill, I’ll pay for the shot! The leading British launch were hit, and the enemy having failed their mission retreated to the frigate.

8. The beacon: A replica of the Kåver was erected on the dune summit Kåverbjerget south of Sønderho in 2011

The Kåver is an old Danish beacon first time erected on Fanø in 1624 by Ribe merchants. Two beacons erected with a few miles distance was used by the sailors to locate the narrow lane at the entrance to Ribe and Sønderho.

We are not in the possession of a description to tell how carpenters and other good people managed to pull the very heavy timber up to the top of the dune and had it erected vertically. However, we must assume that the job was performed in the same manner as ships masts were raised. When an erection starts from a horizontal position, it is necessary to use an intercostal lever (Reconstruction by Theodor Hansen after a model seen in The Netherlands).