The Conflagration

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Geographic Coordinates: 51° 50' 4.20" N, 10° 47' 15.55" E

1. Once, there was a young man in Wernigerode. He dwelled in the Heide quarter, and had a bride who worked as a maid on the Burgstraße road. One evening, he went to the Burgstraße in order to visit his bride. He stayed with her until 11 o’clock. When he left and reached the front of the house of H. in the Burgstraße, a white figure used a broom to sweep in front of the entrance. Because this seemed strange to him, he asked: “What does this mean that the entrance is swept during the night? It’s not possible to see any dust!”

Then the white figure replied: “I am a spirit, and as clean as I shall sweep this street in this night, the street shall be just as clean of buildings within the year. For a great conflagration shall break loose in which all the houses in the street will be burnt down.” And this indeed occurred. But the old Count (Christian Ernst) supposedly spoke an incantation against the fire so that it could not rage as much as it wanted. In this manner, a few buildings in the Burgstraße remained standing. But the fire roared mightily, and the flame closed as quickly behind the old Count as he galloped up the street with his horse.

2. Others tell the following of this conflagration: A carter once had a row with the brandy distiller Findeisen, from whom he always had to fetch the brandy, and whose former house can be seen if you look straight down the Burgstraße street. He started a fire in the back of Findeisen’s barn. When Findeisen heard the calls of “Fire!”, opened the door, and the flames reached towards him, the carter said: “Let the cursed fire burn!”

Then Count Christian Ernst, who could ward against the fire, repeatedly rode around it, and the fire lunged towards him and did not cease. And even though nobody had heard the curse against Findeisen, he said: “My dear people, the fire has to burn, for it is cursed.” In this manner, it burned until it reached the house on the Burgstraße which now belongs to the baker Remke, and towards the market until it reached the house of the merchant Hetzer.

When everything had been rebuilt after this great fire, the arsonist fell deathly ill. He was wholly black, and no one wanted to visit him. Then he asked for the pastor. The pastor arrived and asked: “Well, what kind of enormous sinner are you?” He replied: “I am the arsonist who has set Wernigerode ablaze.” Then the pastor spoke: “Then let your soul go wherever it wants!” Five days later, the pastor died from fright. But the arsonist had died immediately, and his corpse was put on a cow’s hide which was put on the knackerman’s wagon and driven to the gallows’ hill.

Source: Pröhle - Unterharzische Sagen, 66f