Not well known mass execution of Soviet soldiers commemorated in Amersfoort, the Netherlands.

[Penguin]

Not well known mass execution of Soviet soldiers commemorated in Amersfoort, the Netherlands

Their graves are anonymous, their stories little known. The 101 Soviet soldiers who are commemorated tomorrow [April 9th] at Camp Amersfoort. Defeated on the battlefield, brought to the Netherlands as living propaganda material, beaten and killed.

"It was the second-largest mass execution of the war in the Netherlands", says Remco Reiding of the Russian Field of Honor Foundation. "You would expect that people would like to know."

Tomorrow [April 9th] is the 75th anniversary of the Nazis ended the brutal journey of the Soviets with shots to the back of the neck. Around a monument at Camp Amersfoort at dawn candles will be lit for the victims. It's only the fifth time Reiding organizes the ceremony; previously there was little attention to the group.

"During the Cold War, it was not customary to commemorate soldiers from a country that was 'our new enemy'," Reiding explains. "Moreover, these boys came from a far away country, and we have no information whatsoever about their identity. So, there are no family members can visit a grave. Therefore, the story never came to life and increasingly forgotten."

The SS bastards caught bone.
Excerpt from 'The truth' (former Dutch communist resistance newspaper)

The soldiers arrived in September 1941 in cattle cars in Amersfoort, after a two week journey. Prisoner of war from the Eastern Front, probably Uzbeks. They must have felt completely lost: displaced, starved, beaten, in a country where they did not speak the language.

"The Nazis brought them to the Netherlands to make us see kind of 'untermenschen' (subhumans) they were. They were put on public display: they were made to walk as a group through hedgerows of people, through the city all the way to the camp. In the camp too, they were made to spend days outdoors, as an example for the Dutch prisoners there."

The plan fails immediately because the shocked Dutch were prompted to give water, fruit and bread to the vanquished soldiers - something that the Germans did not allow, of course. An attempt to pit the soldiers against each other also failed. "There was a German film crew there to document how they would fight each other for a piece of bread but when the bread was thrown over the fence, exactly the opposite happened: It was divided neatly into pieces by the men, although they were all terribly hungry."

"The bastards of the SS caught bone", expressed [illegal] resistance newspaper The Truth in its day. "At no time did they manage to establish discord between the Dutch and Russian prisoners."

Skulls on desk
It seems that the Nazis wanted the Soviet soldiers to die of hardships. By disease, malnutrition and mistreatment 24 soldiers died within six months. Finally, in consultation with Berlin, a mass execution of the rest of the group was decided on. The men were told that they would be transported to France, but after a short drive ended up in front of a firing squad.

"You could say that they had no usefulness anymore. The propaganda story had not worked and eventually the Nazis did not know what to do with them anyore. Then it was decided to shoot them." Two skulls of the prisoners ended up on the desk of the camp doctor, as a curiosity.

The place where the men were reburied after the war became known as the Russian Field of Honor [ http://russisch-ereveld.nl/ ], where Soviet soldiers who died in captivity in Germany were buried o. Reiding spent a lot of time [ http://nos.nl/artikel/2034792-poetin-bedankt-nederlandse-onderzoeker.html ] trying to figure out the identity of these war dead, but the 101 of Amersfoort will likely forever remain anonymous: the Germans destroyed all information about these men.

"That makes us morally responsible for these guys," says Reiding. "Far away from home without the family knowing, slaughtered like beasts. That's something we should keep in mind, even if only once a year."

"Yesterdays war victims, nota bene allies at that time, should not suffer from contemporary politics."
Remco Reiding

Yet Reiding too notes that tensions in the relations with Russia are once again raises by bickering over MH17, European embargoes and reports of Russian fake news. "A difficult relationship between the Netherlands and Russia is felt at all levels, so we feel that too. But what we do is a-political. The war victims of yesterday, which were our allies then, should not suffer contemporary politics."

With 150 visitors tomorrow morning, Reiding expects double the number of people that came last year, and more than ever to date. "Of course, it is early in the morning and we have a relatively new tradition, but still, it is quite a nice result. We are very happy that for the first time a school will attend, with fifty pupils and their parents. It would be a nice tradition to continue."

On April 22 Other Times pays attention to the story of the murdered Soviet soldiers , at 21.20 on NPO 2.

Translated from http://nos.nl/artikel/2167211-onbek...an-sovjetsoldaten-herdacht-in-amersfoort.html

See also
https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russisch_ereveld_Leusden
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amersfoort_concentration_camp
https://www.tracesofwar.com/sights/1544/Russian-War-Cemetery-Amersfoort.htm
https://www.its-arolsen.org/en/late...suing-the-traces-of-russian-prisoners-of-war/

https://www.landmarkscout.com/camp-amersfoort/

May they rest in peace and be honored for all eternity.

 

[vostok]

The elder sister of my grandfather was hijacked to work in Germany during the War. She married a Dutchman from Dordrecht and lived happily with him in marriage all her life.

 

[Penguin]

The elder sister of my grandfather was hijacked to work in Germany during the War. She married a Dutchman from Dordrecht and lived happily with him in marriage all her life.

Small world, isn't it ;-)

My dad and one brother had to go into hiding so as not to be shipped off to Germany to work. Another brother had escaped to Britain via Sweden and sailed supply convoys as merchant marine. Their sister was in the resistance in the Amsterdam area, trafficking false papers and ration cards in support of people in hiding, among other things. All having been born in the period 1922 and 1926, they were between 14-18 when the German invaded in 1940. Living in the old centre of Amsterdam, they saw many of their classmates banned from school and social life, eventually to be shipped to the East, never to return. My granddad, a former navy man, spent some time in captivity as hostage (hostages were often shot by the German occupation forces in retaliation). But we're good with the neighbor now ;-)

Russian prisoner of war in Netherlands
A multiracial palette of Asians from Uzbekistan, Armenians, Georgians and, obviously, Russians too arrived in the Netherlands as a prisoner of war from the eastern front.

In September 1941, to the bike-place at Amersfoort railway station came 101 prisoner of war from Central Asia, probably mainly from Uzbekistan. They were captured on the Eastern Front, not long after the German invasion of the Soviet Union (Operation Barbarossa). The soldiers looked very bad and after a long train journey they had an abandoned look in their eyes, they were dirty and hungry. The Germans considered this Asian Bolsheviks (Communists) as "sub-humans" (people of low class) and have them treated as such. Amersfoort population showed particular compassion.

camp Amersfoort

Victory Column at the execution site
Source: nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Russisch_ereveld_Leusden

During their stay in Camp Amersfoort the Russians, as they were called, were treated brutally. Within six months 24 of them died from hunger, disease and abuse. On April 9, 1942, the remaining 77 were shot before a firing squad. It would prove to be the second largest mass execution in the Netherlands during World War II. At the place of execution was set a monument, where the Russian Field of Honor Foundation holds a memorial every year since 2012. After the war their remains were reburied at Rusthof. Gradually, they got there in oblivion. Their names are not known.

American Battlefield
On the American Battlefield cemetary in Margraten (Limburg province) another 691 soldiers of the Soviet Union were buried. These soldiers had fought in the Red Army when they were taken prisoner by the Germans. The prisoner of war were transferred to a camp, inter alia, in Stalag VI A in Hemer and Stalag VIK piece in Brock. Many also found themselves in the Ruhr area, where they had to work under appalling conditions. Most of the 691 Soviet soldiers buried in Margraten succumbed to illness in the last days of the war or in the first days and weeks after the liberation. The US military had taken them in hospitals in places like Germany Lüdenscheid, Hamm, Dortmund and Bad Lippspringe. After their death - often by tuberculosis - their remains were transferred to the nearest cemetery outside of Germany, so that no Allied war dead had to be buried in enemy territory.

Russian Field of Honor

Opening cemetery on November 18, 1948 by Minister of War WF Schokking. Source: http://russisch-ereveld.nl/het-ereveld/

After the war, the authorities of the cemetery in Margraten wanted to make a permanent cemetery exclusively for US soldiers. The soldiers from the Soviet Union were transferred to Amersfoort, where the 101 'Russians' that died in and near Kamp Amersfoort were buried.

Amersfoort thus served as a gathering place for victims from the former Soviet Union buried in the Netherlands . The remains of 73 Soviet soldiers and forced laborer in German service (mainly Georgians and Armenians) too were reburied in Amersfoort.

Because at Rusthof was insufficient space, a separate cemetery was established. The Russian Field of Honor was opened on November 18, 1948 by Minister of War WF Schokking. The cemetery now has 865 Soviet victims of the Second World War.

Sources:
Foundation Russian Field of Honor: http://russisch-ereveld.nl/het-ereveld/

Film Recordings of the opening of the Russian cemetery in Amersfoort: nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russisch_ereveld_Leusden

PS: Anyone here familiar with the so-called 'War of the Russians', that took place on the isle of Texel in the Netherlands from April 6 through May 20, 1945 (i.e. past the German capitulation)?

 

[AZADPAKISTAN2009]

humans can be like animals sometimes .... (referring to mass killing)

 

[vostok]

Small world, isn't it ;-)

My dad and one brother had to go into hiding so as not to be shipped off to Germany to work. Another brother had escaped to Britain via Sweden and sailed supply convoys as merchant marine. Their sister was in the resistance in the Amsterdam area, trafficking false papers and ration cards in support of people in hiding, among other things. All having been born in the period 1922 and 1926, they were between 14-18 when the German invaded in 1940. Living in the old centre of Amsterdam, they saw many of their classmates banned from school and social life, eventually to be shipped to the East, never to return. My granddad, a former navy man, spent some time in captivity as hostage (hostages were often shot by the German occupation forces in retaliation). But we're good with the neighbor now ;-)

The grandfather's sister and her future husband met in the labor camp. They were to be shot and they fled. German woman farmer helped them to hide. They worked and lived at her farm until the end of the War, and then moved to Holland.