Dejbjerg Plantation

Ancient remains, a monastery, millers, convicts and rakkers, in a mixture of Danish history and outcast Danes you will find Dejbjerg Plantation. The plantation was bought by Hedeselskabet in 1900, and in the years 1903-15 it was planted by prisoners from Horsens State Prison. The rampart that surrounded the prison colony can still be seen.

But it is not only convicts who have left their mark on the plantation. Bjørnemosehuset and Heimisdalen tell the story of the Raks. The Raks were an outcast group. They were the ones who did the work no one else wanted - they helped the hangman, emptied outhouses, removed dead animals, were chimney sweeps and more. The rest of society looked askance at the rascals, good people refused to touch them, and in Dejbjerg Church there were special racial chairs so that "ordinary people" would not have to share a pew with them.

In Dejbjerg Plantation you will find Helmisdalen, Helmis was the name for an old worn-out horse, and the valley got its name because this was the way the rakkers dragged the dead animals down to their home in Bjørnemosen before skinning them. Bjørnemosehuset, or rakkerhuset, was home to the last rakkers in West Jutland.

In the plantation there are also traces of antiquity. It is known that people have lived in this area since the Stone Age, and it was also in this area that the Dejbjerg chariots from the early Iron Age were found. In the plantation, you can see the outline of ancient farmland on Troldbanke.

In 1897, a memorial stone was erected to the founder of Hedeselskabet, Enrico Dalgas. The memorial stone stands on a piece of preserved heathland.