The legends about underground tunnel systems are ineradicable. But do they exist or not? Reporters Frank von Hebel, Martin Groenewold and Colin Mooijman sought an answer to this question for the historical podcast series De Nostalgisten.
Subterranean passages are – just like Templar treasures – the soft porn of archaeology. Every self-respecting city of some size has at least a story about an underground passage, fully supported by – often – somewhat older men who really remember how they once ended up in such a system of passages as a boy. Newspaper of the North already explained the phenomenon in an article that appeared on August 3, 1935:
‘Many an old person can still talk with certainty and conviction about these mysterious roads underground. If one throws a small objection among all his statements…, with a raised voice, he emphatically claims that it is really true after all, that doubt about it has been excluded. If one asks casually whether he has ever seen such a corridor, he does not say emphatically ‘No, never!!’, but immediately comes up with a story from others who have actually seen it. discovered something about it.’
Escape routes for the people of Appingedam?
Yet. Every myth, especially such a persistent one, deserves serious attention. Our search had its origins in 1998. One of the first stories that reporter Frank von Hebel wrote as an intern at the Newspaper of the North wrote, concerned the search for an underground tunnel system in Appingedam. A number of notables had united in a foundation that thoroughly investigated the persistent stories about secret passages. To this day, the four suspect that there are corridors that date from the thirteenth century. They would have been escape routes for city residents.
Former catering entrepreneur Eltje Bos, who ran the iconic Wapen van Leiden for a lifetime, remembers how it started. “A man who was in the resistance during the war called us. He told how he once ended up in a corridor in the Nicolai Church that ran under the Damsterdiep. Unfortunately, that man is no longer alive, he was already in his 80s.”
They received dozens of – often handwritten – letters from (former) residents who managed to pinpoint the locations with flawless precision. Some also include accurate – again hand-drawn – maps. Some excerpts:
(…) Grandpa was a resistance fighter, hid in the hallway, entrance between French School and Nicolai Church, hallway ended behind the Catholic church. Hallway full of skeletons. (…)
(…) Building next to Bruintje Beer. Cellars emptied for renovation. Basement 4.5 meters deep. There were 2 bricked-up entrances to the Gouden Pand. (…)
Et cetera, et cetera.
‘An underground corridor led to the outside of the city’
According to the collected indications and data, there is approximately 10 to 15 kilometers of corridor under the city center and surroundings of Appingedam. But Groningen and Franeker also know these stories. The 16th-century writer Cornelius Kempius tells the story in the book About the origin, location, quality and size of Friesland, as well as the deeds performed by the Frisians in ancient times about the then St. Walburg Church that once stood on the Martinikerkhof. Under the church, according to Kempius, there was a ‘cave, from which an underground passage ran outside the city, to neighboring Helpman’.
But the writer also immediately admitted that he himself has never even set foot in this corridor.
Some stories are a lot more current, as a story from Dagblad van het Noorden from 2018. After fifty years, two former nurses of a respectable age visited the old and vacant sister flat behind the old Roman Catholic Hospital. This was scheduled for demolition. From the apartment they could walk to the hospital via a tunnel. “We always had to be home before 11 o’clock at night,” said Mrs. Bontjer.
Did The Nostalgists manage to find a secret passage?
If the ladies were not, they had to enter through the main entrance of the hospital. The names of the latecomers were noted there. If they were often late, they had to report it to the director. “That’s why we opened a window in the underground corridor a little,” Bontjer said. When the nurses were dancing in the city center until the middle of the night, they would crawl back in through the open window. “We were so stupid. Once in the winter I walked past the window during the day and there were all kinds of footprints in the snow. We could have been caught so easily.” The underground passage is now – unfortunately, no longer accessible.
Then of course the big question is: did these reporters manage not only to find an underground passage, but also to enter it?
Then go listen to this new episode of The Nostalgists .
The Nostalgists
The Nostalgists is a six-part podcast series by Dagblad van het Noorden about historical events in Groningen, Drenthe and Friesland. In each episode, Frank von Hebel, Martin Groenewold and Colin Mooijman highlight one topic. The first episode, about FC Groningen’s successful European Cup debut in 1983, was online on Wednesday, February 14. February 28 follows the story of the spectacular o escape of bank safe cracker Aage M. from the detention center in Leeuwarden. With his famous thermal lance he burned his way to freedom on April 18, 1974. You will hear episodes about it in the coming weeks the Showbiz Quiz (March 6), the search for a Nazi treasure on Schiermonnikoog (March 13) and the history of hazing at student associations (March 20).