Page. 10 == Saturday, January 13, 1945 In Liberated Holland By Set. Jack Phillips goods or boarded up. before they left. They even took pedal-bikes, wheelbar- rows and baby carriages to carry away their loot and per- sonal belongings. Quite a come- down for the mechanized, blitz- army of 1940! By kind .permission of the proprietor we are using this eafe as a club room. Although all private dwell- ings and cafes are allowed to burn only one 25 watt lamp be- tween 6:00 and 10;00 p-m. we have two in the cafe. The big: bower plant nearby was dyna- mited by the Germans, but a small generating plant is now functioning. We asked permis- Sion to have an extra light, and it was gladly given. Under similar circumstances, the Ger- - mans would have ordered an- -other light to be used. e HOLLAND has had a hard time of it during the oceu- pation, and she is talange a ter- rible beating now. Speak to any Hollander whose home has been destroyed or badly- damaged, and there must be hundreds of thousands of them; speak to a Hollander whose town or city has been ravaged by the Ger- mans; speak to a relative of one of the 400,000 Hollanders forcibly taken to Germany for slave labor; speak to any of these and you will find no ad- vocate for a soft, sentimental peace with Germany. The following notes on ra- tions under German National Socialism will give you- some The people of Europe have suffered hu nger, rule. idea of how short the average Hollander was of the very necessities of life—unless he could afford to buy on the black -market. 1940-1942: Meat, 9 ounces per person per week, including bones; butter, 9 ounces per per- son, per week (consumer had to buy 9 ounces of one): eges, none except for farmers and those keeping chickens; bread, 5 pounds of ersatz, brown, per person per week; cheese, suffi- cient for children, but only min- ute quantities for adults; choco- late, none; tea and coffee, none but ersatz: smokes, two ounces of cigarette tobaceo a week, or 40 cigarettes, or 10 cigars for men over 18; for women half rations. Clothes: In nine months a man received 80 points. One suit and one overcoat ate up almost all these precious points. As in Belgium, rationed clothes were made of poor material. Shoes were not rationed, but plication had to be made to the nearest local distribution cen-= ter, from where, once a month, all applications were sent to the national distribution center. The head teacher of the nearby Catholic primary school told me he was able to buy only two pair of shoes legally during the occupation. When he bought on the black market he was lucky to be able to buy for only 18 Gulden, a five Gulden pair of shoes. Other civilians who didn’t have a “friend,” had to pay 35 Gulden. This same brother’s salary was slashed ‘ [ AM writing this in a cafe (tavern) located in a sleepy Holland town of less than 10,000. There isn’t much life in this town, and nearly all the stores are empty of The Germans stole just about everything they could get hold of by 40 percent when the Ger- mans took over. Suits that had sold at 25-50 Gulden in peace time were black marketed for as much as 306 Gulden. Women were al- most as bad off for clothes, and every woman and wife had to sew and mend to keep herself and her family from nakedness —unless she had big money to hand out. To understand how fan- tastic these black market prices were, you must know how much the people earned. The average laborer in Hol- land made about 25-35 Gui- den a week and the average slalled worker around 40-45. Young workers drew from five to fifteen Gulden a week, and domestics, as in Canada, earned yery little more than their board. on There was considerable traf- fic in tobacco and cigars smug-= gled into the country from Bel- gium, and the poor classes paid more than a good price ‘for contraband shag. Before the war, 50 gummed cigarette pa- pers sold for five cents (1/20th of a Gulden). During the oc- cupation the legal price rose to 88 cents. The black market price was 11% -Gulden, about 65 cents in Canadian money at present rate of exchange. During the 1942-44 period rations grew slimmer and black market prices rose to new heights. A few examples: Bread, 65 ounces per person, per week; butter, fat or mar- gerine, nine ounces per person Starvation and oppression under Nazi Above is pictured a group of murdered civilians uncovered by Allied forces. for 12 days; meats, 41% ounces per person for a week (includ- ing bones); smokes, men’s ra- tions cut in half and then ail rations cut by 10 percent. 20 good cigarettes that sold on the black market for two to six Gulden during the first period rose in price-to 12 Gulden.” HEN the Germans first came they tried to win over the Hollanders as friends. But they failed, except for those few miserable traitors who be- trayed their country in 1940, and those few industrialists and misguided citizens who be- eame collaborators for selfish gain, or because they had no faith in Allied victory. During the first two and a half years of occupation there was comparatively little ter- rorism. Seyss-Inquart ruled as Reich Commissar, assisted by Dutch and German advisers. The Ges- tapo were little in evidence and the enforcement of German law rested, outwardly at least, with the Netherlands police and- the German garrisons. Using the cinemas, the press, the newspapers and the bill- boards, the Germans carried on an active propaganda cam- paign. The number of classes in pri- mary school was inereased from seven to eight, and in- struction in German language made compulsory in the last two classes. The text book was written by a Dutch and a Ger. man -educationalist, and was not Nazi propaganda. A teach- er I spoke to told me the Hol- land people would never have stomached such a book, and the Nazi knew it. Their idea was to teach young boys and girls German from a “harmless” text book of the old school, and then win them over to Nazi ideology through the mediums of the German controlled press, wireless and the cinema. But most teachers in MHolland’s primary school carried out a campaign of intellectual sabo- tage; they never found Hme to teach German. One Catholic teacher from this community was senten- ced to 22 months in a con- centration camp for declar- ing: “You’d beter spend your time , learning English. It will be of more use to you in the future.” OON after the conquest of Holland the Jews began to feel the cruel weight of Nazi persecution. They were forced to wear the yellow star in pub- lie, were eliminated from busi-_ ness and professional life, and banned from all public places, such as cafes, cinemas, thea- tres, parks, trains, railway stations restaurants, etc. In 1943, the Nazis began mass arrests. Jewish men, women and children, of all ages and all conditions, were ruth- lessly snatched from their homes and carted to Germany in cattle cars. From Germany, -of the SGT. JACK PHILLIPS those that survived were to the mass murder factoric | Poland. : By 1941, there were no J left in Holland except 7 who had been hidden away their Christian friends. Early in 1943, the Cat bishops of Holland prote | against this barbaric treat of the Jews in a telegran Seyss-Inquart. Almost sir’ taneously, they issued a le of denunciation which was i in every Gatholic Church Holland. So great was Spiritual power of the Cath Church—so great the indig # tion aroused by the inhw persecution of the Jews— | no disciplinary action taken against the church this bold protest. f In the spring of 1948, the cupation took on more ¢ political aspect. The Ger S:S. and Gestapo were ey Where, in uniform and in p clothes. The leaders of trade unié and political parties w: either arrested and held ' hostages, or driven unde ground. The Dutch Na} (NSB) headed by Miussi | and numbering about 100,0 | were taken off the she ; dusted and placed in ?¢] limelight. From their ran’ | were recruited the Dut }) S.S., S.A. Gestapo arf NSKB Ghighly paid tram port corps workings for t 9 Germans). Mayors, senior civil servai army officers, police offict station masters, works ma gers and other important fu tionaries were removed in fa) “reliable traitors.” NSB man became president | the Netherlands National Bz and more money poured off ‘# printings presses and floor the country. f The miserable traitors ¥ sold their honor and coun’! in 1940, and who had be hungry for spoils ever sit seemed to have come into th: own. At last they were getti a fat share of. the spoils. / tually, most of them got 0 the crumbs from the Germs who despised them as much our policemen despise prof | sional stool pigeons. 1 —Continued on Page