Peter Andresen Oelrichs

Peter Andresen Oelrichs (born February 26, 1781 on Heligoland , † June 18, 1869 in Amsterdam ) was a Heligoland captain. He is the author of the small dictionary for learning the Halunder , the Heligolander language, for Germans, English and Dutch . He recorded the vocabulary of the variety of North Frisian spoken on the island of Helgoland . He translated the words into German, English and Dutch.

Life

Peter Andresen Oelrichs came from a Husum family; his grandfather or great-grandfather came to Helgoland and made it to the Ratmann there .

When Oelrichs was sixteen, he wrested his parents' permission to go to Hamburg. He was hired as a cabin boy on a ship there . As such, his main job was sweeping and scrubbing and all other types of cleaning. After the first trips to London, the first Atlantic crossing followed to Charleston on the Gulf of Mexico - this time already as an ordinary seaman .

After 1802 he learned the duties of a helmsman from the Husum captain Momsen . His first position in this function was with Helgoland ship captain Nikolaus Peter Krohn, who commanded an armed merchant boat frigate ; he became the third helmsman. Around 1811 he became the first captain of a merchant ship ; later he drove for a Russian shipowner . As the chief helmsman of a transport ship to East India , he saved the ship and crew from great danger by defying the captain's orders. Then he became captain of this ship himself and commanded it for three years.

In October 1820 he went back to Batavia as chief helmsman . Then he fired and worked as an accountant and overseer in the service of the Dutch government. In the meantime he had married in Holland; he sent his wife and children to the Dutch colony. Except for a daughter who was married in Batavia and a son who lived in Samarang, all died. He married a second time, but his second wife died in 1834.

Two years later he fell ill and went back to Helgoland on a longer home leave. He soon retired and married a third time. He had several children with his young wife. In the free time he wrote and in particular wrote the four-language German-English-Dutch-Helgoland dictionary and had it printed. He was probably also a Freemason . He later moved to Holland because that was the only place where he could get his full pension, and there he married for the fourth time.

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personal data
SURNAME	Oelrichs, Peter Andresen
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	Captain and dictionary author
DATE OF BIRTH	February 26, 1781
PLACE OF BIRTH	Heligoland
DATE OF DEATH	June 18, 1869
Place of death	Amsterdam

Peter Andresen Oelrichs

Life

See also

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