UBC Undergraduate Research

Desperate Times, Desperate Measures: German Oppression, Dutch Resistance, and the Tragedy at De Woeste Hoeve Huyskamp, Ross

Abstract

A case study of the attack on Hanns Albin Rauter and the subsequent reprisals at De Woeste Hoeve allows us to investigate the role of the German occupiers and the Dutch resistance, and especially the relation between them after Operation Market Garden. The Dutch-German relations slowly deteriorated over the course of the occupation, reaching a critical low in early March 1945. By that time the Germans were determined to forestall defeat and clamped down on the increasingly hostile Dutch population. Meanwhile, the Dutch resistance suffered from various factors that inhibited its development, but was simultaneously encouraged by Allied victories and motivated by extreme cold, lack of fuel, scarcity of food, and ever-increasing levels of German repression to undertake increasingly bold and daring missions. When these two forces met, the results were deadly and revealing, giving a more nuanced perspective of the state of affairs in the Netherlands after September 1944.

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Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International