They came to Haven during the
Second World War and decided to stay!
AS Hitler sent his armies across the border into Denmark many Danes did not
relish life under the German rule. Among these were some 50 fishermen who sailed
their trawlers out into the North Sea looking for a more hospitable home.
Many went to Grimsby, but some 50 sailed round into the Irish Sea to the port
of Whitehaven they knew from past friendly visits.
Many were single men with their own boats, in a sense echoeing their Viking
forbears who were familiar visitors and settlers along the Cumbrian seaboard.
The viking names are common in all the western Lakeland dales and new genetic
research is likely to confirm Cumbrian's Viking connections.
One such family that came to Whitehaven in the war years was that of Niels Kresten
Thomsen, late of Monkwray Brow. In 1997 he died leaving assets in the area that
showed his skill as a trawler owner and fishing agent. He left well over £1
million in his will.
Another of the Danish descendants is Knud Eric Thinnesen, a Whitehaven trawler
owner for 40 years. His former vessel was the Ceylon, a Danish ship, now sadly
decommissioned. He now has a son Eric in the trawling industry.
Eric senior came over in 1953 with his brother Hugo Thinnesen died recently
aged 78, he was one of those who came over at the outbreak of war.
Knud Thinnesen has another son, called Hugh Thinnesen, who also worked in the
fishing industry,and is now the master of the fisheries protection vessel Solway
Protector. Keith Bergerman was the son of another Danish fisherman called Oscar
Burgerman who sadly is no longer with us.