Bertha

Hans Christian Koldbro Yder was born on 2 September 1905 in Holeby, Denmark, a Danish national. He arrived in Fremantle on the ship Tournai on 27 July 1955, his papers describing him as a builder’s labourer and a widower. On 23 February 1962 he was naturalised at Geraldton, the town in which he had made his home for the past 8 or 9 years before his drowning. He had also been working at the Ghurka lead mine near Northampton as a gardener.

Yder owned a 25 foot motor boat named Bertha LFBG 220. It was powered by a 4 cylinder Perkins diesel engine and was insured with Steeves Agnew Pty. Ltd. for the sum of £1150 in joint names, Yder and James Bowes Pty. Ltd. Yder had been crayfishing off the Geraldton coast for around 5 years and at the time of his disappearance at sea was living with a man named James Henry Buckingham at a property on North West Coast Highway near the Drummonds Cove turn off. He last saw Yder at around 3.00 am on Saturday 10 July when he left the house to go out in his boat and pull his craypots.

At about 7.00 am the same day Yder was seen at the Fisherman’s wharf by fisherman Alexander Strachan, owner of the Louise, and he stated his intention of not going out to pull his pots. Yder was in the habit of fishing in very dangerous reef country stating ‘you have to take risks if you want to catch crayfish’. His reason for this being that he was in considerable debt to James Bowes Pty. Ltd. for his boat and equipment and he wanted to have consistently high catches to try and square his debts. After getting his boat out Strachan gave Yder a hand to tie his boat up and thought no more about it.

A fellow fisherman, Charles Neville Wilkerson and owner of LFB 171 Echo, spoke with Yder just before they both left the Fisherman’s wharf for their fishing grounds. In a statement made by Wilkerson he said that he told Yder he considered him foolish trying to pull his pots as the grounds where he had his pots were dangerous with waves breaking about the area and a big sea running. Yder replied ‘I am going to give it a go anyhow’. His dog was onboard as it always was and Yder was dressed in knee length rubber sea boots. Wilkerson left the wharf about 10 minutes after Yder and that was the last time that he saw him.

At about 3.45 pm a fisherman named Sam Bumbak was sailing his boat out from the mouth of the Greenough River, pulling three pots about a mile out and then deciding to move out to sea until the waves settled down. Travelling out about 200 yards he saw the fishing boat Bertha which was only around 150 yards from the reef. The Bertha was circling slowly in a clockwise direction and appeared to be drifting southwards. Bumbak watched for a few minutes and then realised that there was something wrong. He sailed towards the boat and saw Yder’s dog swimming in the water, nearly exhausted, and managed to pick it up. He could not get any closer than 200 yards to the Bertha but could clearly see that Yder was not onboard.As he was alone, in pretty rough seas close to the reef, he decided to not try and take the Bertha in tow and set off two red flares in the hope that someone on shore would see them, however no one sighted them and after searching the area he made haste back to Geraldton.

Bumbak arrived back in Geraldton about 5.00 pm and reported the incident to a man named Trevor Kember who then notified the Geraldton Police Station. Sergeant Patterson went down to the Fisherman’s wharf to arrange a boat to go out to where the Bertha was last seen but given the lateness of the day no one was prepared to venture out.

The next day at 6.50 am the fishing boat Charm, skippered by Roy Urquart and accompanied by Sergeant Short and Alexander Strachan, left Fisherman’s wharf and commenced the search for the missing boat Bertha. Various pieces of wreckage and equipment were picked up and identified as belonging to the missing boat. Another boat, Blue Danube LFBG 174, was also in the area and picked up two life jackets branded 220, a four gallon drum of oil and some wreckage.The recovered wreckage and other articles were taken to the Geraldton Police Station.Boat and beach patrols failed to locate any trace of the missing man.

On Monday 12 July Alexander Strachan went out and retrieved 23 pots belonging to Yder along with some ropes and floats from snagged pots. All were branded with G220 which was Yder’s number, they were taken to the Geraldton Police Station for storage.

Yder had no relatives in Australia and it was quite a long process to determine who should be in possession of his property given he was in debt to the sum of £1200 to James Bowes for his boat and gear. The Danish Consulate in Perth and in Denmark were contacted and with much correspondence backwards and forwards between them and the Geraldton Police Station it was finally all settled in January 1967. The 25 craypots, valued at around 23 shillings a set along with some incidental items not wanted by relatives in Denmark were handed over to James Bowes Pty. Ltd. as a creditor. Some items of sentimental value including a silver watch, some personal papers and photos were sent to relatives through the Danish Consulate in Sydney. A 1957 model Holden utility was repossessed by the Industrial Acceptance Corporation on 11 August 1965.