i don't know any more places for memorials, except i guess i forgot the Dam monument. i know the oude kerk in the RLD was used as a morgue during the hunter winter. Children were sent to farms in the countryside duing the winter. SOmetimes to simply get food and return, sometimes to stay and live. I heard stories about curfews and about the press gangs that would grab you and take you to work camps in germany. A man told me how he and his buddy were chased by one but luckily for one a tram came and he was able to run past it and escape but they took his friend and he never saw him again. He told me about escaping from dancehalls through windows because they were there after curfew and the police were coming. He was a huge glen miller fan. A lady told me about how she would smuggle newspapers and food rationing cards and once even a handgun. She was 16 at the time. She told me how she helped out at a safe house where they hid onderduikers. They had a special code to let people know when it was safe to come in or for when it was too hot to come in. They had two flowerpots on the mantle and depending on their positioning it meant if the coast was clear. One winter day they were expecting a man but he didn't arrive. of course they were all worried about him and wether or not he was caught and then if he was caught, did he tell where the hiding place was? after several hours they finally remembered they hadn't put the flowerpots in the 'coast is clear' setting. the guy immediately knocked on the door, having been wandering around the block in the cold all that time. anyway i know she has so many more stories to tell but i can't help feeling guilty about getting her to open up about what had to be one of the most traumatic and scary times of her life.
hi mafu you may be talking about ijssalon koko in van woustraat, and the "fusilladeplaats" monument by the eerste weteringplantsoen. the first incident happens in feb 1941. the WA (dutch nazi militia) have been noisily and sometimes violently demonstrating to coerce cafes and restaurants to hang a "jews not desired" sign. there's already been a lot of vandalism in connection with this movement. the amsterdam police can't stop it -- they are frustrated by the intervention of the german ordnungspolizei who keep protecting the dutch nazis. so the non-nazis (both jews and non-jews) are starting to form "knokploegen" (punch-teams) to protect themselves and their property against trouble with the WA. that's what happened in waterlooplein. after the rembrandtplein/thorbeckeplein riots, the WA were driven out of the square so they marched on the jewish district not far away. they were vandalizing and terrorizing people on sunday night 09 february. they came back again monday and tuesday night, but by now knokploeg members from various parts of town had gathered to confront them. a scrap metal dealer in the area was supplying the defenders with iron bars for weapons. the police reports of the time give statements by the WA people talking about how "hundreds of jews" descended on them and beat them up. since it was dark, and there was a blackout going on, and they didn't realize some of their opponents were non-jews, just concerned amsterdammers. tuesday the fighting got so bad that one WA sergeant, hendrik koot, was mortally injured. he died a couple days later at the binnengasthuis hospital. the statements in the police reports get twisted and amplified by the german officials, so that by the time himmler hears about it back in germany, it looks like we have a wave of jewish terror here in amsterdam. wednesday the authorities set up barricades and temporarily seal off the jewish district. off to the south, ice cream shop koko is run by two german jewish immigrants, e cahn and a kohn. on sunday 16 februari, the night before koot's funeral, somebody smashes in their windows. more fights break out on monday during the funeral procession. one knokploeg is guarding ijssalon koko against any further destruction. on wednesday night there's a loud banging at the door, and the guys inside figure here come the WA again. i guess the windows are boarded up so they can't see outside -- in fact it's not the WA, it's a patrol of german ordnungspolizei led by the chief of secret police. cahn opens the vent on a bottle of ammonia gas, and they all sneak out through the back door to hide at the neighbor's place -- the shoemaker who lives on pieter aertszstraat. the germans kick in the front door of koko, and are met by an unpleasant spray of ammonia. they also report being shot at, but that seems to be a fantasy, there's no evidence of gunfire. they trace the footprints in the back garden and arrest everybody at the neighbors' house, including cahn and kohn. the report back to the german authorities is that they have busted "an illegal terror-group" at the cafe of two german-jewish immigrants. for himmler, rauter and seyss-inquart this was the last straw. they ordered that 425 random jewish males should be rounded up in public and sent to a concentration camp. that action was carried out on saturday afternoon 22 february, in the middle of jonas daniel meyerplein, right between the two major synagogues. meanwhile of the people arrested at the house on pieter aertszstraat, only one returned alive -- a guy named rodriguez-garcia, i think he was one of the knokploeg members. this was the beginning of the german occupiers getting nasty. up until then they'd been letting the local fascists do their dirty work for them. the roundups in meyerplein led to public outrage and a few days later, to the unprecedented general strike in protest. there's an annual remembrance of that each 25 feb by the dokwerker statue. the other monument, the one with the bugler lying on his side, refers to march 1945. by then the dutch resistance was active and strong, cuz people knew the nazis were losing. in retaliation for one of the dutch "terrorist" actions, a bunch of dutch political hostages were shot by firing squad in this park near the singelgracht. people passing by were compelled to stop and witness it. i think later on somebody sneaked out and spread a dutch flag over the dead bodies. they call it the fusilladeplaats and it's one of the stops on the silent march on 04 may. forgive me for my bandwidth-trespasses love s g collins
Hehe.. all this WWII stuff makes me think of a saying of 'Loesje' (a critical poster-group) here.. I think it's from the '80's but it's still relevant: "Refugee If you let me stay here I'll promiss not to laugh about your resistance during the war" Teehee
s g collins ( i thought it was sgt collins for some time) how did you find out about the brothers? is there a website. i have yet to goto the verzets museum. have you? mafuman
hiya mafu i don't know of a very complete website about this stuff, unfortunately. i was looking up that stuff from two books by lou de jong, who recently died but early after the war he was head of the RIOD (rijksinstituut voor oorglogsdocumentatie, ie the "reign's institute for war documentation") ... one book is from a series of paperback transcripts from his early 60s tv series "de bezetting" which was remade in the 1980s. the other is from his freakin huge "de koninkrijk der nederlanden in de tweede wereldoorlog" which i think has at least a dozen volumes ... i've only got book 4 on loan from a friend because it touches on february 1941. another book that's interesting about that particular time-frame is "oorlog in de stad" by friso roest and (?) sorry i can't remember the coauthor. also a friend and i recently made a trip to the municipal archives and looked over the police reports from those february days. you have to get police permission in writing first, cuz that archive still isn't public for reasons of privacy laws. but some of the firsthand depositions were interesting. the thing that scares me is that they let us handle *the originals* which were already getting hard to read. i wish they would scan the stuff very carefully before more greasy fingers like mine touch them. i wish i knew more old people who were actually around in those times. they're going fast. i liked your stories from the lady you talked to. i have a feeling kahn and kohn weren't actually brothers, otherwise they might have had different surnames? maybe they were just brothers in biz. unless we're actually talking about some different guys than the ones i read about. i've been to the verzetsmuseum a couple times. my favorite thing was seeing some of the real artifacts from that time. on the whole the museum seems geared to people who are first learning about that period, a lot of young student groups come thru etc. ie fairly superficial. but i did notice that upstairs near the exit they had what seemed to be a little reading room with lots of books about the verzet. velvet you must forgive me for being the refugee who promises not to laugh! tihi. i really don't know why i'm fascinated by the subject, i think it's just cuz i love the city and because (as the protesters put it at the dokwerker in 2003) "verzet is ook nu actueel!" love s g collins
the names sound right, besides the location is exactly that of where i remember the plaque. i want to do some research about that time period. I am looking for stuff about polet and vreeken but i also need to get their first names right too. I know polet was involved with bridges built in amsterdam, maybe statues too. Vreeken i heard was involved in the spanish civil war and then wa sinvolved in the dutch resistance. not having first names to go along with the stories makes it hard to research. i am going to be in holland with my wife and kid in september. i am going to look up that lady. (she lived on anne franks block in zuid amsterdam somewhere when the war broke out and knew the family) do you reside in or near amsterdam?
yes mafuman i live near the zuiderkerk at the moment. i don't know about polet and vreeken, i wonder who they are. i've heard of henri polak, he's got a street named after him. btw have you found that there's not too much in-depth english-language literature about amsterdam during the occupation? i wonder if i'm missing something. love s g collins www.postwarmedia.nl
there's a johan polet, seems to be described as one of the important sculptors of the amsterdam school -- could that be the guy? love s g collins
if amsterdam school is circa 1920's-30's then i suppose it is him. i heard that some of the resistance members were artists and possibly communists. after the war when new enemy became the russian communists, alot of these guys fell out of favor. if you find anything in dutch and need it translated you could always post it here. i am still relatively new to this research and haven't found much of anything. your posts about the riots were news to me and although i had heard of the ijs salon i didn't know it tied into a bigger picture.
Hey guys.. just thinking.. maybe you can start a new thread about it in the Amsterdam forum? It's really interesting stuff but because it's not related to the initial start of this thread there is a big chance that people who visit this forum don't see all the info you're giving here... that's too bad.
back to the original topic. the best piece of advice i think i could give anyone travelling to amsterdam is to take the short train ride to haarlem and check out willy wortels, its a fun coffeeshop and different from what you find in amsterdam. also they do fantastic deals on weed. like if you buy 50Eur you get 12.5% free. also you can buy a gruis bag, which is all the shakings left over that they cant sell on their own. the bag is 12eur. you get a few grams. and the best thing about it is that sometimes it can be really great like all the strong strains, but also sometimes it can just be ok. but its pretty cheap!they also do really strong space cakes. and theres another tiny coffeeshop which is also great. i think its called the teahuis. they have 50 types of tea and 50 types of hash and weed. so maybe check it out?
