If the climate change predictions are anything like correct, covid-19 is likely to prove the merest bagatelle with what we face in the next couple of decades - if, that is, I live to see them.

I dare say a war or two has also done for the planet in many respects. But today is a Day in History to be reflected on in terms of the toll on humankind inflicted by other humans and should be observed in every heart.

Green George wrote:

If the climate change predictions are anything like correct, covid-19 is likely to prove the merest bagatelle with what we face in the next couple of decades - if, that is, I live to see them.

Indeed GG, and covid-19 is really just another effect of human-induced global changes, and so it likely isn't going to be the last devastating pandemic. Paul commented that he was glad I'd ended my last post on a positive note, but actually I don't feel much posivity at all. Yes many people are saying that there needs to be change, but the biggest and loudest voices are still those of big business, those in their pockets, and the millions of their ignorant backers who still deny that they too are part of the problem and so claim that all these words of warning are all just 'project fear', 'a political ploy' or a 'foreign conspiracy'  ... so really I don't hold out much hope for human civillisation.

Priscilla wrote

...
Tonight as our road celebrates I shall wear my father's medals right and my own, left. 
... [/quote]

Priscilla, a question seriously meant, on the custom of wearing family members' medals on the right breast?
I have seen it on TV for instance on Armistice Sundays.
It seems to be a custom in for instance Australia and New Zealand as well.
In this country the custom was that when medal reciepients died, their decorations were 'returned to the crown', and you can't wear anyone else's.
Thus decorations mostly seen on aged photos - and in glossies, until people began receiving medals for UN , later EU and NATO Service and this was seen on the uniforms of veterans, and later on as ribbons on those joining the Home Guard.
Still, it would just be the ones given to those who'd actially 'been there'.
Do you know when and how the custom of wearing decorations on behalf of others started?


Crossed posts.

Crossed posts.

Doomed! Well yes, we probably are. Unless as a whole we can manage to get round our genetic, in-built selfish, tribal behaviour, which seems to have worked very well on the extended-family or village scale - a few hundred people or so - but rather fails when the community now numbers some 7,500,000,000 and rising, and all still contained within the same limited terrain and resources.

Regarding wearing medals on the right ... I thought one should never, ever, on any occaision, wear another's medals or honours - so I really don't know where this wearing them on the right thing came from. There's probably nothing specific to stop anyone wearing another's medals (unless you are yourself in uniform when strict rules will apply) but to do so would surely mark the wearer out as a bit odd and ego-centric in my opinion. Medals, like noble and academic titles or coats-of-arms, are strictly personal and cannot simply be handed over to be borne by other family members. At my dad's funeral his medals were placed on a cushion on top of his coffin: I still have them but would never wear them as they are his and his alone.

Regarding VE Day ... An important victory as it was, but it was of course still not the end.

As I posted above, in May 1945 my Dad was then based at Melsbroek airfield in Belgium, but for the night of 8th May he was (via a lottery drawn from a hat) in Paris with a 48-hour leave pass. Moreover he was with his mate Harold who had been the pianist for the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra before the war and so could always improvise a tune if there was an 'old Joanna' at the back of the bar. Anyway they seem to have had a good time for VE night in Paris.

But within a just a couple of weeks he was moved to Wahn, just outside Cologne in Germany, where he remained as part of an army of occupation until 1947, and in his own words: "they hated us and we hated them".

But more immediately, directly after the German surrender, my Dad's unit started preliminary training for possible re-deployment to the Far East and the assault on Japan. The bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August eventually put an end to that ... but in May 1945 the 'inevitable', and inevitably bloody, invasion of Japan was still in most people's minds. My Dad certainly expected, since Germany had now surrendered, to be transferred East.

A former workmate was part of the forces slated to take part in "Operaton Zipper", preparative to the assault on Singapore. Louis Mountbatten addressed them beforehand, saying he was sure they regretted the Japanese surrender as it deprived them of the chance to carry out the assault.

Reg said his and his mates views were - somewhat different.

Meles meles wrote:

Doomed! Well yes, we probably are. Unless as a whole we can manage to get round our genetic, in-built selfish, tribal behaviour, which seems to have worked very well on the extended-family or village scale - a few hundred people or so - but rather fails when the community now numbers some 7,500,000,000 and rising, and all still contained within the same limited terrain and resources.

MM, I couldn't have said it better. "You take the words out of my mouth" (I translated literally from Dutch, but see now, after a quick search that it is the same: "je neemt de woorden uit mijn mond")

And it seems that we are fully like-minded.

Kind regards, Paul.

But there was also  a deep bitterness at the time of surrender  in that thousands of allied - mainly Australian and British - prisoners were killed when it was announced - in Borneo and elsewhere. And there too one must not forget the treatment of prisoners throughout that campaign. I personally know several servicemen  and civilian men women and children surviving remnants of army companies and families of several nationalities who somehow survived. Some harboured very deep bitterness all their life whilst others were forgiving with extraordinary grace.

Crossed posts here I was adding to GG's post about Mountbatten.

When I was doing my secretarial training there was an older lady on the course who was doing it as a refresher. She had absolutely brilliant secretarial skills so she didn't really need it but she was an interesting person.  She was a widow whose husband had been a prisoner of the Japanese and his health had been badly affected and he died before his time - though she didn't meet him till after the War.  She described her husband as one who had suffered greatly but had not lost compassion.

One of the Girl Siduri's uncles was a prisoner of the Japanese, and was being shipped to Japan as slave labour. His ship was sunk by an American submarine with all hands.

Meles meles wrote:

in May 1945 the 'inevitable', and inevitably bloody, invasion of Japan was still in most people's minds.

As you, Priscilla, GG and LiR have rightly pointed out, the atmosphere east of Suez was decidedly different. Japanese forces were still heavily entrenched throughout the Asia-Pacific theatre. On 9th May 1945 Japan’s remit still stretched from Sakhalin to Sumatra, from Manchuria to New Guinea and from Burma to Bougainville. Huge swathes of China were still under occupation and fierce fighting continued there. British Empire forces were making painfully slow progress thru Burma despite that country being contiguous with India with all the man-power and logistical support which that implied. Better news, perhaps, had come from the Philippines which had been cleared of Japanese forces in April allowing the US to begin the invasion of Okinawa which campaign was still ongoing. Even so it had taken a staggering 10 American divisions 6 months of heavy combat to retake the Philippines. The outlook was grim. Meanwhile, not at war with Japan and possessing of the largest army in the world, the Soviet Union marked the 9th of May simply as ‘Victory Day’ with no ‘in Europe’ qualifier needed.

Five years later, the 9th of May would be the date chosen by Robert Schuman, the French foreign minister, for a declaration made in Paris in which he proposed placing the coal and steel sectors of France and Germany under a supranational body - ‘une Haute Autorité commune’. Schuman stated that this organisation would also be open to other countries in Europe - ‘ouverte à la participation des autres pays d'Europe’. The Schuman Declaration of 1950 is seen as a landmark step in the foundation of the European Union and the 9th of May was adopted by the European Community in 1985 as being ‘Europe Day’. In his declaration Schuman noted that it came five years almost to the day ‘presque jour pour jour’ since Germany’s surrender and that it was time for France to make the first decisive move in building the European project. Thus, either by accident or by design, Victory Day and Europe Day would both be marked on the same date.

This started on the 11th May, so a day early. Posted in case I forget it.

Thank you Trike. Very interesting (at least to me). Where do you find that all?
Kind regards, Paul.

Mark Felton's YouTube videos are always well made and interesting, Paul.

Here's one posted today by him that also fits the current date, give or take a day or two:

nordmann wrote:

Mark Felton's YouTube videos are always well made and interesting, Paul.

Here's one posted today by him that also fits the current date, give or take a day or two:

 
Thank you very much nordmann for this information. And I see now that Trike, on another forum of here, has posted a whole series...enough to look at till next year...thank you Trike...

The problem for me! is to find time to view it all, even in this Covid 19 confinement period.

Kind regards, Paul.

June 15th 1920 is recognized as the day when, after a plebiscite, the northern part - some two thirds of Schleswig was re-united with Denmark after 56 years of having been - following the Prussian-Austrian War in 1866 a part of the Prussian Kingdom and thus from 1871 part of the Second German Empire.
Many before and some 30.000 men of Danish mind were conscripted into the German armies during WW I, some 5-6,000 remained away.

Following the Peace treaties of Versailles, Schleswig-Holstein as well as the duchy of Lauenburg were divided into three election zones with zone I being some two thirds of northern Schleswig, where about 75% of the electorate voted to become Danish.
In zone 2 - southern Schleswig and northern Holstein the majority voted to remain German, and in zone 3 - the remaining parts to the south, no elections were held.

During the first many years, including and following the Second World War times were difficult for both those of Danish mind living south of the new border, and those of a German mind now living in Denmark.
This was to last until around 1960.

Many celebrations who had been prepared for the centennial are now - during present circumstanced - put 'on standby for the time being'.

Since what has become known as the Re-unification in 1920 the border has been stable, I hope it may remain so.

One thing I've always wondered about but never could find a satisfactory answer - why didn't the Nazi regime make "reclaiming" this territory as big a part of their policies as they did elsewhere in Alsace, Sudetenland, Poland etc? Even during occupation, when they could have drawn border lines pretty much where they wanted to, they still recognised the pre-war border as the official line between "Germany" and "Denmark". Was there a lot of behind the scenes activity between the Danish and German governments that kept the issue from the public eye, or was it simply that the numbers and land involved just didn't excite the Nazis so much for its propaganda potential? Or something else?

Well, Nordmann, as no explanations have yet been given officially as far as I know, my attempt here may be as bad as anybody else's.
The organized Germans north of the new border, who, during the 1930'es and all of the occupation, had become very much Nazi infested, did their best at propaganda in favour of a 'revision' of the border.
The Danish Nazi party whose representation in the Lower House of the Rigsdag (then a two chamber Parliament) never was above three members were against a revision, even when it, especially after the attack on the USSR in June 1941, at first covert and later overt acted as a recruiting agency for the Wehrmacht and the SS, had a larger influence on the Danes nationwide than the relative fewer members of the German organisations in North Schleswig.
Besides those of Danish mind south of the 'new border' generally behaved as citizens, fullfillig their obligations to the German Republic - and were perhaps seen as potential opponents of the regime.
In brief, the feelings of inferiority among the German minority weighed against a relatively peaceful occupation of a food-producing area, who even volunteered a number of members to the Third Reich.
So which mattered the most, mind or matter?
As I see it the bean-counters did a cost-benefit analysis, and that won - for the time being!

Makes sense - and admirably pragmatic. Though certainly as the war went on the situation must have changed, especially if there was food being produced and (I assume) already being diverted from the Danes to the denizens of the "glorious fatherland" due south.

It is still very intriguing though. In Norway, and admittedly only very recently, there has been a healthy revision of the "official history" of the occupation, away from the simplistic "we good guys / them bad guys" version in which every Ola Nordmann stoutly defended his homeland against the oppressive invader. This includes some rather revelatory stuff regarding pre-Quisling attempts to strike deals with the Germans to avert invasion, even as the British were planning an invasion of their own up north and advertising the Norwegian monarchy and government as "allies" to their own people. The government went along with this international perception even as they worked their arses off with various diplomatic initiatives and missions to the Reich trying to broker trade and non-aggression deals. Being neutral they reckoned, I suppose, they could play one off against the other in this way.

But of course they didn't have a sizeable German population within their borders to begin with - which is why I have always reckoned the Danish activities in that regard must have been even more frantic, and even less recorded within the "official" history once the whole shebang was over.

That's perhaps one more reason why 'closed files and archives' and stuff in many cases were closed and may have to remain secret for up to 100 years after 1945. A few have been opened to 'select' historians who may have then published official histories on 'selected' points in history.
At present Danish TV - both of the national channels - are showing programs titled along the lines of 'Why did my Father/Grandad behave like he did way up to his death' with reporters trying to untie questions, following traces of people even to KZ Camps - and much admiration of the Swedish Count Folke Bernadotte, who stands out as the organizer of the re-patriation of most of the surviving Scandinavian prisoners.

Apparently the line officially held is, as you say, "we good guys / them bad guys", occasionally names and deeds of Danish informers and torturers are mentioned, but great care is taken where some sensitivities may still be livid.
There is a questionable line as well on the death peanalty - totally abolished long before the war, and then re-introduced for crimes committed during the war.
Another questionable line go to the orders of the killings of informers, who gave these orders and who did the deeds? An official seal of approval was put on the lid of this Pandora's Box, and no judicial testing was done post-war. A blanket approval was given.
This line have been and is still questioned - now mostly by historians - but also of relatives of human beings involved then.
One - in my opinion - positive thing is, that following that war a number of what here is called a 'Kollegium', perhaps best translated as 'Hostels for relatives of the Freedom Fighters' were set up along a number of institutions of learning, where applicants for rooms had and still have to prove their relationship to those Freedom Fighters who lived and died for this country.
This keep an interest in that - and their families - history alive among some young people.
At an interview shown recently on our regional TV incumbent students told - independently - that their parents had met when there, and that they themselves had met their girl-/boyfriends there.

The question of who had been collaborator/informer versus resistance fighter is one that Norwegian and Danish post-war society had exactly the same challenges with, and both raced to downplay the former while exaggerating the latter at the expense of actual history, I reckon. The same is true, I imagine, for every other country occupied by the Germans at the time too. In truth the vast majority of people were in the "grey zone" in between, and in reality it was from these people that the German administration managed to get the best information anyway, often with the minimum amount of coercion or threat. It is always true that the best intelligence is derived from the source who has least of an axe to grind with anyone, and the Germans were no fools in that respect either.

But that still doesn't explain the almost complete lack of opinion - one way or the other - that was voiced at the time about the German border with Denmark which, as you said, was itself a rather recent concoction prior to the Nazis' rise to power and one that isolated a large chunk of Germans within a "foreign" state. Maybe we'll all be a little bit wiser come 2045, but since I'm not planning on waiting that long I'll venture a guess that there was far more negotiation and back-scratching going on behind the scenes from 1933 onwards than even the official documents will reveal. If starting a hassle about where to draw a national boundary was, apparently anyway, the last thing either side needed then we can assume that both sides were getting pretty much what they wanted out of it.

I'll have to bear Mark Felton's output in mind, nordmann.  I sporadically watch The History Guy.  One of THG's recent offerings was about France trying to take possession of Jersey in the Channel Islands in 1781 - which I had overlooked previously

Not on this day in history though.

Eh, ok.

Nielsen wrote:

That's perhaps one more reason why 'closed files and archives' and stuff in many cases were closed and may have to remain secret for up to 100 years after 1945. A few have been opened to 'select' historians who may have then published official histories on 'selected' points in history...

 
Nielsen, thank you very much for all this information, I learned from it and it is interesting for me as a parallel to what I studied about that stuff and had from hearsay of an inner circle about that situation of resistance and collaboration here in Belgium.
I discussed already some parallels with Dirk Marinus in the WWII spy thread, but I would appreciate if he could explain the situation of repression and all that in The Netherlands.

Dirk, I find nearly nothing about the repression in the Netherlands after WWII, while in Dutch about the same in Belgium, I find an overwhelming info. 
Was there not a hard repression in Netherland? Although the NSB had some 100,000 members during WWII and in Belgium I guess VNV and Rex together less but perhaps in procent of the population the same...?
Nevertheless in the Netherlands there were only 35 executions for collaboration, while in Belgium some 242.
And contrary to what the Flemish movement said there were more death penalties along Walloon side than among the Flemish side...

Kind regards to both, Paul.

Yes. As in Norway the rush in executions seem to have been more about preventing the convicted people possibly talking too much about who else was involved than in justice. If only every prosecutor in every instance could be played by Spencer Tracy ....

... instead in Norway we got the Labour Party prime minister's godfather (who admittedly looked like Jimmy Stewart so sufficient for purpose ...)

nordmann wrote:

The question of who had been collaborator/informer versus resistance fighter is one that Norwegian and Danish post-war society had exactly the same challenges with, and both raced to downplay the former while exaggerating the latter at the expense of actual history, I reckon. The same is true, I imagine, for every other country occupied by the Germans at the time too. In truth the vast majority of people were in the "grey zone" in between, and in reality it was from these people that the German administration managed to get the best information anyway, often with the minimum amount of coercion or threat. It is always true that the best intelligence is derived from the source who has least of an axe to grind with anyone, and the Germans were no fools in that respect either.

 
As you say nordmann, the same scenario overhere too. And those discussions ended only in the beginning of the Sixties. At school, 10 years old, I was in the Fifties an eyewitness of some reprisals from children in my class against a child of a supposed so-called "zwarte" (black one) collaborator), nearly sure instigated by their parents...
And as I found out this evening "collaboration" is still an item in nowadays Belgian politics...perhaps something like in Germany and in Italy...immediately after WWII a start of the Cold War...and some of the old collaborators rehabilitated for the Cold War politics...

You said:

Quote :

It is always true that the best intelligence is derived from the source who has least of an axe to grind with anyone, and the Germans were no fools in that respect either.

How true that is. From all what I read about the question, that seems to be one of the main sources.

Kind regards, Paul.

Talking about Danish territorial claims, I hadn’t realised that James Hepburn, Earl of Bothwell had offered Orkney to King Frederick II of Denmark & Norway in return for Frederick’s support for Mary, Queen of Scots.

It was something of a desperate bid, though, as Bothwell had been chased out of Scotland, and Mary taken prisoner, by Scottish nobles following their unorthodox marriage and Bothwell’s bid for the throne. Bothwell’s right to offer Orkney was itself tenuous as the earldom of Orkney had only been granted him as a wedding present by Mary. King Frederick was too canny to fall for this and kept Bothwell at arm’s length. Bothwell remained an exile in Denmark where he died and was buried in 1578.

The showdown with the Lords had occurred at Carberry Hill on 15 June 1567. From then on it was all downhill for Bothwell and Mary.

And his death was dreadful - this man, used to patrolling the northern seas, riding at dawn in the beautiful Border country, living and loving, not wisely, but too well - was kept for the last years of his life chained to a pillar in a prison cell at Dragsholm, languishing in his own filth. He died after ten years a captive - a merciful release - and, according to some reports, "distracted of his wits or senses". I cannot think of a worse end for a man of his "hazardous, rash and glorious*" temperament. Religion would have offered him no comfort: he had neither the comfortable assurance of the Catholic faith, nor, although nominally a Protestant, the superior, cold certainty of a righteous Calvinist.
 
A loner, in our modern sense of the word - a fascinating man. Mary shouldn't have touched him with a barge pole. Her mother, Mary of Guise, advised her daughter (in a letter sent just before she died) to give Bothwell military, but never political, power...

She should have added: "Sleep with him if you must, but for God's sake, don't marry him!"

Oh Lord, Vizzer - you've started me off. Back to Statues now.

* glorious = vainglorious here

Vizzer and Temperance,
Re James Hepburn, Earl of Bothwell, husband number ?? of Mary Queen of Scots, state prisoner in Denmark where he died and apparently is buried in Faarevejle Parish Church.
According to my sources - comparisons of the Danish, English, German and Swedish wiki articles - he was treated as a noble who was accused of crimes against the - a - King and imprisoned / held hostage.
There is no description relating to yours, Temperance, "... was kept for the last years of his life chained to a pillar in a prison cell at Dragsholm, languishing in his own filth. He died after ten years a captive - a merciful release - and, according to some reports "distracted of his wits or senses" ..."
And it was 'only' the last five years of his imprisonment / life he spent at Dragsholm, his first years were at the Royal Court in Copenhagen, and later at Malmöhus Castle in Scania in present days Sweden.
Instead there's a reference to a letter he sent to the King of France, Charles IX.

This is from the Book of Days (15th June) link posted by Vizzer :


Five years passed in fruitless negotiations. The cause of Mary being in 1573 regarded as ruined, Frederick unrelentingly assigned the Scottish noble to a stricter and baser imprisonment, in the castle of Drachsholm in the island of Zealand. Here his seclusion was so great, that a report of his being dead spread abroad without contradiction; and Mary herself, in her English prison, regarded herself as a widow some years before she really was one. It is now ascertained that Bothwell died on the 14^th of April 1578, when he must have been about forty-seven or forty-eight years of age, and after he had endured a captivity more or less strict of nearly eleven years. He was buried in the neighbouring church of Faareveile. So ended a dream of ambition which at first must have seemed of fair enough prospects, being not much out of keeping with the spirit of the age, but which had been signally unfortunate in its results, precipitating both of the principal parties into utter ruin, and leaving their names to suspicion and reproach through all ages.

Nielsen - I was typing a great long reply to you this afternoon, but as I was so doing, complete with quotations from Antonia Fraser and Robert Gore-Brown, we had the most terrible thunderstorm here, and I lost power (electric!), my post and my internet connection. Only just had my router/hub thing put right (I thought it was completely fried, but thank Heavens it's not), but everything is running very...very...very...very...slowly. So will try again tomorrow, all being well! This message will probably take about half an hour to show up!

Okay - I cheated and looked on History.com.  On June 17th in the past:-

The Statue of Liberty arrived in New York(1885), the Battle of Bunker Hill began (1775) and in 1972 the Watergate Burglars were arrested.  Of course there were more happenings for this day in history but I've just mentioned three.  I haven't checked back over the history of this site so I apologise if these matters have been mentioned in earlier years by other commenters.

This morning died one of my all time favourites...103 years old
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-53091856



Sincères condoléances (sincere condolences)

Paul.

Oh, I just mentioned Dame Vera on the RIP thread, Paul.  I remember hearing a radio programme where Dame Vera's daughter (I didn't realise the lady was her daughter at first) was being interviewed.  The daughter mentioned talking to Dame Vera in another person's hearing and calling her "Darling" and the other person said something to the effect that you can't call Dame Vera Lynn darling.  The daughter then explained the family relationship!

Paul,

  about your ;

"Dirk, I find nearly nothing about the repression in the Netherlands after WWII, while in Dutch about the same in Belgium, I find an overwhelming info. 
Was there not a hard repression in Netherland? Although the NSB had some 100,000 members during WWII and in Belgium I guess VNV and Rex together less but perhaps in procent of the population the same...?
Nevertheless in the Netherlands there were only 35 executions for collaboration, while in Belgium some 242.
And contrary to what the Flemish movement said there were more death penalties along Walloon side than among the Flemish side...

Kind regards to both, Paul


As I have mentioned before especially on the old BBC forum, the biggest collaborators during the German occupation of the Netherlands  were the aristocracy and the elite.

As a matter of fact it was on May12th 1940 that a ranking German officer arrived by car at the door of a neighbour two doors away from where we livedand rang the bell. And oh boy the backslapping , handshakes , laughter etc going on.
But what we have to remember is the fact that many of the aristocrats in Holland had German families/relations. Some had attended universities in Germany and made many friends during their stay in Germany which on many occasions would have been renewed during holidays before the outbreak of the war.
And the same was of course applicable to many of the elite population of the Netherlands.
And these friendships. parties going and celebrating  continued up to about the middle of 1943 and then when they realised that there was a possibility of German losing the war they slowly but certain distanced themselves from German friendship.

But , no what could they do to make certain there was no repression when Germany had lost the war. 

Wel  lo and behold, they started using their finance to finance the resistance movements.

The exiled Dutch government had already made it known right at the beginning of the occupation that financial aid given to families of Dutch members of the  armed forces which had escaped to Britain , Dutch Royal Navy, Merchant Navy at sea, Dutch Air force would be reimbursed at the end of the war.

Thus that is now the escape route for the once collaborating aristocracy and the elite to ensure they would NOT be held to account after the war was finished.
They could now claim to work in the resistance which some of them had the cheek to do in 1945. And blow my hair aside, many were given awards and even top jobs in 1945.

In other words again a example of what money can do   and the words " BIG DOGS DO NOT BITE EACH OTHER "


Dirk

Paul btw my apologies fro a late reply.

Ah yes - the "Darling" quote reminds me of a young musician who was told off for calling harpist Marie Goossens "grandma". He explained that she was, indeed, his grandmother.

Dirk Marinus wrote:

Paul,

As I have mentioned before especially on the old BBC forum, the biggest collaborators during the German occupation of the Netherlands  were the aristocracy and the elite.

As a matter of fact it was on May12th 1940 that a ranking German officer arrived by car at the door of a neighbour two doors away from where we livedand rang the bell. And oh boy the backslapping , handshakes , laughter etc going on.
But what we have to remember is the fact that many of the aristocrats in Holland had German families/relations. Some had attended universities in Germany and made many friends during their stay in Germany which on many occasions would have been renewed during holidays before the outbreak of the war.
And the same was of course applicable to many of the elite population of the Netherlands.
And these friendships. parties going and celebrating  continued up to about the middle of 1943 and then when they realised that there was a possibility of German losing the war they slowly but certain distanced themselves from German friendship.

But , no what could they do to make certain there was no repression when Germany had lost the war. 

Wel  lo and behold, they started using their finance to finance the resistance movements.

The exiled Dutch government had already made it known right at the beginning of the occupation that financial aid given to families of Dutch members of the  armed forces which had escaped to Britain , Dutch Royal Navy, Merchant Navy at sea, Dutch Air force would be reimbursed at the end of the war.

Thus that is now the escape route for the once collaborating aristocracy and the elite to ensure they would NOT be held to account after the war was finished.
They could now claim to work in the resistance which some of them had the cheek to do in 1945. And blow my hair aside, many were given awards and even top jobs in 1945.

In other words again a example of what money can do   and the words " BIG DOGS DO NOT BITE EACH OTHER "

Dirk

 
Dirk,

thank you for your explanation about which I now hear for the first time. The Netherlands are so close, only some 20 km from here, and nevertheless we know that little about the recent history. About the 80 Years war, all what you want, but don't ask for instance about Indonesia. Multatuli and "Saïdjah en Adinda" is nearly as far as it goes...Excuses for the lack of Low Countries' brotherhood...

I suppose that here the French language aristocracy was rather anti-German and anti-Nazi...
As our famous: Jean de Selys Longchamps
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_de_Selys_Longchamps
And many of the aristocrats were also in the resistance.
About the difficult first rather right wing oriented start around King Leopold and the evolution,even some landing on the Nazi side...in Dutch...
https://www.scriptieprijs.be/sites/default/files/6d7067d4b2b9f987e1075c41cb5b5445.pdf
And to show how difficult it all was...in French:
https://www.belgiumwwii.be/belgique-en-guerre/articles/legion-nationale.html
https://www.belgiumwwii.be/nl/belgie-in-oorlog/gebeurtenissen/1941-07-15-het-belgisch-legioen-komt-tot-stand.html

In The Netherlands you have the excellent: "NIOD" and in Belgium we have the exellent "Cegesoma"
http://www.arch.be/index.php?l=nl&m=praktische-info&r=onze-leeszalen&d=cegesoma
 
Paul.

Green George wrote:

Ah yes - the "Darling" quote reminds me of a young musician who was told off for calling harpist Marie Goossens "grandma". He explained that she was, indeed, his grandmother.

 
Gil, related to my story to Dirk about
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_de_Selys_Longchamps

we have also the "Sun" (Bild Zeitung) related story of his niéce:
https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/en/2013/09/04/_we_didn_t_take_precautionsithoughticouldnthaveababy-1-1720671/

Kind regards from Paul.

PS: I hope nordmann don't take offence for deviating again a thread...

Not four weddings and a funeral today, but one wedding and two executions. July 28th 1540: Henry VIII married Katherine Howard, and Thomas Cromwell got the chop, along with Lord Hungerford (same scaffold - must have been an awful mess...).

Temperance wrote:

... same scaffold - must have been an awful mess...

Particularly as according to the chronicler Edward Hall, Cromwell's execution was clumsily botched "by a ragged and Boocherly miser, whiche very ungoodly perfourmed the office".

Lord Hungerford, in addition to the charge of treason for his sympathy for the Pilgrimage of Grace, was also convicted of using witchcraft and for the "treason of buggery", so his, and Cromwell's names were well and truely blackened.

Henry VIII, the utter sh*t that he was, when he came to regret losing Thomas Cromwell's abilities, promptly blamed his council for their "false accusations", complaining to the French ambassador that “they made him put to death the most faithful servant he ever had."

I've seen a theory online that Henry VIII's mental state may have been affected by a jousting accident he suffered where he sustained injuries to his head.  I know from some of the reports I typed as a legal secretary that head injuries can sometimes cause drastic changes in personality and mental ability.  I've also heard/read that the theory is dismissed by some authorities.

12th August 1895: The only woman ever to be executed in New Zealand/Aotearoa was hanged on this day. She was Minnie Dean, living in Winton, just about 15 miles from where I was brought up. She operated as a baby farmer in the days when either because of illegitimacy or just too many children, people used these as a form of adoption. Minnie was found one day carrying a suitcase with a dead baby in it, and I think others were found dead on her property. She is still well-known in the south, but apparently not so much up north. I must ask my kids if they have heard of her. She came from Scotland and was not very well off; her baby farming was no doubt a way of increasing their income. 

There is still debate about her guilt or not. Her husband was not suspected of any crime.

Caro, as I read it, one child found in the garden of Minnie was suffocated and one died by an overdosis of Laudanum...the laywer said the two were by accident and they were burried because of negative publicity...and yes such accidents could happen...
It can be possible and until the "murder" is proven, the doubt stands in my humble opinion...

Kind regards, Paul.

On this day in History with the capitulation of  Imperial japan brought World War!!  an official end to hostilities. But this did not end the suffering for many who survived the Far Eastern front.   Living long in the east I met many - and when  alone some of several nationalities would speak of their experiences and often family losses  in appalling circumstances. Time will mellow memory for the coming generations but it is of my time and some of my people and friends so  the memory remains - and yes, we do remember them.

On this day in History with the capitulation of  Imperial japan brought World War!!  an official end to hostilities. But this did not end the suffering for many who survived the Far Eastern front.   Living long in the east I met many - and when  alone some of several nationalities would speak of their experiences and often family losses  in appalling circumstances. Time will mellow memory for the coming generations but it is of my time and some of my people and friends so  the memory remains - and yes, we do remember them.

Lancaster's chevauchée 1346 

Less famous than the Battle of Crécy 3 weeks earlier, or the Battle of Poitiers 10 years later, Lancaster’s chevauchée which began on 12 September 1346 was perhaps equally significant. Whereas King Edward the Third’s victory at Crécy had been fought in northern France, the large-scale offensive commanded by his cousin, Henry earl of Lancaster was launched from Gascony in the south-west. Ranging over 180 miles along the Gascon border, Lancaster’s combined English and Gascon force raided fortresses and towns, degrading and denuding Valois forces and assets in the area.



(Medieval viticulture – Valois interference in the lucrative wine trade between Gascony and England had been a prime motive in prompting Lancaster’s chevauchée in 1346)

Before Lancaster’s chevauchée, Valois forces had been able to threaten and raid Gascony at will and even besiege the capital Bordeaux itself, afterwards however, the traumatised and demoralised Valois were on the back foot and it were the Gascons and the English who were able to call the shots along the border and beyond. The psychological upshot of the chevauchée was that Edward’s claim to the French throne was now seen not just as a diplomatic pedantry, and his victory at Crécy not just a flash in the pan, but with victories on 2 fronts, the Plantagenet position in France was such that they would confidently press Edward’s claim in a war which would last 100 years.

On the same day, 18 miles away, another Aberdeen based team, Aberdeen Rovers, had a much better result, only conceding 35 goals against Dundee Harp.

On the site I used to frequent (and will still so long as anyone is on there) I ran a thread in which I posted what happened 100, 200, 300 etc years ago that day. Some days there was nothing to say, most were pretty obscure events, but not without interest, so I propose to continue it here if that's OK.

19 March 1922 - Gen. Max Freiherr von Hausen died. 100 years ago today.
German General from Saxony who commanded the Third Army in the opening weeks of World War I. 
He served in the Saxon Army for nearly 40 years before being appointed Minister of War in the Kingdom of Saxony in 1902. 
At the outbreak of war in August 1914 he led the German Third Army into southern Belgium as part of the Battle of the Frontiers entering Dinant, Charleroi and briefly Reims in France. However he was forced to retreat at the Battle of the Marne and removed from command, illness being cited. He held no further field command. 
He died in Dresden aged 75.