The last few months before freedom

After I had taken more than 60 eggs, and all the butter to the mother of my sick friend Nanni, and handed some sustaining packets of food to family and friends, there was enough left for ourselves to supplement the meagre rations so that we wouldn't starve to death.

On the whole, however, the situation in our part of Holland became desperate. It was not only the people who died of hunger-oedema, but lots of babies died. There was no milk for them. People got diseases which, in normal circumstances they would have been able to fight, because e.g. they lacked essential vitamins. And the doctors did not have the medicines any more to treat them.

But by this time the world outside had become aware of our plight and help was going to come. Through the International Red Cross we first received lovely white bread and margarine. It tasted better than the nicest cake we could remember. It had come from Sweden, which had sent all the ingredients, even the coal to stoke the ovens in the Dutch bakeries. So the bread was fresh. That was in March, and we had a big loaf several times. Later on, foodstuffs also came through the Swiss Red Cross - wheat, oats I can remember. It had been difficult to organise this all, because the Allies as well as the Nazis had to agree to it. But it certainly saved a lot of lives.

Then there was great excitement at the end of April when food was dropped from the air! It had taken many months of negotiations before the Allieds and the Germans came to agree that on certain military airfields the British Royal Air Force could throw down food parcels. It was quite dangerous, of course, because the German guns were pointed at them, but I believe that the airmen were really pleased to do this job, after all the risky and grim trips they had made to drop bombs on German cities.

The event was called: "Operation Manna." I remember seeing some of the Lancaster bombers flying low over our house. We waved to them from our attic window. 1,800 tonnes of food fell on our land in various places. It was distributed through the ration-cards. Dirk remembers he was handed an opened tin half-filled with sausages, which he started eating straight away while walking home, like everybody else did.

We did not know that the war was nearly over. There were lots of rumours: was it true that the Allied troops were progressing into Germany conquering towns and lands? Would they soon come and recapture the occupied part of Holland? Would our town me the scene of battle, before we regained our freedom? Was Hitler dead? Had an armistice already been signed?

And then, late in the afternoon of May 4th, my mother and I looked out of the window and saw that a handful of people had gathered in front of the Church at the other side of the road. I went out and joined them, and heard someone say: "It's really true, the war is over." But another one doubted: "We've had these rumours before . . ." Then someone said: "Look!" and in the distance, round the bend of the road, a man came, walking slowly. A small stature, carrying a rucksack, and wearing a crumpled grey suit . . . When he came nearer I thought I could see the marks where a David's Star had been torn off his lapel. In one hand he held a small red, white and blue flag. With the other he waved. I turned and saw, at the corner of the road, a dark-haired woman with two small children. They waved too. As the man passed me I saw his intensely pale face. He had survived the war, in hiding! When the man and the woman met, they embraced. I knew in my heart that the war was over. The next day, May 5th, our town, Haarlem, was liberated, peacefully by British and Canadian forces.

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