Hannie Schaft

Hannie Schaft was born in Haarlem. Her mother was a Mennonite and her father was attached to the SDAP (the socialist party). During her law studies at the Universiteit van Amsterdam she became friends with the jewish students Philine Polak and Sonja Frenk. This made her feel strongly about actions against Jews. After the German occupation of the Netherlands (1940), university students were to sign a declaration of allegiance to the occupation authorities. When Hannie refused to sign the petition in support of the occupation forces, she could not continue her studies and moved in with her parents again. She became more and more active in the resistance movement and helped people who were hiding from the Germans with stolen IDs and food-coupons.

She joined the Raad van Verzet, a resistance movement that had close ties to the Dutch communist party and was not trusted very much by other resistance groups. Her motivation to join the communists was that they were at least resisting actively With her friend Truus she carried out various attacks on Germans, collaborators and traitors. She learned to speak German fluently and got involved with German soldiers. Some resistance members considered her a traitor for that.

After a sub-department of the Raad van Verzet in Velsen killed a farmer, without authorization from the groups' leaders, Hannie brought a list of names of the ones who did that to her leaders. Afterwards the names people on this list were given to the Sicherheitsdienst, which meant a certain death. Must likely Hannie did not know the result her action would have. After the war this episode was investigated by a special commission.

Hannie Schaft was hated by the German occupier, because just before the end of the war she executed various attacks that were pointless in the eyes of the Germans. She was arrested by accident when she was distributing illegal newspapers. Although at the end of the war there was an agreement between the occupier and the Binnenlandse Strijdkrachten not to execute women, she was shot dead three weeks before the end of the war in the dunes of Bloemendaal. She supposedly said to her executors: "I shoot better than you".

A number of schools and streets were named after her. For her, and other resistance-heroines, a foundation has been created; the Stichting Nationale Hannie Schaft-herdenking. A number of books and movies have been made about her. She features in De Aanslag of Fons Rademakers. Ineke Verdoner wrote a song about her. Author Teun de Vries wrote a biography of her life, which has inspired the movie 'Het Meisje met het Rode Haar' by Ben Verbong featuring Renee Soutendijk as Hannie Schaft.

See Also

• Netherlands in World War II