The National Socialist Movement in the Netherlands (abbreviation: NSB) was a Dutch political party that existed from 1931 to 1945. The NSB adhered to the ideology of National Socialism, presented itself not as a party but as a movement based on an anti-democratic attitude, and functioned as a collaboration party during the German occupation of the Netherlands in the Second World War.
One of their slogans was “Freedom, Justice, Welfare.”
Some of their members learned that Freedom, Justice, and Welfare were not quite what they thought they would be. As part of their collaboration with their German counterparts, the Nazis, members of the NSB were also expected to work in Germany. Following is the text of a letter from someone called Dolly, believed to be the daughter of an NSB family.
Dolly soon learned that the “real” slogan for the NSB should have been “Regrets, disappointment, disillusionment.”
November 19, 1942.
Dear Father and Mother,
Finally some messages from me. However, I have to write too quickly, in between my work. I am fortunate enough to give this letter to a Dutchman who is going on leave tomorrow afternoon for 14 days in Leiden. However, he puts this letter on the bus at Eindhoven station. I hope you get it on Saturday, otherwise on Sunday. Now, I can finally write what I want. Please do not pay any attention to what I have written in my previous letters as they are all lies, and I had to write them.
Dear Father and Mother, I am very nervous—every night, there is chaos. I have already been to the Labor Office here a hundred times, including to the doctor, but everything is in vain. I feel so terribly homesick for home. I only weigh 45 kilos, so I have lost 15 kilos, which says something about my height. Now, there is only one way that you can help me get out of here, and that is only a statement from a doctor from home that I am needed there, can get me out of here. Mother, please be so kind as to try it with Doctor Alphen v.d. Veer.
I’m simply exhausted, if I have to stay here any longer I will go crazy with fear and will definitely commit suicide. You are truly my last hope. I have to thank you for the lovely apples. They were very bruised—but did me good anyway. I’m still in the kitchen, from six in the morning until half past nine in the evening, with fifteen minutes of rest to eat. I’m as weak as a dishcloth. We don’t have any free time at all, even working all day on Sundays. How terribly wrong I was about these people. Now I have to pay for it too. The chef throws one insult after another at me. For example: “You foreigners are not good enough to be dragged around by the hair. We are the master race, now and forever, just swallow that with a calm face.”
If you are successful, Father should go to the Labor Office. I believe they will tell you what is so necessary for an explanation. A telegram works more reliably here. Two Dutch girls have already gotten away this way. I now wait every day for the answer that will save me. Help me, please. I am also so alone here that I can hardly do anything. I feel like a prisoner who is allowed to get some fresh air. Father and Mother do not abandon me now. I know I don’t deserve it. But I really want to make it right. I have to finish now, they are already calling me again. In any case, do not leave anything in your letters that I have written, because it will not get through and is dangerous. So see you soon, but I sincerely hope that I can say, see you again.
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The NSVO—Nationaal-Socialistische Vrouwenorganisatie (National Socialist Women Organisation-SS), was the female branch of the NSB, the Dutch Nazi party.
To win women for National Socialism in the Netherlands, Mussert founded the NSVO on 1 September 1938. As an independent branch of the NSB, it was led by Mrs. A.M. by Hoey Smith-van Stolk. The purpose of the NSVO was to promote and strengthen the National Socialist philosophy of life and worldview among Dutch women and the care of National Socialist workers who needed it.
The establishment of the NSVO was not an immediate success. In 1939, the organization had about a thousand members. For comparison, the NSB had about 37,000 members around that time. However, during the course of the occupation, enthusiasm for the NSVO increased. The NSVO in 1943 was at its peak and had twenty thousand plus members. This can partly be explained by the forced closure of various other women’s organizations under pressure from the German authorities. Another explanation for this explosive growth is the change in direction by the newly appointed leader.
Up till May 1940, the character of the NSVO was more social than political in nature. That changed after the German invasion. The Greater Germanic idea gradually came to play more and more of a role, and the racial doctrine of the SS was eventually accepted. For example, for NSVO women, the racial theory had to guide their choice of a husband. Keers-Laseur and Op ten Noort were now the pivot of the NSVO. The organization grew from 1,500 to 6,500 members in February 1941. All this meant that the NSVO increasingly ended up in the more radical camp of the German-oriented Dutch SS. For the NSB, the NSVO thus went from supportive to threatening. Mussert, therefore, dismissed the duo, which, in his opinion, were too oriented towards Rost van Tonningen in February 1941. The childless Keers-Laseur and the unmarried Op ten Noort were not role models for the comrades. Their new leader, Mrs. Olga de Ruiter-Van Lankeren Matthes, was married (to the Amsterdam Circle leader of the NSB, JW de Ruiter. They had four children and, therefore, optimally fulfilled the National Socialist ideal of women.
The image of the ideal National Socialist woman also changed. The magazine The National Socialist Woman (later Nederlandsch Vrouwenleven) was increasingly filled with tips on women’s fashion, housekeeping, and education. From a political struggle magazine, it became a typical women’s magazine in order to recruit more women for the NSVO. The photos of the NSVO meetings show there were activities of making children’s clothing, rope bags, and slippers, as well as practising how to care for children. For example, the Mother Service Department provided courses for housekeeping, infant care, first aid, and parenting.
The NSVO members were also busy collecting money. After the invasion of the Soviet Union, leader Olga started a major fundraising campaign for the German Red Cross. This yielded no less than eighty thousand guilders. Part of the money went to Kareol, the convalescent home for the Dutch wounded. The rest of the amount was received by Mrs Seyss-Inquart, the wife of Arthur Seyss-Inquart.
Later, Olga visited Dutch Waffen-SS members recovering from injuries sustained on the Eastern Front in the Lazaret (hospital) in Rosmalen.
After German chances of eventual victory diminished in the course of 1943, no new membership numbers were announced.
The NSVO emerged from fundraising, and The Aid and Assistance Department continued that work. This included providing frontline fighters with Christmas packages and knitting warm clothing for the Eastern Front fighters. Home visits to wounded comrades and cooking one-pot meals were among the typically female tasks of this department. In September 1944, during the panic of Mad Tuesday (5 September 1944), the Aid and Assistance department arranged the evacuation of NSB members to the east of the country. The care of all these refugees was in the hands of members of the NSVO. In the chaos of early 1945, the NSVO could no longer function properly. Some individual NSVO women continued to provide practical assistance to the evacuees.
After the liberation, male NSB members and their female counterparts were arrested. They were locked up in makeshift camps. Some children were locked up, usually until care was arranged through family or the Special Youth Care Office. But the women often spend at least a year in pre-trial detention.
Most members of the NSVO and NSB served very little time (if any) imprisoned. The most disturbing aspect was that none of these women were forced to join—they were all volunteers. Through their collaboration and complacency, they were guilty of Nazi crimes and the Holocaust.
pamphlet winter aid in the Netherlands 27 April 1941
What always amazes me is the mundaneness and normality of long periods during any war. Even during World War II, when millions upon millions died, there were days that can only be described as regular days.
I picked 27 April 1941, because I came across images that illustrate this “normality.” Even the weather that day was normal.
A cold day with an average temperature of 4.9℃ [40.82°F]. It remained dry throughout the day. The maximum temperature reached 8℃ [46.4°F] while the minimum temperature remained at 1.2℃ [34.16°F].
Photo from a photo album from Mr and Mrs Van Leeuwen, living in Schiedam. From their flat, they looked out on the harbours of Rotterdam. Mrs. J. van Leeuwen was a teacher. Together with her husband, she regularly made trips to the Netherlands during the school holidays. Photos from consecutive pages in the album from the period 1939-1945. The photo shows, Schiedam Veterans. Netherlands, Schiedam, 27 April 1941.
Football. Dutch league, season 1940-1941, 2nd decision game for the Championship Western 1st Division, ADO-DHC (result 3-1), stadium De Kuip in Rotterdam, Netherlands 27 April 1941. Photo: The toss, ADO goalkeeper Willem Koek, the referee trio and the captain of DHC follow the drop of the coin. Right border/referee De Nijs.
In the same match, ADO was on the attack, and DHC goalkeeper Van de Broek kicks the ball away.
The threat of violence was always present. The Slamat ship disaster took place on 17 April 1941. The Slamat was a Dutch Lloyd ship that was deployed during Operation Demon to evacuate British, Australian and New Zealand soldiers from Greece. On 24 April 1941, the ship left Alexandria in convoy for the Greek port of Nauplia. The embarkation of evacuees was extremely difficult, after which Captain Tjalling Luidinga decided to stay longer than the deadline in order to take as many people as possible with him. On the way back, the Slamat was hit by airstrikes. The ship sank, and only ten crew members survived the disaster. It was the largest Dutch merchant ship disaster of World War II.
In 1932 Mussert founded the WA (Resilience Department): a paramilitary organization of black-uniformed NSB members (Dutch Nazi party). On Sunday, 27 April 1941, a large open-air meeting took place in Eindhoven, at which the leader addressed his fighters.
State prosecutor Albert Rosenfelder, at the front of the picture
Hitler had a vision for an empire that would last a thousand years. It only lasted 12, but in those 12 years, he and his Nazi party did more damage than any empire before.
On 30 January 1933, Von Hindenburg appointed Hitler chancellor. “It is like a dream. The Wilhelmstraße is ours,” Joseph Goebbels, the future Minister of Propaganda, wrote in his diary. Wilhelmstraße in Berlin was recognised as the centre of the government in Germany.
On 23 March 1933, the Reichstag met in Berlin. The main item on the agenda was a new law, the ‘Enabling Act.’ It allowed Hitler to enact new laws without interference from the president or Reichstag for four years. It gave Hitler and the NSDAP absolute power in Germany. The day before that on 22 March, in a picturesque town called Dachau—20 Kilometers north of Munich—the first concentration camp was opened.
A press release stated: On Wednesday the first concentration camp is to be opened in Dachau with accommodation for 5,000 people. All Communists and—where necessary—Reichsbanner and Social Democratic functionaries, who endanger state security, are to be concentrated here, as in the long run, it is not possible to keep individual functionaries in the state prisons without overburdening these prisons, and on the other hand, these people cannot be released because attempts have shown that they persist in their efforts to agitate and organize as soon as they are released.
The camp stayed open until 29 April 1945, when it was liberated by the US Army.
In those 12 years, the camp had 10 camp commandants: • SS-Standartenführer Hilmar Wäckerle (22 March 1933–26 June 1933) • SS-Gruppenführer Theodor Eicke (26 June 1933–4 July 1934) • SS-Oberführer Alexander Reiner [de] (4 July 1934 –22 October 1934) • SS-Brigadeführer Berthold Maack (22 October 1934–12 January 1935) • SS-Oberführer Heinrich Deubel (12 January 1935–31 March 1936) • SS-Oberführer Hans Loritz (31 March 1936–7 January 1939) • SS-Hauptsturmführer Alexander Piorkowski (7 January 1939–2 January 1942) • SS-Obersturmbannführer Martin Weiß (3 January 1942–30 September 1943) • SS-Hauptsturmführer Eduard Weiter (30 September 1943–26 April 1945) • SS-Obersturmbannführer Martin Weiß (26 April 1945–28 April 1945)
Rudolf Höss, later commandant of Auschwitz-Birkenau, learned much from Theodor Eicke at Dachau. Facing trial and likely execution in Poland for his crimes during World War II, Höss recounted a flogging he witnessed in Dachau. It was Eicke’s order, Höss remembered, that at least one company of SS personnel be there when the punishment was carried out:
“Two prisoners had stolen cigarettes from the canteen and were sentenced to twenty-five blows of the cane. The soldiers lined up in a U-shaped formation with their weapons. The punishment bench stood in the middle. The two prisoners were presented by the block leaders. The commandant put in his appearance. The camp commander and the senior company reported to him. The duty officer read the sentence and the first prisoner, a small, hardened, lazy man, had to lie down across the bench. Two soldiers from the troop held his head and hands firmly while two block leaders carried out the sentence, alternating after each blow. The prisoner didn’t utter a sound. It was different from the second one, a strong, broad-shouldered, political prisoner. After the first blow, he screamed wildly and wanted to tear himself loose. He continued screaming to the last blow, even though the commandant told him repeatedly to be quiet.”
In January 1941, the leader of the Dutch Nazi party, Mussert, was invited to Munich by Himmler. Goal: to enthuse the NSB leader to the SS. The Dutch NSB delegation included Mussert, Van Geelkerken, Rost, Feldmeijer and Zondervan. On 20 January 1941, a surprise tour awaited: a day at the Dachau concentration camp. The visitors were shown nice-looking aspects of the camp: model dormitories, good sanitary facilities, and a kitchen that produced good quality food that everyone tasted and thought was the usual prison fare. In March 1946, Mussert says in the cell barracks in Scheveningen, “So I was in Dachau in 1941. It was beautiful. People were in the free air: they painted, baked, and gardened. They looked good and smiled. Of course, I found that out later, I saw the exhibition section.”
Although they did not have the same level of evilness as the NSDAP, the NSB were nevertheless willing participants in the Holocaust. Mussert may not have been fully aware of what was going on in Dachau in January 1941, since it was reasonably early on in the war, but he knew exactly what the fate of the Jews was later on and he facilitated the occupying Nazi regime in any way he could.
Beginning in 1942, Nazi doctors performed medical experiments on prisoners in Dachau. Physicians and scientists from the Luftwaffe (German Air Force) and the German Experimental Institute for Aviation conducted high-altitude and hypothermia experiments, as well as experiments to test methods of making seawater potable. These efforts aimed to aid German pilots who conducted bombing raids or who were downed in icy waters. German scientists also carried out experiments to test the efficacy of pharmaceuticals against diseases like malaria and tuberculosis. Hundreds of prisoners died or were permanently disabled as a result of these experiments.
While these medical experiments happened behind closed doors, new evidence of ominous intent became visible in the layout of the camp itself. In 1942, a new crematorium was constructed, supplementing the existing one erected two years earlier. This new crematorium, named Barrack X, was fitted with four furnaces, a disinfection section, and, most chilling in retrospect, a gas chamber. Generally, the SS utilized the crematoria to immolate the bodies of inmates who died in the camp. They also hanged or shot inmates involved in resistance activity there (the whole area was separated from the prisoners’ barracks by a wall). Despite all the labour and resources expended, the SS thankfully never implemented the mass gassing of human beings at Dachau.
The number of prisoners incarcerated in Dachau between 1933 and 1945 exceeded 200,000.
The number of prisoners who were murdered in the camp and the subcamps between January 1940 and May 1945 was at least 28,000. This number does not include those who were killed there between 1933 and the end of 1939, as well as an unknown number of unregistered prisoners. Also, a great number committed suicide. It is unlikely that the total number of victims who died in Dachau will ever be known.
As late as 19 April 1945, prisoners were sent to KZ Dachau; on that date, a freight train from Buchenwald with nearly 4,500 was diverted to Nammering. SS troops and police confiscated food and water that local townspeople tried to give to the prisoners. Nearly three hundred dead bodies were ordered removed from the train and carried to a ravine over 400 metres away. The 524 prisoners who had been forced to carry the dead to this site were then shot by the guards, and buried along with those who had died on the train. Nearly 800 bodies went into this mass grave.
On 26 April 1945, prisoner Karl Riemer fled the Dachau concentration camp to get help from American troops and on 28 April, Victor Maurer, a representative of the International Red Cross, negotiated an agreement to surrender the camp to U.S. troops. That night a secretly formed International Prisoners Committee took over the control of the camp. Units of the 3rd Battalion, 157th Infantry Regiment, 45th Infantry Division, commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Felix L. Sparks, were ordered to secure the camp. On 29 April, Sparks led part of his battalion as they entered the camp over a side wall. At about the same time, Brigadier General Henning Linden led the 222nd Infantry Regiment of the 42nd (Rainbow) Infantry Division soldiers including his aide, Lieutenant William Cowling, to accept the formal surrender of the camp from German Lieutenant Heinrich Wicker at an entrance between the camp and the compound for the SS garrison. Linden was travelling with Marguerite Higgins and other reporters; as a result, Linden’s detachment generated international headlines by accepting the surrender of the camp. More than 30,000 Jews and political prisoners were freed, and since 1945 adherents of the 42nd and 45th Division versions of events have argued over which unit was the first to liberate Dachau. But one thing that can’t be argued, what the liberators found was something that stayed with them for life.
One disturbing aspect about all of this is that the torturing and killing happened within the boundaries of German law.
The Holocaust wasn’t only the mass murder of the European Jews and other groups, it was also desecrating places of worships, especially synagogues,. It was showing total contempt and disrespect for holy places.
The above picture was taken on September 16,1944. It shows American and Canadian Jewish soldiers clear the synagogue in Maastricht , which was used as a warehouse during the war. This photo appeared in the New York Times of September 16, 1944 under the caption: “Hope springs eternal”.
The V-actions were Allied propaganda expressions based on the V-sign (V for Victory). To curb the success of these actions, the Germans devised a similar action: ‘V=Victory, because Germany wins for Europe on all fronts’. In August 1941, the synagogue in Apeldoorn. was set on fire, and daubed during on of those V-actions.
The synagogue in Deventer, destroyed by the Nazis, 1941.
Synagogue of Nijmegen, in Gerard Noodtstraat, defaced with anti-Semitic slogans and a Swastika , August 1941
Defaced synagogue in Beverwijk, circa 1942
The synagogue in Apeldoorn was set on fire and defaced by NSB members. August 1941.
Synagogue Paslaan 18, in Apeldoorn. Set on fire by NSB members in mid-August 1941.
What pains me to say is that all of these synagogues were desecrated by Dutch and not Germans. They probably were members of the NSB, the Dutch Nazi Party, buy they were Dutch and no one forced them to do this.
The Weerbaarheidsafdeling (WA; “Resilience Department”) was the paramilitary arm of the National Socialist Movement in the Netherlands (NSB), the fascist political party that collaborated with the Nazi ocdupiers of the Netherlands during World War II. The organization, roughly equivalent to the German SA, was founded in 1932 by Anton Mussert, co-founder of the NSB in 1931 and its leader until the end of the war. Members wore and marched in black uniforms and were thus called “blackshirts”. In 1933 the Dutch government banned the wearing of uniforms (by civilians), and the WA was disbanded in 1935 in order to forestall the Dutch government’s banning it. In 1940, after the German invasion, the WA became openly active again and more ruthless than before. They specialized in violent attacks, particularly on the Dutch Jewish population.
The WA magazine called The Black Soldier
On Saturday afternoon, 7 September 1940, about 200 members of the National Youth Storm, accompanied by a number of WA men, marched through The Hague. A cyclist, intentionally or unintentionally, collided with a girl from the Youth Storm and was then beaten up by the gunmen. The public got involved, after which passing German soldiers also came to the aid of the WA soldiers. Police officers from The Hague fired warning shots to restore order. A number of WA’ers were hit by bullets. It is not unlikely that it was fired by the German military. One of the WA officers was 28-year-old Petrus Nicolaas (Peter) Ton (seen in the picture above), who was shot in the head and died later that evening.
For the NSB there was no doubt: Ton had been murdered. The young WA was considered a martyr. Thousands of NSB members from all over the country were present at his funeral on 11 September at Nieuw Eykenduinen cemetery, and the entire leadership of the movement, led by Mussert, and the general commander of WA, Mr A.J. without.
Mussert used the murder of Peter Ton to demand that the Nazi occupiers finally intervene in the system of justice and police.
He got his way: Hanns Albin Rauter (supreme boss of the SS and the police in the Netherlands) immediately fired the Hague police chief N.G. van der Mei. The police officers involved in the incident had Rauter arrested. Arthur Seyss-Inquart (the German ‘Reich Commissioner’ and Hitler’s deputy in the Netherlands) and Rauter took the opportunity to centralize the leadership of the Dutch police. Two attorney generals were also fired.
It could not be established from the Dutch side whether a police bullet from The Hague actually caused Ton’s death because the autopsy on the remains was only performed by the Germans. It is possible that Ton was hit by a stray German bullet. His death brought the NSB into great excitement: Ton was the first NSB member to die ‘in office’ and for his National Socialist ideals. In the NSB jargon of the time, Ton was the first ‘blood sacrifice of the Movement’. The WA company to which Ton had belonged was given its name as a reminder. While waiting for the NSB mausoleum to be built on the Goudsberg in Lunteren, Ton was buried in The Hague. His funeral ceremony became a manifestation of the NSB, in which many thousands of comrades and comrades were present from all over the country.
In general, I have some level, albeit low, of sympathy for those who chose to collaborate with the Nazi regime in the Netherlands because maybe they felt it was the only way to survive.
However, I have no sympathy for the Nederlandse Landwacht. They were in it for their own greed and hungered for power. Their aim was to terrorize Dutch citizens, including their neighbours, and to protect members of the Dutch Nazi party, the NSB. None of these men had to join and never forced to do so. They joined because they wanted to join.
The Nederlandse Landwacht was a Dutch paramilitary organization founded by the Nazi occupiers in the Netherlands on 12 November 1943. It should not be confused with the military volunteer corps ‘Landwacht Nederland’, which was established in March 1943 and renamed Landstorm Nederland in October and that became part of the Waffen-SS.
The Landwacht was first seen on the street in March 1944. The Landwacht mostly was made up of Dutch National Socialist Movement (NSB) members equipped with shotguns. The populace nicknamed them the “Jan-Hagel,” Dutch slang for a rabble but also related to the Dutch word for a shotgun (hagelgeweer). The Landwacht was mainly used to guard buildings, check identity cards, and carry out arrests, house searches, and raids. They did not wear a uniform initially but were identified by a red bracelet.
In one case of bullying by the Landwacht on 13 June 1944, the ‘heroes of the Landwacht’ took food from successful HBS students in Apeldoorn. Reinier Hardonk wrote in his diary, “Young people, who had passed the Christian HBS, went out per Jan Enjoyment. They had collected some butter, eggs, sugar, etc. as presents for the teachers. They were along the way by Heroes of The Land Guard and were arrested. The food was taken and the boys were taken to Arnhem as prisoners. What a heroic act!”
The Landwacht was feared and hated by the population, among other things because during the Hongerwinter, the Dutch famine in the winter of 1944–45, the Landwacht confiscated food parcels from Dutch civilians. Many thousands of Dutch people had travelled hundreds of kilometres to obtain bread or some potatoes. On 27 March 1945, the illegal Het Parool newspaper devoted an article to the Landwacht’s many arrests and executions. Het Parool voiced its opinion saying, “…Landwachters should be shot after the war.”
Members of the Landwacht generally wore the black NSB party uniforms: black shirts, black trousers or riding breeches, black leather motorcycle or riding boots, and a black leather belt with a matching carrying strap. Depending on the weather, a black tunic or black overcoat could be worn. Though the Landwacht were poorly armed, black pistol holsters were sometimes carried.
The Landwacht were so cruel that sometimes the Germans had to intervene. For example, the Ugchel diarist Willem van Houtum writes on April 8, 1944, “German soldiers beat Landwachters from the platform in Deventer. They checked the citizens there for clandestine goods. They threw everything on the ground. For example, bottles of milk and precious eggs were smashed. Another member wants to ride the bus for free in Epe. This is only allowed for members of the German Wehrmacht. After many words, the conductor calls the head office in Apeldoorn and this in turn calls the Ortskommandant. Apeldoorn was met by two sturdy mechanics. They take him to the Ortskommandant. He suddenly wants to pay at that moment, but that is no longer the point. The mechanics literally grab him by the collar and bring the criminal to the intended address. After some scolding The Ortskommandant notices that the Landwachter is carrying a revolver under his coat, which is why he is handed over to the SD, who put him in jail. The villains eventually end up in jail. According to rumours, there are already more Landwachters in prison than can be checked.”
At the end of August 1944, the Winterswijk Landwacht got a hold of a farmer’s daughter, the mayor of Wisch and Terborg describes, “At farmer Rougoor, they tied a cloth over Leyda’s eyes, they would count to ten; if she did not say where the Jews were, she would be shot. When she said nothing, they shot into the ground, but the girl persisted. Shame on those bastards. The cross of merit to Leyda!”
During the famine winter, the Landwacht became deeply hated for confiscating food so laboriously gathered by civilians during food scavenges.
Eventually, only three members received the death penalty after the war, Gerard Rollema, Gerrit Sanner and Dirk Eijkelboom.
One of the weapons during World War II was propaganda—a powerful tool. The armies did not have to be persuaded to go to war, it was their job to follow the orders of their respective governments.
However, propaganda was used to persuade civilians of the merits of war. This was done by all sides.
World War II was different from any war before because it included the targeted mass murder of the civilian population. The Nazis were convincing the general population that they were not just fighting external enemies but also internal ones. They organized propaganda tools to sell their lies to market them as truth. It is a fact that there is an element of truth in every lie.
Lou Manche was a member of the NSB, the Dutch Nazi party. He was also a member of the WA, the Dutch equivalent of the Stormtroopers, they called themselves a group who maintained order, but in fact, they were just a gang of thugs.
Lou Manche was also an artist and, by all means, a very talented artist, but rather than using his talents for good—he used them for evil.
Manche became a prominent propagandist for the NSB. The poster at the start of the blog is one of his posters. In the poster, he made clever use of semiotics, the study of signs and symbols and their use or interpretation. There are a few symbols in the poster: The Star of David, the hammer and sickle, and a caricature of Winston Churchill sitting on someone, who I believe to be Stafford Cripps, who was appointed Ambassador to the Soviet Union by Churchill. He also used words like: retarded; dandy; millionaire communist; and gold trading Jews. The symbols and words were subliminal messages meant to slip past your mental radar and embed themselves deep into your subconscious mind. It focused on making Jews, English, Communists, and people with mental illness look to be the enemy of the state.
People who read the messages may have thought they were not so harmful because they didn’t call for aggression. They may have thought they were warnings of what could happen. The headline read, If England Wins the War, then listed all that could happen. In short, it implied that the Jews would exploit the Dutch, the English were retards, and the Soviets would destroy the country.
The poster also refers to a piece H.G Wells had written in a magazine called, Fortnightly.
Wells warns about the mistake the English government has made by going to war with Germany. To end Hitler’s regime, he warns about what may come after Hitler. He also says that they think that they can render Hitler powerless just so that can go back fishing and golfing, quoted on the poster of Lou Manche. This of course was one of those cherry-picking tactics of the Nazis, H.G. Wells had been one of the authors banned by the Nazi regime. His book “The Outline of History: Being a Plain History of Life and Mankind” was one of the books, thrown into the flames, a the 1933 book burnings. But if it suited the Nazi agenda, they would be willing to overlook that fact.
Although many Dutch used their common sense and did not heed the propaganda of the NSB and Lou Manche, there were many who fell for it, and quite a few were well-educated. 75% of all Dutch Jews were murdered during the Holocaust, Lou Manche’s ‘art’ had a part to play in this.
Many of Lou Manche’s propaganda posters remind me of modern-day memes, which are often used in a similar way to get a political message across. Like then they are usually taken out of context.
After the war, Lou Manche was tried and jailed for a short time. In 1954, the Royal British Legion commissioned him for a stained glass piece, but after an assembly of protests, they decided against it and assigned it to another artist.
I am passionate about my site and I know you all like reading my blogs. I have been doing this at no cost and will continue to do so. All I ask is for a voluntary donation of $2, however if you are not in a position to do so I can fully understand, maybe next time then. Thank you.
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Not every evil act was committed by a weapon or by sending people to the gas chamber. Some evil acts were much more subtle.
Herman Heukels was a photographer and a member of the NSB, the Dutch Nazi party, Hermans’ weapon was a camera. He took pictures of several raids. His most famous pictures are probably those he took in Amsterdam, on the Olympia Square on June 20,1943, of Jews awaiting deportation. His photographs were published in Storm, the newspaper for the Dutch SS.
It was evil because he knew these people were going to be deported to camps like Westerbork and eventually Auschwitz and Sobibor. He knew that most of these people would be murdered. He took pictures of families who would be dead only a few weeks or a few months later.
The people he took photographed were clearly distressed. Their houses or apartments were just taken away from them—all they had left were a few suitcases. They didn’t know what their future would hold for them but they knew it wasn’t good.
Herman did not take these photos for them to pick them up after he had developed them. Herman posted them in a vile newspaper so that its readers could gloat.
Herman Heukels‘ passport had expired a day after he had taken the photos on Olympia Square on 21 June 1943. He then applied for a foreign passport—I can only presume a German one.
Heukel was arrested after the war and committed suicide on 26 April 1947 while in prison.
I am passionate about my site and I know you all like reading my blogs. I have been doing this at no cost and will continue to do so. All I ask is for a voluntary donation of $2, however if you are not in a position to do so I can fully understand, maybe next time then. Thank you.
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One might be forgiven that the title implies a current school trip to Dachau, but the title refers to another kind of trip to the notorious death camp.
The Dutch Nazis, the NSB. did not have the same level of hatred against, Jews,Roma and disabled people as their German counterpart. Himmler was aware of this but he needed support for the SS from the Dutch.
In January 1941 ,Himmler invited the leader of the NSB,Anton Mussert to Munich.
Most of the NSB leadership accompanied Mussert on his journey to Munich.The aim of the meeting was to make Mussert enthusiastic for the SS so he would encourage Dutch men to join them.
As part of the trip an excursion was planned to Dachau, but to ensure the Dutch delegation would not be shocked by what they saw there, the whole excursion was staged on January 20,1941.
They were shown good dormitories, great sanitary utilities and a well equipped kitchen with high quality and fresh food. In short the wool was pulled over their eyes.
In an interview in jail in 1946, Mussert stated.
“That time when I visited Dachau, it was beautiful. People were walking around in the open air, they were busy gardening.baking and painting. They were all smiling. Later on of course I realized that this was all staged”
Although they did not have the same level of evilness as the NSDAP, the NSB were nevertheless willing participants in the Holocaust. Mussert may not have been fully aware what was going on in Dachau in January 1941, since it was reasonably early on in the war, but he knew exactly what the fate of the Jews was later on and he facilitated the occupying Nazi regime in any way he could.
The whole trip was a propaganda exercise. It is also a clear indication that the Nazis knew exactly that what they were doing was wrong, for they even hid their crimes for their ‘friends’.
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History of Sorts 
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