December 2022
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The title of this post is a quote engraved in the Marble reception hall of the Netherlands American Cemetery and Memorial in Margraten in the Netherlands. The cemetery was created in October 1944 under the leadership of Joseph Shomon of the 611th Graves Registration Company as the Ninth United States Army pushed into the Netherlands
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The Dutch resistance was quite small compared to other countries. It developed relatively slowly, but the February strike of 1941 greatly stimulated it. Their actions were mainly non-violent, but there were several assassinations. The approach of the Allies in September 1944, however, prompted the Dutch resistance to expand and intensify its actions. Not only did
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This post is about just a few of the 1.5 million children murdered during the Holocaust. These children have three things in common, today would have been their birthday, they were all Jewish and they were all murdered. Pictures above: Betje de Vries-van de Kar was born in Amsterdam on 28 December 1923 and was
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A diary is the most personal possession someone might have. It is a journal of their wishes, fears and often their secrets. It is therefore extremely important when a diary becomes public it is treated with the utmost dignity and respect, especially those that were written during the darkest era of mankind. Diary of Susi
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A U.S. military policeman prepares the firing squad for German spies: Corporal Wilhelm Schmidt, 24, Officer-Cadet Guenther Billing, 21, and Sergeant Manfred Pernass, 23, after a court-martial by American authorities in Belgium during the Ardennes offensives. Three Germans were captured wearing American uniforms, armed with American weapons and driving an American jeep during the ill-fated
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The right to education is one of the most fundamental human rights. In August 1941, the Nazis passed a law to set up schools for Jewish students and teachers only in the Netherlands. The photograph above is of Jewish students of the school on Cliffordstraat, Amsterdam West. A class of 10 students, with teacher Goubitz.The
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Yesterday, a court in Germany convicted 97-year-old Irmgard Furchner and she received a two-year suspended sentence. Most of you will have heard of it. What you possibly didn’t hear is that after the war she married Heinz Furchtsam, a SS officer who also had worked in Stutthof. For reasons unknown to me, he changed his
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These are just a few impressions of Christmas during World War II. The above photo is of a Christmas party in a German hospital (Lazarett) on 20 December 1941. Sisters of the Red Cross wanted to surprise the wounded German soldiers on Christmas Eve and diligently practice their Christmas Carol. Dutch soldiers during the mobilization
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“Music has charms to soothe a savage breast,” is a famous line which was used by a character in William Congreve’s 1697 play The Mourning Bride. And sometimes music does soothe the savage beast, but during the Holocaust, some of these ‘beasts’ were so evil that nothing could soothe them. However, music did play an
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I am a great believer in balance. It is good to have a balanced view of life. I have written quite a bit on how the Dutch failed their Jewish-fellow citizens, and the Dutch complacency might be considered a crime. However, as I mentioned earlier, sometimes you need to take a step back and take
History of Sorts 