Plague cemetery Welbergen
The plague cemetery Welbergen is a former cemetery outside the Welbergen district of the city of Ochtrup in the Steinfurt district (North Rhine-Westphalia). According to oral tradition, it was primarily used to bury the dead from Ochtrup, Langenhorst and Welbergen, who had died in a plague epidemic in 1666. Today there is forest there.
Today's appearance is determined by an ensemble of various monuments in the midst of tall trees, which was reconstructed in 1978, and an information board for the city of Ochtrup. The original plague cross in this cemetery was used for a court cross in 1954; the carved date 1706 therefore refers to the first erection of the court cross and not the construction of the plague cemetery. The parish registers of St. Lamberti Ochtrup report that this epidemic was introduced by foreign soldiers in 1666. The cross is simple, without a body and made of wood. The associated historical base is made of sandstone . A wayside shrine standing next to it, depicting Mary and John under the cross, is a work from the first half of the 18th century. Leaning against this wayside shrine is a tablet with a twelve-part prayer text that can no longer be fully deciphered.
The ensemble at the Welbergen plague cemetery is on the list of architectural monuments in Ochtrup under number 24.
source
- Information board of the city of Ochtrup on site. Author: Anita Bender
Coordinates: 52 ° 11 ′ 48 ″ N , 7 ° 14 ′ 59 ″ E