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“It is indescribable what goes through a man’s soul when one sees so many faithful sons of Holland shot down there in his yard, by a gang of which one wonders what kind of creatures they are.”
It is a passage from the letter that farmer Kraaijenbrink from Varsseveld writes to the family of Luther Kortlang after the Second World War. Kraaijenbrink witnesses how on 2 March 1945 a German firing squad shoots 46 men in his yard at Rademakersbroek. Among them is 25-year-old Luther from Ermelo. The mass execution is in retaliation for the murder of four German soldiers in Varsseveld, committed by the resistance.
In the last months before the liberation, the German occupiers acted with an increasingly heavy hand. The Germans take revenge for actions of the resistance, by so-called death row inmates in prisons and executed without trial. Hundreds of men die in these fusillades. Below the death row inmates are leaders from the resistance, but also people who are in prison for minor offenses.
On May 5, 1945, the day on which the whole of the Netherlands celebrates the liberation, Luther is buried in Ermelo. Luther’s father and brother, who were also imprisoned, are still missing at the time. Their tragic fate only becomes known a few weeks after the liberation.
Watch the video where Emily Kortlang, the daughter of Luther’s sister, tells her family’s story:
The 46 of Rademakersbroek
2023-05-04 04:35:45
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