In the quiet Bavarian town of Freilassing, a man named Alois Irlmaier once walked among the ordinary, yet saw the extraordinary. To the untrained eye, he was a simple well-digger, a stout figure with calloused hands and a humble demeanor. But to those who sought him out in the mid-20th century, he was something far more: a prophet.
The Making of a Mystic
Born on June 8, 1894, in Scharam bei Siegsdorf, a speck of a village in Upper Bavaria, Alois Irlmaier entered the world as the son of farmers, hardworking, devout Catholics. His early life was unremarkable: one of ten children, he received little formal education, instead learning the ways of soil and survival. But as a young man, Irlmaier discovered an innate gift for dowsing, locating underground water with a divining rod. His fingers would tingle, veins pulsing, as if the earth itself spoke to him. It was a talent that would define his trade as a well-digger, but it was only the beginning.
The First World War interrupted his quiet existence. Drafted in 1914, he served as a soldier until a lung injury in 1915 sent him back to civilian life. By 1920, he had married Maria Schießlinger, raising four children (one adopted) while taking over his father's farm. Tragedy struck in 1926 when an arsonist razed his homestead to the ground, an event Irlmaier claimed to have foreseen, though he lacked proof to name the culprit. Rebuilding proved impossible amid Germany's economic turmoil, and so he turned fully to his trade, sinking wells and divining water for a living.
It was in 1928, at the age of 34, that Irlmaier's life took a fateful turn. He began experiencing visions, vivid, unbidden flashes of events yet to unfold. By 1939, word of his abilities had spread beyond his village, drawing curious visitors to his doorstep. What began as a trickle became a flood after World War II, as grieving widows, desperate mothers, and lost souls sought answers about loved ones missing in the war's carnage.
A Prophet in the Dock
Irlmaier's fame was not without its price. By 1947, his reputation had grown so large that it attracted skeptics and detractors. A local pastor, Markus Westenthaner, accused him of fraud and illegal clairvoyance-for-profit, a charge rooted in Bavaria's strict laws against "gaukelei" (trickery). The trial in Laufen became a spectacle. Witnesses testified to astonishing feats: Irlmaier predicting bomb strikes during the war, locating missing soldiers, even solving crimes. In a dramatic twist, he reportedly described the judge's wife in precise detail, what she wore, what she was doing at that moment, stunning the courtroom. The verdict? Acquittal. The judge's ruling was unequivocal: "The testimonies… are so astonishing, concerning things inexplicable by natural forces, that it is impossible to call him a charlatan."
Yet Irlmaier was no showman. Tired of the spotlight, he later hung a sign outside his home: "I only speak about well-digging." His health declined, debts mounted, and in 1959, liver cancer claimed him at age 65. On his deathbed, he murmured, "I'm glad to go now, so I don't have to see what I've seen."
His Terrifying Predictions
What did Irlmaier see? Contemporaries like Conrad Adlmaier and Wolfgang Johannes Bekh wrote down his predictions. These predictions show a world in chaos. Some seem to have come true, while others remain unclear. Unlike Nostradamus, whose quatrains are cloaked in metaphor, Irlmaier's visions were stark, almost cinematic. He spoke of a "third great war," sparked in the Balkans by the assassination of a "great one," followed by a sudden Russian invasion of Europe. "Three armored wedges" would slice through Germany, he said, catching the populace off guard as they fled westward.
He described a "yellow stripe" or "death strip", a chemical weapon unleashed from the south, possibly the Middle East, devastating a swath from Prague to the Baltic Sea. "Whoever crosses it dies," he warned. Planes would rise "from the sand," and a great battle would unfold near the Rhine. Then, a cosmic reckoning: "three days of darkness," triggered by a celestial event, dust choking the skies, and only the faithful, armed with blessed candles, surviving the purge.
Irlmaier's foresight wasn't limited to war. He foresaw a world of "small black boxes" for communication (mobile phones?), payments with "little cards" (credit cards?), and a moral decay preceding catastrophe, hyperinflation, migration crises, and a loss of faith. Some claim his predictions align with modern events: the 2015 migrant wave, economic instability, even tensions with Russia. Others see coincidence, not clairvoyance.
The Man Behind the Myth
Who was Alois Irlmaier, really? To his neighbors, he was a jovial, unassuming soul, a "simple peasant" with a sincere faith. His visions, he insisted, were gifts from God, not tricks for profit. Yet skepticism abounds. Critics argue his predictions were vague enough to fit any era, or that he mirrored wartime fears and Cold War anxieties. His defenders counter that his accuracy, pinpointing bomb strikes, identifying the dead, defies dismissal.
Books abound, from Stephan Berndt's Alois Irlmaier: A Man Says What He Sees to Bekh's biographies, each wrestling with his legacy. In France, Claude d'Elendil's works tie him to a broader eschatological thread, alongside figures like Marie-Julie Jahenny. Online, X posts circulate with speculation: "Irlmaier said America would abandon Europe, look at today!" one user writes in 2025, as U.S. foreign policy shifts. Another muses, "His 'yellow stripe', chemical weapons in Ukraine?"
Irlmaier's story resonates because it mirrors our own unease.. Did he truly see our future, or did he reflect the timeless human fear of collapse? Perhaps the truth lies in between, a man touched by something beyond, yet bound by the limits of his time. For now, Alois Irlmaier remains an enigma.
Some of his predictions can be read in the following articles in the German mainstream and regional media:
Süddeutsche Zeitung
Der Spiegel
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Image source: Screenshot/YouTube