On the Road is a weekday feature spotlighting reader photo submissions.
From the exotic to the familiar, whether you’re traveling or in your own backyard, we would love to see the world through your eyes.
Captain C
This is the last of three photosets from my visit to the Verzetsmuseum (Resistance Museum) in Amsterdam last October. Plus one very necessary palate cleanser.
Some photos of the effects of Nazi bombing on the Netherlands, Rotterdam IIRC.
Bomb damage in (I think) Rotterdam.
The winter of 1944-45 is known as the Hunger Winter in the Netherlands. The Nazi occupiers diverted and withheld food from the Dutch civilian population, out of a combination of spite and to supplement their own dwindling supplies. Around 18,000 Dutch folks died from starvation during this period. It is said my own family survived because my Opa and his colleagues at the pharmaceutical facility were able to use the facilities there to brew gin to trade for food.
I will just repeat what I wrote when I originally posted this here:
Seyss-Inquart, the Nazi satrap of the Dutch Occupation, at the Nuremberg Trials, and me doing what would possibly have gotten me kicked out of the spectator gallery of said trials had I been there and not negative-20-something years old at the time.
Entrance to the exhibit on the persecution of Jews in the Netherlands during the occupation. Roughly 75% of the Netherlands’ 140,000 or so Jews (which included German Jewish refugees) were murdered in this period.
Wim Henneicke, Jew hunter. Like a (shameful) number of others, he hunted down and turned Jews in for money (7 and a half guilders per Jew), and in his case, a pre-existing hatred of Jews.
Also, his hair looks like that of Geert Wilders, current Dutch right wing politician.
The info card about Wim the Jew hunter. Eventually, he saw which way the wind was blowing and tried to join the resistance, but they soon decided he was untrustworthy and executed him in 1944.
After a heavy museum like the Verzetsmuseum, it is imperative that one engage in self care. In my case, I went to the nearby Kebap Diner and had some fries and Chocomel with Ralph the Bunny.
Jay
Thank you, we need to remember.
Mokum
In the title it should say Verzetsmuseum.
HinTN
What a soulless ghoul.
Thanks for the reminder that the survivors can remember and teach the next generations.
Lapassionara
Thank you.
Yutsano
Everything is better with a bun-bun lunch companion. I wonder if I could bear witness to this after my reaction to Dachau.
Andrew Abshier
On my trips to Europe I always made a point to visit sites associated with the Shoah. I definitely understand the heaviness, and I was out on the periphery (Venice, Italy and Royallieu in France). It is upon all of us to bear witness and remember.
Trivia Man
Never forget.
Back in the 80’s i was a cashier and had one semi regular customer. He always had his sleeves rolled up a bit on his forearm and you could see his tattoo. It wasnt until later i realized what it was, clearly he was intentionally reminding the world – Never Forget.
mvr
Grew up with stories about these years. Just from my mom. My dad didn’t talk about it.
Their experiences were both difficult but very different – due both to gender and class. They only met after the war.
My mom used to tell stories of going up on the roof (I believe in Scheveningen where she lived at the time) and watching the bombing of Rotterdam. Germany got the Netherlands to surrender with a threat to expand that bombing to Amsterdam, as she told us. Her then fiance’ was sent to a concentration camp early in the war.
My father was at Delft University, which was shut down when the faculty and students refused to sign loyalty oaths to the Nazis. His father ran the hospital in Rotterdam at this time if I have my chronology correct. I also suspect that led him to be able to protect my dad during the early years of the war, though by the end he had to live in hiding to keep from being drafted into the German army.
So as I said, I grew up with my mom’s stories about this from the time since I was five or so. Also with warnings that it could well happen here. My Dad kept his Dutch citizenship partly to give us an out if it did. Had George Wallace won in ’68 we would have emigrated. What they were worried about feels more real now than it did then. So I’m glad Harris is doing a fine job with her campaign. Holland has its own problems with fascists these days and in any case I no longer have Dutch citizenship and would have trouble getting it back due to those fascists and sympathizers who have made immigration harder.
Thanks for educating us!
RevRick
My dad, who served as an assistant to the Naval Attaché in the American Embassy in Berlin, was only evacuated in late April 1940, when it became clear Hitler was going to invade France. He passed through Rotterdam a few days before the bombing, got stuck in Genoa, Italy until France surrendered, and then took tramp steamers to Buenos Aires and Rio de Janeiro, before finally making it back to NYC in November.
NutmegAgain
Wonderful, thank you. I love Amsterdam (although it’s been years since I visited.) There’s also a museum of colonial exploits, I don’t remember the exact name, kind of out & away from most of the museums. Since my ex grew up in Indonesia, seeing Dutch colonialism from that perspective was, er, interesting (and infuriating).
Captain C
@Jay:
@HinTN:
@Lapassionara:
You’re welcome. It’s a well done museum and it is important to remember.
Captain C
@Yutsano: Bunny, fries, and Chocomel makes it easier.
Captain C
@NutmegAgain: It used to be the Tropenmuseum and is now called the Wereldmuseum. Definitely both interesting and infuriating.
Captain C
@mvr: Glad your folks made it out alive, if not unscathed. My Opa taught at the Free University in Amsterdam until the Nazis shut it down (same reason and timing). He then taught at the Underground University. After moving to the US, he got a plaque honoring him for this, along with a letter pointing out that he was technically deserting as he was, I think, still in the reserves and had not secured permission to leave the country.