Dutch volunteers in the Waffen-SS during WW2. We've talked a great deal about that on this
channel. Around 25,000 Dutch men served in the Waffen-SS. Most of them fought on the Eastern
Front: between 4,000 to 6,000 were KIA or MIA (21%). So what happened to the survivors? In
this video you will learn about the fate of the Dutch Waffen-SS Volunteers after the war.
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In the Netherlands the Germans surrended on 5 May (although the official signing took place one day
later). Germany surrended on 8 May 1945. Another signing took place on 9 May. Once the war ended
Nazis and collaborators were prosecuted and in some cases lynched by angry mobs.
In the days after liberation aggression by the Dutch citizens is not directed towards
German soldiers, but towards the collaborating fellow country men, or alledged collaborators.
We're talking about members of the Dutch nazi party: the NSB. Also girls that had flirted, dated
or slept with German soldiers were targetted. Although these women weren't violently attacked,
they were often pubicly humuliated, shaved bald, and swastikas were painted on their heads.
Dutch Waffen-SS served in the Wiking Division (Regiment Westland) and the Dutch Volunteer
Legion. Later in the war these units were renamed. Then there was also Landstorm Nederland for those
who didn't want to serve abroad and thus stayed in the Netherlands (although some saw
action in Belgium). Many of these were in the country when the war came to an end.
They were uncertain what to do. Trying to escape or stick together? One of them wrote:
“Indeed, on the day of the capitulation, the boys were told that anyone who thought they could
reach their home could go. Several did so, after providing oneself partially or fully with civilian
clothes, but very few seem to have managed to get home! The Dutch 'underground forces' appeared in
public that day and arrested practically everyone they did not know. When we received confirmation
that we could go, I also had my doubts, but I soon realized that this was an impossibility.
After all, I could only have gone to Epe where everyone knows me, and what should I
have done there? Come crawling back home? Never. Besides, there was no chance of that anyway,
because long before that time I would have been caught. And so I decided to stay.”
Perhaps that was a wise decision. Many were caught by the Domestic Forces (Binnenlandse
Strijdkrachten): a group of armed Dutch resistance members who eagerly wanted
to disarm the Germans. This was explicitly forbidden by the Allies, basically because
of the simple fact that lack of discipline could lead to incidents. These incidents did happen and
resulted in several deaths. Collaborators that were caught often faced public humiliation.
One volunteer and his unit were lucky in that sense:
“We had Canadian troops on guard again. We sang loudly. Hundreds of cursing civilians lined the
road, and sometimes one would attack one of us to rip off his war decorations, but then
a few Canadians would immediately jump off the accompanying jeeps and hit them.
11 to 25 May housed in a tent camp where we were well looked after.”
The Allied troops looked after them because they were treated as POWs. Also to prevent lynchings.
Dutch politicians feared there would be a day of reckening in which countless of people would lose
their lives. This however did not happen. Although revenge murders did take place this
did not happen widespread. What did happen where massive arrests. Those who performed the arrests
were mostly inspired by a statement made by Queen Wilhelmina during the war that:
"...in a liberated Netherlands there would be no more room for traitors".
Although these words weren't repreated in later
broadcasts they remained in the heads of Dutch citizens.
Let's take a look at the Dutch volunteers that were in Germany when the war
ended and were taken prisoner by the western Allies. After serving time in the American
or British POW camps Dutch Waffen-SS POWs in Germany were extradited to the Netherlands.
There they were put in camps together with other people accused of collaboration.
According to historian Peter Romijn between 120,000 and 150,000 Dutch people, accused of
collaboration, were detained in the Netherlands after the war. These people were interned in one
of the 130 camps. In these camps whole families were sometimes interned. For this former
German camps (like Camp Westerbork, Vught and Amersfoort) were used, as well as army barracks,
schools, fortresses, factories and warehouses. The prisoners were guarded by the Domestic
Forces (Binnenlandse Strijdkrachten) who – like said before – lacked discipline. That combined
with their hatred for the enemy resulted in severe abuses, assaults and even murder.
In 63 of the 130 camps there were incidents of severe abuses. In 60 camps there are no reports
of abuses and in 7 camps there are reports that the treatment of the inmates was humane.
One notorious exception was camp De Harskamp where around 4,000 of
the 18,500 Dutch Waffen-SS volunteers who survived the war ended up [In 't Veld]. The
camp was initially guarded by the Canadians who handed over command to the Dutch in June 1945.
One of the inmates wrote about the change of guard:
“June 27 we were handed over to the BS [Domestic Forces] by the Canadians.
From that moment on we were no longer prisoners of war, but political prisoners.”
In the months after the Dutch guards took over the camp wild shootings occured. Most of these
occured at night where the guards fired into the camp injuring or killing some
of the inmates. Punitive exercise was a daily occurence from now on. Guards withheld food
which led to malnutrition and beatings took place during interrogations.
The new regime left eleven dead and a similar amount of people wounded. Another eight
died because they had to clear mines. Mid-1946 inmates were transfered or tried. Towards the
end of the year De Harskamp ended as a internment camp for collaborators.
“The excesses in the internment camps are perhaps understandable
or at least a logical consequence of the emotions that played a role;
one could not suppress the hatred and feelings of revenge against the Dutch traitors. After
five years of Nazi oppression, those who were partly responsible for this had to be punished.”
Translated from: Veldgrauw. Nederlanders in de Waffen-SS (Evertjan van Roekel) 321.
Later a Parliamentary
Committee of Inquiry (Parlementaire enquêtecommissie) investigated the matter.
During the war the Dutch government in exile devised a special legal system to punish traitors
quickly and severely. This was also to avoid kangaroo courts (volktribunalen),
which eventually did happen but not on a large scale. Now there are a lot of different numbers:
numbers of arrests, numbers of charges. In the book VELDGRAUW written by Evertjan van
Roekel a totall of 64,482 judgements have been passed, around 6,800 were Waffen-SS volunteers.
Compared to other West European countries the Netherlands punished many of its subjects.
Van Roekel stated that at the end the special legal system can be called unsuccessfull
since many collaborators weren't punished. Most Waffen-SS volunteers were sentenced between
5 to 10 years in prison for serving in foreign military service against the Netherlands and its
Allies. With eased circumstances this could be brought down to 3 years. With aggravating
circumstances – like having served in the Dutch army before – sentences could go up to 15 years.
Life imprisonment and the death penalty were rare. The countless cases had to be
proceded in a short amount of time, it came across as assembly line work. From 1948
large-scale pardons were given. According to historian Evertjan van Roekel instead of fast,
strict and fair (snel, streng en rechtvaardig) the post-war prosecutions can be described as:
rushed, too strict and quite random (gehaast, te streng en vrij willekeurig). At the end the hatred
against the collaborators subsided and they were
re-adopted in society. Decorated volunteer Gerard Mooyman was sentenced to six years in prison.
He was released in 1949 and he established himself as an entrepreneur in Groningen.
Mooyman avoided publicity and lived a nondescript life. That changed for a while in 1967 when he had
himself interviewed in the magazine Revu. Mooyman distanced himself from his past in strong terms:
'I regard everything I experienced in the German period as a great personal tragedy. As a youthful
National Socialist and a fanatic fighter for this ideal, I later came to the conclusion that
I had fought and suffered for a criminal cause.' In 1987 Mooyman died in a traffic accident.
Not all former Waffen-SS volunteers serving on the Eastern Front returned to the Netherlands.
A certain number were POWed by the Soviets and these were shipped off to Siberia.
In the mid-1950s several of them, most likely 200, returned to the Netherlands.
This is all I know. If anyone has more on Dutch in the Gulag,
lemme know! A number of 6,000 remained in Germany, fearing for what would await them
in the Netherlands. Some later escaped the Dutch prison and made it to Germany,
such as Herbertus Bikker (nicknamed The Butcher of Ommen (Dutch: De Beul van Ommen)), Auke Pattist
(who later went to Spain) and Toon Soetebier. Some of those sentenced to prison later
served in Indonesia and Korea. That is a story for another time.