Cross the street and then turn left again. Stop at the water’s edge on your right.

This is where the fish market used to be. It is therefore logical that you are now in the visstraat, the fish street. You may notice that this harbor has different names on both sides of the water. One side is called the Smalle Haven, the narrow harbour and the other side the Brede haven, the broad harbour.

Around 1800 Den Bosch was one of the most important cities when it came to shipping. It was the link between Amsterdam and Rotterdam and the rest of the Western European hinterland. Thus, use was made of a harbour that dates back to 1448. In that period, the first quay walls were built along the Binnendieze, thus creating the Brede harbour. Sources indicate that the bridge you are now walking over already existed in 1356 and it is also described that there was already an unloading tap here in 1406. This old inner harbour was created when the so-called Vughterstroom was placed within the second wall of the city in the 14th century. Around 1630, the inner harbor was used so much that it was decided to build quay walls on the other side of the water, which is how the Smalle Haven was created.

Let’s keep moving while I tell you more. Keep walking further in the direction of the Wilhelminabrug, the bridge you already crossed earlier in the day.

In my youth, the large high factories of De Gruyter stood on this quay. Piet de Gruyter opened a horse gruel mill in 1818: a company that processed pulses, grains and seeds. Even though the city center often stank of coffee and cocoa roasting, many Bosschenaren think back with a certain nostalgia to this large gritter with a factory that was called ‘the Yellow Monster’, because it covered the entire quay of the Smalle harbour. De Gruyter was one of the largest employers in Den Bosch. About 1,500 people worked in the production departments alone, more than a third of whom were women. At its peak, there were more than 550 stores across the country and nearly 7,500 employees.

In 1980 the factory was demolished and apartments were built in its place. The Gruyter factory had already been rebuilt on the industrial estate of the Rietvelden, where modern harbours had meanwhile been constructed along the Dieze and the Erveldplas.