Adventures abroad

The 'M.[Marais or marsh)' de Hollande (colored green) at the mouth of the Gironde where Leeghwater was at work in 1627. Detail of the 'Carte du Bourdelois (...)' by G. Deslisle, 1714. David Rumsey Map Collection.

Leeghwater did not shy away from jobs abroad. In 1626, he was called in to reclaim two lakes near Friedrichstadt in Schleswig-Holstein. A year later, he mapped and surveyed marshes near Lesparre-Medoc, a town at the mouth of the Gironde northwest of Bordeaux. Another few years later, we meet him in three fortified towns surrounded by marshes east of Nancy. He stayed there for five weeks. In 1633 he traveled again to Schleswig-Holstein in the company of his son Adriaen. This time it was to dike an inlet of the North Sea, the Dagebüller Bight. Unfortunately, the afsluitdijk was washed away during a heavy storm surge in October 1634. Leeghwater and his son narrowly escaped drowning during this storm.