Fiskeren

"Fiskeren" is part of five artworks placed at Lodstorvet. The artworks tell the story of Frederikshavn's proximity to the sea.

Holger Drachmann (1846–1908) was a Danish poet and painter. Drachmann was a friend of the fishermen, and they gave him the nickname Store Tummel after an episode in which the Skagen rescuer, Lars Kruse, in 1879 had been nominated for the Medal of Merit for his role as chairman of the rescue fleet – where he had saved around 200 men from drowning. But when the time came for Kruse to receive the award, it had been returned with the letter: “Lars Kruse was not an ‘honest’ man.”

In 1844, the then 15-year-old Lars Kruse had sold a piece of “flotsam,” which was wreckage goods, and for this Kruse was brought before a judge along with his three friends. The punishment for the offense was whipping, and the offense meant that Kruse could not receive his medal many years after the episode.

Drachmann wrote to the city bailiff and pleaded Kruse’s case. The letter from 22 June 1879 concludes: “If my mere urging in these lines should prove insufficient, then I intend to summon all my energy and the influence I wield in the Danish and Scandinavian press for the benefit of such a worthy client, and I would deeply regret if, by shedding light on this case, I also came to touch upon possible adjacent shadows in the Honourable Bailiff’s jurisdiction and in the social conditions at Skagen.” Kruse received his medal the same year.

The five works on Lodstorvet are a gift from the Town Foundation to Frederikshavn on the occasion of Frederikshavn’s 200th anniversary as a market town.

The photographer behind the images on Lodstorvet is Linda Suhr, Suhr Production.