Liberation Days are not events we commemorate here in the UK, but then we haven’t been invaded and subjugated by a foreign power for centuries*
It is of course a different picture in other parts of the world, and you do not have to go any further than mainland Europe to experience national holidays which mark the liberation of countries from the control of Nazi Germany.
Last month, the Italian side of our family had their “liberation holiday” on April 25th and today, May 5th my friends and acquaintances across the Netherlands will be doing the same.
According to one source, “Liberation Day (Dutch: Bevrijdingsdag) is a public holiday in the Netherlands celebrated each year on 5 May to mark the end of the occupation by Nazi Germany during World War II. It follows the Remembrance of the Dead (Dodenherdenking) on 4 May.
The nation was liberated by Canadian forces, British infantry divisions, the British I Corps, the 1st Polish Armoured Division, American, Belgian, Dutch and Czechoslovak troops.
Parts of the country, in particular the south-east, were liberated by the British Second Army which included American and Polish airborne forces (see Operation Market Garden) and French airbornes (see Operation Amherst).
On 5 May 1945, at Hotel de Wereld in Wageningen, I Canadian Corps commander Lieutenant-General Charles Foulkes and Oberbefehlshaber Niederlande commander-in-chief Generaloberst Johannes Blaskowitz reached an agreement on the capitulation of all German forces in the Netherlands.
The capitulation document was signed the next day (no typewriter had been available the prior day) in the auditorium of Wageningen University, located next door.
After liberation in 1945, Liberation Day was celebrated every five years.
In 1990 the day was declared a national holiday when liberation would be remembered and celebrated every year. Festivals are held in most places in the Netherlands with parades of veterans and musical festivals throughout the whole country”.**
It was Jürgen Beekers, who first alerted me to Bevrijdingsdag, after we had corresponded about the search for a young British soldier who was killed during the liberation of his part of the Netherlands in October 1944.
Jürgen is part of a very special project which encourages residents in the region around the municipality of Nederweert to adopt the war grave of a Commonwealth serviceman buried in the local British Military Cemetery.***
It is a project I have written about already and I think it is fitting to return to it today.
I am waiting for confirmation of the birthday of Arthur Chetham who was killed between the villages of Asten, Liessel and Neerkant on October 27th 1944 and is in the war cememtery.
And once we have that date Jürgen, will be able to lay flowers at the grave on Private Chetham’s birthday.
It arrived today and l know he was born on October7th 1924.
So, for now I shall be thinking of Jürgen, his family and the others I know in the Netherlands on this special day.
And also of the 365 Commonwealth servicemen buried in that war cemetery and the the activities of those in Nederweert to honour their sacrifice.
Location; Nederweert, Netherlands
Pictures; Nederweert War Cemetery , 1945-2021, courtesy of The Adoption Graves Foundation of the Nederweert War Cemetery, and the collection of Jürgen Beekers
*With the caveat that some in Wales, Scotland and Ireland may question that comment
**Liberation Day, Netherlands, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberation_Day_(Netherlands)
*** The Adoption Graves Foundation of the Nederweert War Cemetery https://adoptiongravesnederweert.com
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