CHAPTER EIGHT
GOING HOME
Only one day after the armistice, the British ambassador in The Hague wrote to the Dutch government declaring that, as the war was now over, all treaties concerning the POWs interned in the Netherlands and Switzerland were no longer valid. He therefore requested that all British POWs should immediately be released and allowed to return home. To this end the British proposed to send five ships to collect the approxi- mately 5,000 British and Commonwealth men currently interned in the Netherlands.1 The Dutch were in complete agreement. They had no wish to detain internees for any longer than was strictly necessary in order to make appropriate arrangements for their transport home. On 15 November 1918 the first British internees and POWs embarked for the short trip home.2 The Dutch authorities took the British declaration of the invalidity of the internment treaties to mean that they now also had no obligation to intern any German servicemen, and they too were released in the week following the armistice.3 Their journey home was considerably easier as they had no sea to cross. Some, and it is hard to estimate how many, when released from internment opted not to go back to Germany but remained in the Netherlands. Even with the recent addition of the POWs, the number of German and British internees was, compared to the Belgians, relatively small. The return of the Belgian internees was complicated by the fact that a signifi- cant area of Belgium was still occupied by the Germans, albeit Germans that were heading homeward themselves. Consequently, although no longer under an obligation to intern the Belgians, the Dutch Minister of Foreign Affairs wanted to wait for agreement from the Belgian govern- ment before activating the plans for sending the Belgians home. These plans had been drawn up in 1917 in anticipation of the end of the war and allowed for a systematic, but gradual, clearance of all of the camps. The internees were to be transported to the Belgian border by a fleet of trains. The general principle was that those who were not employed in the
1 LM Geschiedenis der Interneering, p. 1528. 2 LM Geschiedenis der Interneering, p. 1531. 3 LM Geschiedenis der Interneering, p. 1533.
Netherlands would be sent home first, so as not to leave Dutch industry suddenly short-handed.4 The work groups would then be gradually with- drawn back to the camps, and they would then depart for Belgium from there. The internees would travel home alone; families were to be sent along later. The first trains for Belgium left the Netherlands on 2 December 1918. The Dutch government picked the date of 15 December 1918 as the point from which it would cease to have any financial responsibility for the internees. Any that remained in the Netherlands after that date would have to look to the Belgium government to provide them with money to live on.5 The planning for the return of the Belgians was very detailed. Specific orders had been prepared dealing with everything from exactly how much luggage each man was allowed to take with him, to what would happen to the dirty sheets after the camps had been vacated (they were taken into store in Woerden). The families of the internees were also sent back by train starting on 21 December 1918 and continuing through the Christmas period. All of the families were initially transported to a resettlement centre in Antwerp.6 Not all internees were able to travel home immediately. Special arrange- ments had to be made for the seventy or so prisoners who were currently being held in the military prison at Vlissingen. They were escorted home under armed guard and handed over to the appropriate authorities in their own country. A larger group that also needed special attention was the internees who were too ill to travel. They remained in the Netherlands until appropriate arrangements could be made. For some this meant a long delay. In February 1919 there were still twenty Belgians under the care of the Dutch Army Medical Services and a further forty Belgians had to wait until June 1919 before they were transferred to the military mental hospital in Selzaete, to the north of Gent.7 Not only men had to be returned. During the course of the war the Dutch had also interned a large amount of equipment. Some had been taken over by the Dutch military and the cost of this equipment was offset against internment costs. Some was prohibited by the terms of the peace settlement from being returned, such as the German aircraft and
4 LM Geschiedenis der Interneering, p. 1529. 5 De Vries, ‘Nederland als Non-beligerente Natie en de Internering van Buitenlandse Militairen Gedurende de Eerste Wereldoorlog’ p. 105. 6 LM Geschiedenis der Interneering, p. 1550. 7 LM Geschiedenis der Interneering, p. 1574.