Be Brave, Become Stormer
An Analysis of the Experiences of the Members of the Dutch Nationale Jeugdstorm during the Period of German Occupation, 1940-1945
Universiteit van Amsterdam (UvA)
Master History: Holocaust and Genocide Studies, 2016-2018 Carmen Moll
Mentor: Peter van Dam Second Reader: Jouke Turpijn
Content
Abbreviations ………... 3
1. Introduction………... 4
1.1 Historiography: The Dichotomy between Right and Wrong……….. 5
1.2 The Nationale Jeugdstorm……….. 9
1.3 Research Methods and Methodological Considerations……… 16
1.4 Plan of the Analysis………... 18
2. The Ideological Foundations of the Nationale Jeugdstorm………. 20
2.1 1934-1940: The A-political Character of the Nationale Jeugdstorm………. 23
2.2 10 May 1940: The Invasion of the Nazis………... 24
2.3 The Ideological Commitment of the Jeugdstormer……… 30
3. The Communal Identity and Social Relations of the Jeugdstormers………... 36
3.1 Social Interaction in Dutch Society: Anti-National Socialist Sentiment………... 37
3.2 Connecting Ideology to Identity: The Formation of a Community…………..… 40
3.3 The Communal Experience of Membership to the Nationale Jeugdstorm……… 44
3.4 The Social Relations of the Jeugdstormers: Interaction or Isolation?... 49
4. The Willingness to use Force within the Jeugdstorm Community……….. 56
4.1 Some Sort of Military Scouting: Militarization of the Jeugdstorm……… 58
4.2 Feelings of Enmity within the Jeugdstorm Community……… 62
4.3 Enmity in Practice: Were Stormers Willing to Use Violence?... 65
5. Conclusion: The Jeugdstorm as a Community of Experience………. 72
6. Bibliografie...………... 80
Abbreviations
AJC Arbeiders Jeugd Centrale
NIOD Nederlands Instituut Oorlog Documentatie
NIVO Nederlandsche Inrichting voor Volkse Opvoeding NJS Nationale Jeugdstorm
NJV Nederlandsch Jonglings Verbond NSB Nationaal Socialistische Beweging
NSDAP Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei NPV Nederlandsche Padvinders Vereniging
1. Introduction
On the 14th of December, 1931, the Nationaal Socialistische Beweging (NSB) was called into
existence at a founders’ meeting in Utrecht. The first and second men within the party were respectively, Anton Adriaan Mussert (1894-1946) and Cornelis van Geelkerken (1901-1976). In the years that followed, the men would attempt to bring on a large-scale mobilization of the Dutch people, who were in the grip of a devastating financial crisis that terrorized the larger part of Europe. According to NSB’s fascist ideology, the ideal society would be based on a strongly connected national community (saamhorige volksgemeenschap) in which the individual would be subordinated to the collective. With Mussert as the ultimate leader, the NSB strove to restore the glory of the Dutch collective. In its early years the NSB rapidly gained popularity among (mainly) middleclass citizens, who were attracted to Mussert’s powerful rhetorics. In addition, the party’s political constituency was strengthened by relatively young people who were attracted to the strong and populistic course of the NSB. Due to the fact that the NSB hadn’t established a minimum age for the membership
application to the party during the first few years of its existence, it was possible for the younger generation to join the so-called “black-shirts”. Within three years, the NSB counted thirteen youth sections nationwide, varying from sport groups to political youth departments. Together these younglings were good for one tenth of the total number of members in 1933.1
In 1934 Mussert made the decision to formally organize the youth of the party, by founding an independent youth section under the leadership of ‘Kees’ van Geelkerken. The official instruction was given on the 1st of May, on a so called Landdag – a member meeting
of the NSB – at the Rai in Amsterdam. Van Geelkerken had been known not to interfere in
1 Bart Engelen, “In Godsvertrouwen Alles Voor Het Vaderland: De Radicalisering van de Nationale Jeugdstorm
the ideological debates that Mussert initiated and instead focused his attention on the
pragmatic organization of the material and support the movement needed.2 Mussert looked at
him as the ideal future leader of the youth section the party needed so bad. Other youth organizations in the Netherlands were judged to be either too politically coloured, like the Arbeiders Jeugd Centrale (AJC), or too internationally oriented, like the Nederlandsche Padvinders Vereniging (NPV). The national socialistic youth movement wouldn’t be the umpteenth pillar of the verzuilde society, but would strive to unite the entire Dutch youth, independently of political preferences. Therefore, the main goal of the youth organisation would be the education of a nation loving future Dutch generation.3 The precise date on which
the organization was installed is subject to historical debate. However, it is clear that the first division, the group Velp, started functioning on June 2nd, 1934. The official installation of this
division took place months later on October 3rd. It took until the 27th of September, for the
first registration forms to be filled out.4 Irrespective the precise founders date, 1934 had thus
brought the Netherlands a new youth organisation and the Nationale Jeugdstorm (NJS) was born.5 In this research the lives and thoughts of the Jeugdstormers who joined the
organization in the years that followed will be explored in order to gain insight in the experience of Jeugdstorm membership.
1.1. Historiography: The dichotomy between Right and Wrong
When analyzing the to the NSB connected organizations within Dutch society, the connection to the post-war debate on “right” and “wrong” is easily made. The Dutch Historian Lou de Jong wrote one of the most influential surveys on the Netherlands during the German
2 Bart van der Boom, Kees van Geelkerken: De Rechterhand van Mussert (Utrecht/Antwerpen: Veen Uitgevers,
1990), 25–29.
3 Renee Kwak, “De Nationale Jeugdstorm: De Noodlottige Belangenstrijd Om de Jeugd, 1934-1945,”
Masterthesis, Erasmusuniversiteit Rotterdam, 1988, 33–34.
4 Idem, 36–38.
occupation named Het Koninkrijk der Nederlanden in de Tweede Wereldoorlog (1969-1994). As a Dutch Jew born in 1914 De Jong himself had experienced the threat the Germans had posed to the Dutch Jewish population and had fled the low countries. Upon his return after the war, De Jong became head of the Nederlands Instituut Oorlogs Documentatie (NIOD) for which he started working on the now still highly valued historical analysis. With fourteen parts and twenty-nine individual books – of which twelve parts are written by De Jong himself – this comprehensive historical overview provides its readers with an extensive history on the totality of the Second World War in the Netherlands. The leading themes in his version of events are oppression, collaboration and resistance. Be it because of the close proximity of the Second World War or be it because of his personal experiences and great losses as a result of the Holocaust, De Jong’s survey leaves little room for doubt: during the war, an individual was either “right” or “wrong”, either for or against the Netherlands, either a resistance fighter or an NSB’er.6
In the years after the war both historians and the general public tended to accept the strict distinctions between those who were deemed “right” and those who were deemed “wrong” in times of the Nazi-empire. The “right” people had fought and resisted the German occupiers and their national socialistic ideology, while the “wrong” people had aligned themselves with the Nazis during the years of war.7 In 1983, the Dutch Historian J.C.H. Blom
was one of the first to mention the lack of nuance in the Dutch Holocaust historiography. In his dissertation he asked the question whether, now De Jong’s extensive history on the Second World War was almost finished, there would be any need for further research on account of the occupational period of the Netherlands. He concluded that this would depend on the ability and willingness of academics to break free of the dominant political moral question of “right” and “wrong” which was connected to division between collaboration and
6 J. C. H. Blom, In de Ban van Goed en Fout (Amsterdam: Boom, 2007), 15.
resistance.8 To accomplish this change of discourse, Blom proposed three new courses for
academic research: 1) studies on the mood among the Dutch population during the years of German occupation; 2) international comparisons between the Netherlands and other countries over de course of the Second World War; and 3) studies based on a more broad temporal perspective.9 Despite the difficulty of the tasks ahead, Blom hopefully concluded
that these new perspectives would break through the stigma of “right” versus “wrong”.10
Since Blom’s dissertation, a vast number of publications appeared which indeed provided perspectives alternative to that of De Jong’s Het Koninkrijk der Nederlanden in de Tweede Wereldoorlog. Research on the prosecution of the Dutch Jews, the interplay between the occupational and domestic forces during the occupation, the mood among the Dutch population under the Nazis, Dutch war economics and food supplies and problems during the post-war period have appeared as main themes for academic research. Within these works the stereotypes of both “right” and “wrong” groups within Dutch society have been nuanced. One of the most prominent works has been the book Grijs Verleden: Nederland en de Tweede Wereld Oorlog (2001) of the Dutch Historian Chris van der Heijden. He finds that the duration and intensity of the war spurred most people to leave behind their pre-war belief systems and worldviews. Van der Heijden recognizes a pattern of adaptation to an
increasingly escalating German dominance and terror. As a result, the strict line between collaboration and resistance – between black and white – faded into grey (grijs).11
Despite these changes in discourse, there are several traditional historical narratives on the Second World War which historians have just recently started to reanalyze. The picture of the ‘isolated’ and ‘opportunistic’ small men, who joined the NSB due to his alienated position
8 Blom, In de Ban van Goed en Fout, 14. 9 Idem, 95.
10 Idem, 25.
11Chris van der Heijden, Grijs Verleden: Nederland in de Tweede Wereldoorlog (Amsterdam/Antwerpen:
in society, that was first established in the works of Lou de Jong and A.A. de Jonge, has generally not been questioned in Holocaust historiography.12 Only recently two Dutch
Historians, Josje Damsma and Erik Schumacher, have opened the debate on this fixed image of the Dutch NSB members. In their research on ‘De Strijd om Amsterdam’ (or: The Battle of Amsterdam), the researchers have tried to answer the question to what extent the dominant narrative on NSB’ers is tenable when it is analyzed on a smaller scale. They’ve looked into the behavior of the Amsterdam NSB’ers themselves and the opinions and judgements that were given about them by their social environment. The analysis shows a far more varied picture of the associations between NSB’ers and non-members, than the one dominant in the historiography. The societal divisions based on NSB membership were far less cutting than generally assumed. When individuals got to know each other, the social isolation of NSB’ers tended to be partially lifted. Therefore, Damsma and Schumacher propose the use of the term “interaction” instead of isolation, as a basic concept for looking into the NSB. In contrast to isolation which a closed concept is, the question of interaction offers a more open perspective to look into the relations between members and non-members over the course of the war.13
Damsma and Schumacher argue that research at the NSB should consider that the movement was both the carrier of Dutch fascism and the representation of a category of Dutchmen in general. The idea that the fanatical NSB members interacted with the rest of society, diverged from the post-war Dutch identity, which was based on a moderate national character. Within this narrative, the Netherlands were perceived to be immune to the spirit of revolution and it thus offered no breeding ground for communism or national socialism. As for wartime historiography, the emphasis was laid on the heroes of the national resistance. ‘Dutch fascism’, as seen in the NSB-movement was regarded a contradictio in terminis. To
12 A.A. de Jonge, Het Nationaal-Socialisme in Nederland. Voorgeschiedenis, Ontstaan en Ontwikkeling (Den
Haag: Kruseman, 1968) 167.
13 Josje Damsma and Erik Schumacher, “De Strijd Om Amsterdam: Een Nieuwe Benadering in het Onderzoek
improve the research on the NSB, and NSB related organizations like the NJS, researchers should deviate from the dominant picture and to some extent, break with the Dutch national identity. As Damsma and Schumacher state: ‘Especially, the place of Dutch collaborators and fascists within the Dutch society is what is interesting, because this not only teaches us about the NSB’ers themselves, but also over the whole of the Netherlands during the period of German occupation.’14
While academic research has to some extent benefitted from the more nuanced interpretation of ‘right’ versus ‘wrong’, there is still progress to be made in creation of an historically neutral picture on the NSB and its members. Collective history on account of collaboration is still very-much colored by the need for an acceptable self-image on the thoughts and actions of the Dutch population during the Second World war. In turn, academical researchers have just recently started to discover some new perspectives and concepts by which the NSB and its sister organizations can be analyzed in a more nuanced way. Years after the Second World War came to an end, the Netherlands are thus still dealing with historic debates on those “deemed wrong”. New historical analysis of these morally difficult subjects can contribute to more critical reflection of the Dutch collective identity and incorporate the thoughts and actions of NSB’ers and NJS’ers as an inherent part of the Dutch society in the twentieth century.
1.2.The Nationale Jeugdstorm
One of the groups within Dutch society who, despite their categorization as “wrong”, has received little attention during the change of discourse are the children of the Nationale Jeugdstorm. The age of Jeugdstormers, when entering the NJS, generally varied from 8 to 18. In addition, adult kader-members were installed to lead the local Jeugdstorm troepen. While
14 Damsma and Schumacher, “De Strijd om Amsterdam,” 20. From this point forward all citations will be
the organization remained relatively marginal during the pre-war period with around 2.000 members, it counted over 12.000 members at its height in 1942 and thus really established itself in the Dutch war society. The children – often the offspring of NSB parents – were united by education and group exercises under the umbrella of national socialistic ideology.15
In contrast to many of the other Dutch youth organizations, the NJS remained active until the end of the German occupation of the Netherlands in 1945. In the period after the war, the children of the NJS were labeled ‘politically contaminated’ and largely put into re-educational camps and boarding schools in order to create a possibility to reintegrate them into Dutch society.16 Others were simply left to the grace of family members, or were put in orphanages,
while their NSB parents served long-term imprisonment before trial.17
The difference between the amount of research that has been conducted on account of the NSB and the NJS is both outstanding and unexpected. Whereas the NSB itself has
received a lot of attention over the past few decades, their youth section has only scarcely been analyzed. Even De Jong only mentions the NJS once over the course of his historical analysis.18 The fact that the Jeugdstorm is an underexplored topic, doesn’t account for a lack
of deployment in the Dutch and German war apparatus. Certainly, during the last years of the Second World War, the outflow of NJS members to (semi)military units substantially
increased. Both the NSB and NJS provided the Germans with Dutch volunteers for the
Waffen-SS, which took part in the genocidal practices in the East.19 In this, both the NSB and
the NJS are one of the view societal groups that connect the Netherlands to the Holocaust in
15 “Jeugdstorm,” Verzets Museum Amsterdam, accessed April 14, 2017,
https://www.verzetsmuseum.org/jongeren/nsb/nsb,jeugdstorm.
16 Tames, “Children of Dutch Nazi Collaborators,” 230.
17 Dick Kampman, De NSB En de NSB’ers: Kennisonrechtvaardiging en Stereotypering (Groningen: VU
University Press, 2015), 9–10.
18 Lou de Jong, Het Koninkrijk Der Nederlanden in de Tweede Wereldoorlog (NIOD, 1969-1994), 232,
http://loe.niod.knaw.nl/grijswaarden/De-Jong_Koninkrijk_deel-01_voorspel_zw.pdf.
19 Evertjan Roekel, Jongens van Nederland: Nederlandse Vrijwilligers in de Waffen-SS (Antwerpen: Spectrum,
general.20 Therefore, looking into the NJS, its members and their lives can provide a unique
perspective on how in the Netherlands the youth was formed to the national socialistic model. Constructing a history of mentality of the young NJS members will provide a new and
valuable insight in the Germanisation of Dutch society during the years of German
occupation. Thus far, most academic research on account of Foute Kinderen has concentrated on the rehabilitation and traumatic post-war experiences of the offspring of former parents. Among others, Bettina Drion, Chris van der Heijden, and Ismee Tames, have written about the memories and struggles of the children of Dutch NSB’ers.21 All these publications have
one important thing in common: their research subject is relatively broad in the sense that they all chose to analyze all children of NSB parents and not just those connected to certain associations like the NJS. The focus is either on the memories or on post-war experiences of the totality of Foute Kinderen.
In contrast, this research will focus solely on the members of the Nationale Jeugdstorm during the years of German occupation. The diaries of seven Dutch Jeugdstormers kept by the NIOD will be regarded the “way in” on a search to the history of mentalities. In addition, seven diaries of kader-members, family members and one Jeugdstorm battalion commandant, will be used for further information. As common for times of crisis, the Second World War saw an increase in the number of diaries kept by both adults and children.22 After the war,
both historians and the general public have worked together to gather and archive these interesting personal accounts of the war in the NIOD. Whereas the diaries were initially only picked up by the general public (think of the Anne Frank Diary, which until very recently did
20 Kampman, De NSB En NSB’ers, 20.
21 Bettina Drion and Maaike Molhuysen, Scherven: Nazaten van Foute Nederlanders over Hun Familieverleden
(Baarn: Marmer, 2013). Chris van der Heijden, Kinderen van Foute Ouders: Hun Verhaal (Amsterdam: Atlas Contact, 2014). Ismee Tames, Besmette jeugd: de kinderen van NSB’ers na de oorlog (Amsterdam: Balans, 2009).
22 Rudolf Dekker, “Jacques Presser’s Heritage: Egodocuments in the Study of History,” Memoria y Civilización
not have a scholarly edition), it is now increasingly accepted among historians to use these interesting sources for academic research, provided that research is based on an appropriate framework dealing with the specific character of diary studies. While other sources – like official NJS documents, correspondence, and post-war interviews with NJS members – will be used to support the finding, the fourteen diaries will be the main source of information, since they provide a unique insight in both the personal stories of these children, and specific culture in which they lived their young lives.23
In the social debates about the Jeugdstormers assumptions on account of guilt, shame and perpetratorship often dominated general opinion.24 On the one hand the children were
brought up in an extremely fascist environment, full of rhetorics and symbolism aimed at the exclusion of those who were deemed “outsiders”. On the other hand, the ethics of
condemning a group of children to the category of perpetrator is generally perceived to be problematic. To what extent can children really be held responsible for their thoughts and actions, when they are still so depended on the actions and choices of their (often, but not always) NSB parents? The discrepancy between perpetratorship and being a victim of the situation asks for a very specific and nuanced analytical toolbox. Since the Jeugdstormers were mainly in their teenage years, their accountability for their involvement in the
organization can be questioned. However, the term victim of the situation, in this context, is in no way meant to be equal or comparable to the victimhood of the Jews in sight of the German enterprise to solve the Jewish Question by means of extermination. At the same time, the Jeugdstormers and their fascist ideology formed an important building block for the German occupational forces within the Netherlands. As argued by the Greek fascism-expert
23 Esmeralda Kleinreesink, “Researching ‘The Most Dangerous of All Sources’: Egodocuments,” in Routledge
Handbook of Research Methods in Military Studies, ed. Joseph Soeters (London and New York: Routledge,
2014), 155.
24 Stephanie Bird et al., Reverberations of Nazi Violence in Germany and Beyond: Disturbing Pasts (London,
Aristotle Kallis, local fascists, like the NJS members, generally actively engaged in the persecution of the Jews, committed violence against their political opponents and often volunteered for local police forces and local government functions. As a result, the stormers can be seen as ‘unique, crucial building blocks of the architecture of genocide in the national socialistic New Order.’25 While the NJS-members were certainly connected to the local
powerbase for the Nazi government, it is difficult and maybe even unfair to argue that they bear full responsibility for their role during this period. Yet, notions of guilt and shame often appear as main themes in the oral history of the children of the NSB.26
In addition to these difficult moral considerations, our own cultural perception further colors the analysis of the foute children of the NJS. In the dominant Western culture, the period of childhood is generally depicted as a very specific – almost utopic – life phase, in which a child needs to be both careless and happy. When a child loses its ‘innocence’ during this phase, this loss is perceived to be unjust and tragic. This cultural notion tends to influence the lens through which we perceive the stories of all children: the reader is almost naturally inclined not to judge a child on its political or moral choices. As the Dutch historian and political scientist Ismee Tames puts it: ‘The ‘innocence’ automatically turns every evil that befalls the child into something “unjust”.’27 As a result, the political and historical context in
which these children lived tends to fade to the background and the emotional interpretation of the NJS members’ life stories gains the upper hand. In light of a more nuanced interpretation of Jeugdstorm membership, this over-emotionalization of the loss of innocence is also not feasible and will therefore not be part of this analysis.
The British professor in German History, Mary Fulbrook has formulated some useful and fitting concepts in her research into guilt and shame among communities of experience,
25 Damsma and Schumacher, “De Strijd Om Amsterdam,” 3.
26 Bird et al., Reverberations of Nazi Violence in Germany and Beyond, 51. 27 Tames, Besmette jeugd, 22.
connection and identification. Shame, according to Fulbrook, is ‘an emotion directed
primarily towards the self, arising particularly when some aspect of the self is inappropriately exposed to the gaze of other’. Guilt, in contrast to shame, is not about emotion but about inappropriate agency, since it ‘relates to an act (or failure to act) towards others, where the focus is on the effects on the victim.’28 The question of guilt is connected to the character of
the codes that has been transgressed and will be answered differently according to the chosen perspective of the researcher. In addition, the cultural context influences the way in which guilt or shame are imposed upon individuals through public processes of blaming and shaming.29 Following this line of thought, Ismee Tames has argued that the children of the
NSB’ers themselves have propagated the image of the ‘innocent child punished by society’. The NIOD research program Legacies of Collaboration: The Integration and Exclusion of Former National-Socialist milieus in the Netherlands after the Second World War contains oral histories and interviews with some great number children from NSB parents who were often members of the Jeugdstorm. Tames, has stated that a ‘trump card effect’ appears to be dominant in all the stories gold by these Nazi children: they all seem to recall incidents of bullying, exclusion and repeating reminders of their NSB family history.30 However, when
she compared their narratives with those of the people in their social environment a more nuanced story appeared. Tames thus concludes that ‘what and how people remember is closely related to how they understand their life stories and what makes sense to them.’31 The
feelings of shame and guilt were perceived to be key factors in being accepted by the post-war Dutch society and have thus so far been presented as part of the redemptive narrative of the innocent child.
28 Bird et al., Reverberations of Nazi Violence in Germany and Beyond, 18. 29 Idem, 18.
30 Idem, 57. 31 Idem, 58.
Over the years a variety of disciplinary frameworks has been used to analyze guilt and shame and Fulbrook has thus asked herself the question: ‘What then can historians add?’32
She argued that whereas psychologists attempt to expose the inner processes of guilt and shame, historians are able to analyze the collective character of thoughts and experiences. By looking at the expression of emotions, dominant public discourses and the communication of feelings in different historical environments, historical research can explore the historical phenomenology of guilt and shame. A central concept in the search for the historical phenomenology is the ‘community of experience’, which she defines as followed:
Communities of experience are those who lived through certain events – ‘defining experiences’ – that significantly affect the subsequent course of their lives, whether or not they explicitly engage in ‘memory work’.33
Fulbrook supplements this framework with the concepts of the ‘communities of connection’ – who did not live through the experiences themselves but are affected by the consequences for their significant others – and the ‘communities of identifications’, who become personally invested due to processes of identification.34 In analyzing the diaries and oral histories of the
Dutch Jeugdstormers these categorizations can be seen as a useful tool for academical research. The children of the NJS should be considered as a community of experience since their membership to the Jeugdstorm – at least in their own perception – altered the course of their lives. Their membership therefore was a defining experience. Finding out what precisely this experience entailed for the period during the war is the central question of this research.
32 Bird et al., Reverberations of Nazi Violence in Germany and Beyond, 17. 33 Idem, 17.
1.3. Research Methods and Methodological Considerations
From a methodological point of view, certain aspects will be taken into account. First of all, diaries exclude direct contact or interaction between research subject and researcher. In this way the source material is relatively limited. To confine this drawback as much as possible, the information found in the diaries will be supplemented by information from additional primary material. Several books like The Nazi Leerling and Onder de Vleugels van de Partij recorded the experiences of former Jeugdstorm members. In addition, the interviews with former Jeugdstorm members in the Dutch documentary program Andere Tijden provide insight in the thoughts and actions of those involved. These sources all have in common that they were created years after the events themselves. Therefore, both the effects of memory loss and mental processes of self-justification will have to be taken into account when using the narratives of these specific stormers. However, as an addition to the main narrative in the diaries, the interviews hold the potential to further contribute, clarify, and specify the research findings of this analysis.
A second difficulty in the study of diaries is the uncertainty of the historical truth narrated by the authors. In contrast to historic sources which are drawn up in a more formal setting – like official NJS documentation – personal writings can be ‘restricted, biased,
afflicted by emotion, and full of errors’.35 For the children who held a membership to the NJS,
the club and their fellow members would most likely be a substantive part of their social life. In addition, a large part of the children would have relatives who held ties to the NSB. Both personal disposition and (un)conscious self-censorship will therefore be kept in mind while reading the diaries of NJS members.
Third, one could question the representativeness of the authors writings for the general experience of membership to the NJS. To what extent can fourteen diaries, of which only
seven are written by Jeugdstormers themselves, account for the experience of almost 12.000 NJS members? This question generally taunts historical research, especially in the case of Holocaust studies. The opinion on the number of sources needed for sound historical research differs among historians. Peter Kushner, for example, argued that it is acceptable to work with a small number of sources when they are looked into by using a maximalist method, in which the information is embedded in a broader historical context.36 In contrast, Jan Gross has
argued that the information of every singular source should be accepted until there are persuasive arguments to the contrary.37 Accordingly, historical research would benefit from
an approach in which literally all fragments of information at our disposal are used. A more nuanced stance was set apart by Omar Bartov, who argued that testimonies can be conflicting, inaccurate or even mistaken. Nevertheless, he stated that these specific sources hold their historical value due to the fact that they provide insight in events that would otherwise remain unknown. He proposed that scholars use testimonies with the same care and ‘suspicion’ as they would by using other sources. 38 Analyzing these specific sources should be a mix of
critical mass collection on the one hand and using all accounts available in case of limited sources on the other. In this research I will opt for the latter stance in examining the testimonies by former Jeugdstorm members. There aren’t many diaries on account of
experiences as members of the NJS, yet, those available will be examined by means of critical source analysis and supplemented with the narratives from other relevant diaries and the narratives of books and oral histories of other former Jeugdstorm children. Although the seven Jeugdstormers only represent a small section of the Dutch Jeugdstorm youth, they are the only firsthand experiences available for academic research and thus, they are the best, if
36 Peter Kushner, “Holocaust Testimony, Ethics, and the Problem of Representation,” Poetics Today 27 (1999):
275–96.
37 Jan T. Gross, Neighbours: The Destruction of the Jews of the Jewish Community in Jedwabne, Poland
(Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 2001), 138–42.
not only way to analyze this specific piece of war-history. In addition, the degree of similarity or diversity in the writings of the children can contribute to some understanding of tendencies among the Jeugdstormers in general.
1.4. Plan of the Analysis
Based on the historiographic context and methodological considerations set apart in the above section, this research will answer the main question: To what extent did the experience of membership to the Nationale Jeugdstorm influence the lives and social relations of the members during the years of German occupation, 1940-1945? In order to fully analyze the experience of membership to the organization, three determinants will be subjects of analysis: the ideological influence, the social influence and the behavioral influence of NJS
membership.
First, I will answer the question: To what extent were the members of the Nationale Jeugdstorm influenced by the official NJS ideology? Both official NJS source material – like official documents and promotion material – and secondary literature, will be used to gain insight in the ideological foundations of the NJS. The organizational developments will then be compared with the experiences of membership and the extent to which members were influenced by the official NJS-ideology, based on a diary analysis.
The second question of this analysis reads: To what extent did membership to the
Nationale Jeugdstorm affect the social relations of the children during the war? In this chapter the collective character of the NJS will be explored against the background of the Dutch society during the twentieth century. After this, the complexity of and interplay between the NJS-collective identity and the identity of individual stormers will be set apart, in order to establish whether the membership resulted in social isolation or social interaction.
Last, I will analyze the behavioral dimension of the experience of Jeugdstorm
membership by answering the question: To what extent were the members of the Nationale Jeugdstorm willing to use violence during the period of their membership? In this final chapter the physical and mental preparation for the use of violence will be set apart. Thereafter, it will be examined whether the experience of membership did result in violent behavior and violent attitudes, by analyzing the diaries of the Jeugdstorm members.
Throughout the analysis the organizational history of the Nationale Jeugdstorm will be set next to the experiences of individual Jeugdstorm members. This two-dimensional
approach – in which top-down and bottom-up historical analysis are combined – will provide a new perspective on the character and consequences of membership to the Nationale
2. The Ideological foundations of the Nationale Jeugdstorm
Years after the Second World War, Hoofdstormer Van Geelkerken argued that the NJS in fact was nothing more than a militarized scouting group.39 This notion seems somewhat modest,
for the Nationale Jeugdstorm was connected to both generic fascism and its most prominent Dutch representative, the Nationaal Socialistische Beweging. As a third political option, which was neither right- nor left-oriented, fascism has often been defined based on what it was not: it was antibourgeois, anti-communistic, anticapitalistic etcetera. The political
conviction was based on the desire to start a ‘new’ society by the power of the people, after a period of crisis and decay. In this, the interest of the state was valued above that of the individual. Both national unity and collective action were considered of the utmost
importance. According to fascist ideology the ideal ‘natural order’ suffered by immigration of ‘outsiders’, the lack of patriotism, tendencies of individualism, international oriented
socialism and communism, the loss of moral values, egalitarianism and consumerism. 40
The term fascism refers to the biggest commonalities between the different local, regional and national variants. German national socialist ideology can be regarded the outstanding example of generic fascism.41 Hitler’s ideology focused first and foremost on
racial and biological antisemitism, while such considerations were only of secondary
importance to many other fascists. Fascists primarily aimed to establish national unity with a purified people but didn’t specifically exclude the Jews.42 So, while both aspired the
establishment of a ‘total state’ and bore a tendency to radicalization, fascism characterized
39 David Barnouw, “Wie de Jeugd Heeft, Heeft de Toekomst,” Fibula: Tijdschrift Voor Jeugd En Geschiedenis
31, no. 3 (1990): 7.
40 Willem Huberts, In de Ban van een Beter Verleden: Het Nederlandse Fascisme (1923-1945) (Nijmegen:
Uitgeverij Vantilt, 2017), 22.
41 Josje Damsma, “Nazis in the Netherlands: A Social History of National Socialist Collaborators, 1940-1945,”
(Dis. Thesis, Universiteit van Amsterdam, 2013), 12.
itself as a dynamic movement which canalized its radicalization towards the by leadership appointed targets, whereas German national socialism internalized radicalization in its most extreme form.43
In practise, these theoretical boundaries, tended to fade. In the Netherlands, the NSB had organized Dutch fascists under the leadership of Anton Adriaan Musset starting from the 14th of December, 1931. While the name of the movement inevitably linked the political party
to the similarly named German Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (NSDAP), Mussert’s ideology was more fascistic then national socialistic of nature. The original party program ignored the racial doctrine and the Führerprinzip that were prominent in the NSDAP. According to Mussert, the specifics of these assumptions were too un-Dutch and thus better left out in the struggle to the ultimate goal: breaking down the ‘pillarization’ of Dutch society. The NSB would embody the totality of the Dutch nation by inspiring collaboration among the people, while eradicating the materialistic individuality that had gained dominance due to capitalistic and socialistic ideology.44 In the nine years up to the
invasions of the Nazis, the NSB had developed its own fascist ideology and its own
organizational structure, with a total of 10.000 members in 1939 (in this period the party was already marginalized on a national level).45 So, while Germany and its national socialistic
ideology were a friendly occupying force for the Dutch fascist, the collaboration between the NSB and the Germans needed compromises, both due to the friction between Dutch
ultranationalist sentiment and German occupation and due to friction between the levels of importance of racial doctrine in ideological convictions.46
The interplay between fascism, German national socialism and Dutch national socialism that lay at the base of the ideological fundaments of the Nationale Jeugdstorm can
43 Huberts, In de Ban van een Beter Verleden, 18–38. 44 Van der Boom, Kees van Geelkerken, 21–22. 45 Damsma, “Nazis in the Netherlands,” 11–16. 46 Huberts, In de Ban van een Beter Verleden, 52.
be placed. Both the German national socialists and the Dutch fascists saw themselves as the vanguard of a newer and younger generation, which would relieve the older generation from their duties. Consequently, the younger generations would have to be prepared to become good citizens which valued the national community above their individual needs.47 As early
as 1932, the party program of the NSB concerned itself with the undisciplined and disordered youth generation in the Netherlands. Accordingly, Dutch children should be raised by the principles of moral convictions, order, discipline, civil sense, and industriousness, which would result in a maximum of character, spirit and intelligence of the new generation. From this moment onwards, emphasis was put on the education of the spirit of the people (de volkse geest).48 These ideas found expression in the ideology of the Nationale Jeugdstorm.
Official documentation of the Nationale Jeugdstorm provides a unique insight in the precise outline of the internally debated ideological currents that dominated the organization, before and during the Second World War. The extent to which these organizational decisions on account of the ideological teachings really affected the members of the Jeugdstorm is hereby unclear. Were the children really perceptive of the fascistic foundations of the organization? Or was NJS membership a merely scouting-like experience for the Jeugdstormers? In this chapter, the relation between the official NJS ideology and the ideological perceptiveness of the NJS members will be analysed based by answering the question: To what extent were the members of the Nationale Jeugdstorm influenced by the official NJS ideology? By means of an extensive comparison between the organizational ideology of the Nationale Jeugdstorm and the worldviews of its individual members, an important element of experience of membership will be uncovered.
47 Robin te Slaa and Edwin Klijn, De NSB: Ontstaan En Opkomst van de Nationaal-Socialistische Beweging,
1931-1945 (Amersfoort: Boom, 2009), 512.
48 Henk van Setten, Opvoeding in Volkse Geest: Fascisme in Het Onderwijs 1940-1945 (Bergen: OCTAVO,
2.1. 1934-1940 The apolitical character of the Nationale Jeugdstorm
From an ideological perspective, the timeline of the Nationale Jeugdstorm can be split in two main periods: the pre-war pedagogic period, and the war years of internal ideological conflict. Between 1934 and 1940 the NJS ideology can be characterized as apolitical and pedagogic. Since the fact that after the invasion of the German forces, the ideological disputes on the organizational level were based on the preservation of the pre-war character, it is important to first focus on the main ideological characteristics of the NJS in the pre-war period.
Between 1934 and 1940, the Nationale Jeugdstorm was, at least on paper, initiated as a pedagogic organization aimed at tending the Dutch youth. The main activities of NJS were summer camps, one-day manifests (so-called Velddagen), trainings and propaganda meetings, walking marches and colportage with the Sneeuwstorm magazine.49 The alleged goals of the
NJS were limited to exercise, gymnastics, athletics and leisure activities, in combination with practical education and the advancement of knowledge about nature, country, people and ‘kinsmen’. According to official organizational documentation, regular exercise would build the Jeugdstorm character and enhance tucht, orde and discipline among the members. Chants and songs would give vent to the spirit of the Dutch people and folkish art. By these
principles, the societal rigid order that had led to a pillarized society had to be replaced by an ‘organic whole’, in which all people would be lively Dutch nation people. In a 1939 official document the main goal of the organization was set apart as followed:
‘We wish love for the Nation and for the House of Orange, for our own People, and to induce and reinforce Language and Culture. Therefore, we have to be a youth
organization, in which all Dutch boys and girls are welcome, and in which they feel at home, regardless of Christian confirmation, rank, social class or accomplishment.’50
49 Te Slaa and Klijn, De NSB, 513.
In order to impel the entire Dutch youth to join the organization, the NJS leadership very explicitly denied its ties to the NSB. The apolitical and pedagogic character of the NJS was explicitly propagated to the outside world, which noticeably stood in extreme contrast with the high number of NSB members who filled the places in the NJS leadership. The tension between the self-proclaimed apolitical and non-NSB related character of the NJS, and the underlying fascistic nature of the Jeugdstorm, resulted in many problems concerning the organization’s right of existence during the entire pre-war period. In addition, it can be argued that, based on membership numbers, the organization had far from united the entire Dutch youth: since 1936 the member administration had not shown any significant growth and in the period before the German invasion the NJS had only counted 1.200 members.51 A former NJS
member who joined the organization in 1936 as so-called ukkepul, years after the war described his outlook on the pre-war character of the NJS and stated:
‘Altogether the NJS was a youth group which resembled many other organizations from that time. especially the scouting is comparable, with the difference that in the Jeugdstorm political propaganda was actively made and that everything was harder and more militarized.’52
2.2. 10 May 1940: The invasion of the Nazis
Due to the staggering membership numbers and problems due to the association with the NSB, the Nationale Jeugdstorm had been non-existent when the Germans invaded the Netherlands at 10 May 1940. For more radical members of the abolished NJS, the arrival of the Nazis was the go-ahead for the Germanization of the NSB youth section. Led by Rost van
51 Kwak, “De Nationale Jeugdstorm,” 73.
Tonningen, the radical leadership attempted to surpass Van Geelkerken’s attempts to re-establish the NJS, by organizing the more German oriented youth organizations: Blauwvoet and the Mussert-Garde.53 Despite their more corresponding ideological preferences, the
Germans chose not to support these organizations, and instead supported the Jeugdstorm. When the NJS was reinstalled at June 8th 1940, the organization’s leadership could rebuild the
Nationale Jeugdstorm in a more “fascist friendly” environment. Little changes were immediately implemented, like for example, the replacement of the official pre-war NJS salutation HOE-ZEE! with the NSB slogan HOU ZEE!, and the change from the original battle cry ‘Fear god, honour the king!’ by ‘In gods trust all for the nation!’ as a result of the betrayal of the Dutch Royal house, which had fled the Netherlands when the Nazis had invaded the country.54 Nevertheless, the process of mapping the ideological course of the NJS
became a complex and troublesome enterprise. Throughout the entire period of occupation there was one central issue that dominated the internal conflicts on the ideological teachings of the NJS: the ‘Diets-Duits’ divide. The Dietse ideology, supported by Van Geelkerken and Mussert, was in line with the apolitical campaign of the pre-war NJS and the original Dutch fascist ideology of the NSB, before they had become closer to the NSDAP due to a lack of support. In contrast, the Duitse ideology, was pursued by an increasing number of kader-members, who had had taken a more radical stance by constantly finding ways to relate or even adopt NJS ideology to the example of German national socialistic ideology. This ideological antithesis dominated the Nationale Jeugdstorm until its very end in 1945.
Basically, the supporters of the Dietse current in the NJS placed the Dutch nation at the centre of its ideology. The “own” was preferred over the “other” which meant that the Dutch culture, language, history and the Dietse tribe should be the main focus of the NJS
53 N. K. C. A. in ’t Veld, De SS En Nederland: Documenten Uit SS-Archieven, 1935-1945 (’S-Gravenhage:
Martinus Nijhoff, 1976), 217–24.
teachings. The original documents of the NJS place this at the fundament of the organization, and explain the Jeugdstorm’s central teaching as followed:
‘The Dutch people are one organic unity. One in spirit and in blood with ancestry and offspring, in their bond to Dutch soil, the Homeland. Individuals or groups need to subordinate their own interests to that of the Homeland and need to serve it to the extent of acquired capabilities. Respect for religion, righteous moral, patriotism, honour and sense of duty, companionship, discipline, order, sacrifice and communal spirit have to be generated, cultivated and sustained within the community.’55
The Jeugdstorm would reach this goal by means of the mental and physical education of its members, by informing people outside the circle of members, and by other lawful means of spreading its message. The education of the Jeugdstormers was aimed to increase their sense of ‘courage, honor and loyalty’.56 Typical Dietse ideological documents elaborated on the
great men of Dutch history, like Willem van Oranje and Michiel de Ruyter, who served as exemplary men.57 The periods of bloom, decay and recovery of the Dutch nation and people
were set apart and elaborated upon in order to educate the stormers about their future tasks of rebuilding the new order. In this new order, the kinship with other Dutch speaking countries like Belgium and South Africa was considered of great importance, and therefore the children would, for example, be taught to sing national songs of these countries.58
55 Nationale Jeugdstorm, Dienstvoorschrift I: Statuut, Opbouw En Leiding van Den “Nationale Jeugdstorm
(Utrecht, Wintermaand 1941), 3.
56 NIOD 123, 1153: ‘Nationale Jeugdstorm Jongeren Kwartier, Richtlijnen voor de Vorming’. 57 NIOD 123, 1153: ‘Geschiedenis van het Vaderland’.
58 “Zangbundel van Den Nationale Jeugdstorm,” Den Nationale Jeugdstorm, 1943, Het Geheugen van
Nederland,
http://www.geheugenvannederland.nl/nl/geheugen/view/zangbundel-den-nationale-jeugdstorm?coll=ngvn&maxperpage=36&page=1&query=Jeugdstorm+zangbundel&identifier=EVDO02%3AK ONB15-64.
The underlying ideological purpose of the Jeugdstorm becomes apparent in a letter of a Regional Leader, who responded to questions on account of the creation of a new NJS division. He mentioned that the main duty of a child was servitude to the community, based on national solidarity and love of the nation. This interpretation of civil duty was similar to that of the NSB, but while the NSB also participated in the political battle, the Jeugdstorm had to remain a pedagogic organisation, which took an absent stance from politics. The main concepts of duty, sacrifice, patriotism, honour, companionship and others, were to be taught in practise, instead of by ‘endless sermons’. Exercise, sport and game were but tools in reaching the goal of changing the minds of the children: the creation of the ‘Jeugdstorm-spirit’.59 So, while the NJS was obviously ideologically motivated, the leaders still perceived
the organization as apolitical. An organization was considered to be political when it
participated in the democratic party politics as seen in the Tweede Kamer. National socialism and, in turn the Dietse NJS ideology were a world view, and thus per definition apolitical.60
Despite Van Geelkerkens’s apolitical vison for the NJS, the organization was certainly used as a pawn in war politics. Both NJS ideology and policy was used to endorse the national separatism that was pursued by Mussert. The Dietse ideology proscribed that the German occupation was a phase of transition towards the real national socialistic state, within the Germanic confederation. In this, Germany would be led by the Führer Adolf Hitler, while Mussert would be the Leider of the Dietse state. This also meant that the Dietse current within the NJS generally opposed the militarisation of the Jeugdstorm. The Jeugdstorm was meant to cultivate the new generation for the future world and not to create the Germanic confederation itself. When throughout the war the German pressure for Jeugdstorm participation in the war increased, the rigid stance of the Dietse section softened: the stormers could fight, but only for Dietsland itself and not for Germany.
59 NIOD 123, 1136: ‘Brief Gewestleider Gewest II Nationale Jeugdstorm, 24 November 1940’. 60 Kwak, “De Nationale Jeugdstorm,” 112.
December 13th, 1942, was a turning point, both for the NSB and the NJS. Since 1940
Mussert had collaborated with the Nazis in an attempt to establish Dutch independence within the Great German empire. When Mussert was named ‘Leader of the Dutch People’ by Hitler, on December 13th, Mussert regarded this as a sign of acknowledgement. In reality the German
leader probably acted symbolically, since he never seriously inclined to grant the leader of the NSB any form of autonomy in the years that followed. Nevertheless, after this NJS
Hoofdstormer Van Geelkerken was granted a new position as head of ‘National Security and Home Affairs’ under Mussert’s newly obtained leadership. The relocation of Van Geelkerken resulted in the fact that his attention was distracted from his Hoofdstormer function within the NJS. Despite Van Geelkerken’s and particularly Mussert’s preference for a moderate, Dietse oriented NJS, the radicals within the organization were now able to gain the upper hand.
The Duitse ideology was both more radical national socialistic and more Germanic oriented than the Dietse ideology. The main point of reference for all the Duitse teachings was the Germanic folkish sentiment. This meant that the main aspiration was not to remain a separate Dietse nation, but instead to ascend in the Great German Empire, in an ultimate alliance between all Germanic people. Instead of accepting Mussert’s role as leader of the Dutch people, Hitler was recognized as Führer and supreme leader of all Germanic nations. Ideologically the emphasis was thus placed on the kinship with the Germanic people and the origin in the Germanic tribe. Throughout the war, Nazism became more and more prominent in the Duitse current of the Jeugdstorm.61 Typical Duitse ideological documents elaborated on
the German race, but also mentioned the Jewish Question, racial hygiene and heredity.62 In
line with the Duitse ideology the reading lists for kader-members also included books like Mein Kampf. In the ideological battle within the Jeugdstorm, the Duitse current continuously attempted to gain closeness to Germany. The radicals-maintained contact with the German
61 Barnouw, “Wie de Jeugd Heeft, Heeft de Toekomst,” 10. 62 NIOD 123, 1153: ‘het Joden Vraagstuk’; ‘Rassenkunde’.
Hitler Jugend, organized kader-trainings in Germany and tried to get the Jeugdstormers to engage in the German Weersportkampen.63 This was all meant to spur ideological
radicalization toward the Great-German ideal. As stated in a letter of a Jeugdstorm leader (1941): ‘It is the task of the national socialistic leadership to guide the youth and educate them to be worthy national socialists to the salvation of the entire Germanic Community.’64
The idea of resilience (de Weerbaarheids-gedachte) became increasingly important in the Duitse ideology. The terminology was mainly a coverup for the preparation of the Dutch youth for front service.65 In contrast to the Dietse current, the radicals did want to support the
Germans in their battle against Bolshevism. They therefore pushed the boys of the Jeugdstorm towards the German exercise camps, where the Wehrmacht extensively recruited their
soldiers. Those who were left behind in the Netherlands due to age or sex (or a lack of parental consent) would be obliged to support the heroic soldiers from the home front. Under the slogan: ‘Front Care is Duty’, the children were obliged to write letters to the Jeugdstorm at the Eastern Front and to perform yearly offertory. In turn the heroic stories and letters of the stormers at the front rapidly appeared in the propaganda magazines of the Jeugdstorm.66
It can be argued that the ideological centre of gravity shifted throughout the course of the war. Bart Engelen, for example, has studied the articles of the Jeugdstorm magazine De Stormvlag and has found that throughout the war the Great Germanic Thought was
increasingly propagated towards the members of the Jeugdstorm. While the magazine in 1941 mainly wrote about the Diets patriotism, there was already an increase in references to
‘Germanje’ and the ‘Führer’ in 1942. In 1943 one of the leading articles read: ‘No Chatter!: We will, as Germanic Youth consecutive, stand around… our Germanic Führer Adolf Hitler.’
63 Ramses Oomen, “Jeugd van Het “Nieuwe Europa: Transnationale Connecties van de Nationale Jeugdstorm
Bij Het Europese Jeugdverbond,” Tijdschrift Voor Geschiedenis 130, no. 4 (2017): 602-604.
64 NIOD 123, 1138: ‘Brief Hoofdstormer Banheer A. F. G. Borst, Oogstmaand 4, 1941’. 65 Kwak, “De Nationale Jeugdstorm,” 244.
Finally, in 1944, the Dietse articles had completely disappeared from the Stormvlag and instead, the redaction wrote about the Jeugdstormers’ battle against Bolshevism.67 Apart from
this, the historical timeline as set apart in the previous chapter shows an ongoing battle between the Dietse and Duitse supporters, to gain the overhand in NJS policy. The NJS pocketbook of 1944 is the ultimate example of this: the content both urged the children to participate in the battle of the Führer, while the booklet also elaborated on the national socialistic Dutch empire, placed within a powerful Europe.68
2.3.The Ideological Commitment of the Jeugdstormers
The organizational history of the Nationale Jeugdstorm thus showed a high degree of internal ideological dispute, which resulted in variations of its ideological teachings both in time and in place. Whereas some local kader-members were attracted and influenced by the Duitse current, others communicated the Dietse ideology to the Jeugdstorm members. In practise the ideological teachings of the NJS served two main functions. On the one hand it had an
external function of attracting individuals to join the party and become a national socialist. On the other hand, it served the internal function to socialize those who had become member into the specific ideological framework. However, the extent to which the ideological lines set out by the organization, really influenced NJS members can be questioned. In an analysis of the ideological commitment of individual NSB members, performed by Josje Damsma, it was argued that not all NSB’ers were equally ideologically committed. By analysing individual cases, Damsma found that NSB’ers joined the party for a wide range of reasons, sometimes even based on social conformity, or the simple incentive to preserve ownership of a radio
67 Bart Engelen, “In Godsvertrouwen Alles Voor Het Vaderland,” 38.
68 “Germaansche Landdienst,” Nationale Jeugdstorm, Geheugen van Nederland, 1944,
http://www.geheugenvannederland.nl/nl/geheugen/view/germaansche-landdienst-nationale-jeugdstorm?query=Jeugdstorm+&page=1&maxperpage=36&coll=ngvn&period=1944%2C1945&identifier=EV DO02%3ANIOD05_3046.
under the new German government. Fierce fascism certainly could be a reason to join the black-shirts, but ideological commitment certainly wasn’t uniform.69 A similarly diverse
picture arises when the thoughts and actions of the young Jeugdstorm members are analysed. A former NJS kader-member after the war argued that over the years: ‘the NJS blurred, because the people of the first hour were the idealists. Those who entered after 1940 often only did this for their own gain.’70
The narratives of the seven diaries of Jeugdstorm members showed varying degrees of NJS ideological influence. While the narrated lengths of Jeugdstorm membership varied between them, the three NJS girls all showed little to no reference to either the Duitse or the Dietse ideology of the Jeugdstorm. A. G. (age 15, stormster), who had only joined the Jeugdstorm for a brief period, mainly wrote about the time she spent in Germany as forced labour in the war industry. She portrayed herself as a victim of the Nazi system, rather than a supporter of the Dutch national socialist collaborators like the NJS.71 In contrast, the other
two girls, an anonymous stormster (age unknown), and meeuwke B. W. (age 10), did actively attend the local Jeugdstorm meetings. Despite the descriptions of their attendance of the meetings of the local Jeugdstorm troepen, both of the girls did not refer to any of the ideological subjects – Diets or Duits – set apart in the above section. The anonymous stormster, who kept her diary in the period between December 1941 and December 1942, extensively elaborated on her school life by detailed descriptions of her studies, tests and test results. She also wrote about family life, vacations and small outings. The girl occasionally referred to her Jeugdstorm membership, but when she did she only globally described the activities she participated in. 72 Similarly, meeuwke B. W (age 10), who wrote during July
69 Damsma, “Nazis in the Netherlands,” 46–47.
70 Maria Driessen, “Slechts Onderdeel Hoewel Onmisbaar: Meisjes en Vrouwen bij Den Nationale Jeugdstorm
en de Nationaal-Socialistische Vrouwenorganisatie in Nederland, 1934-1945” (Thesis, Katholieke Universiteit, 1983), 47.
71 NIOD 244, 1939: ‘Diary A. G.’.
1940 and then again for a period in 1944, summed up her daily activities, like: ‘rose out of bed’, ‘went to school’, and ‘ate’. The girl mentioned her Jeugdstorm membership in relation to an NJS camp she attended in Nijmegen and reported on the activities. However, just like the anonymous stormster, B. W. she didn’t refer to the NJS ideology in any way.73
It is striking that these seemingly not ideologically influenced Jeugdstorm members were all girls. The absence of direct references to any of the NJS’s ideological teachings can most likely be partly explained by the organization’s differentiation between boys and girls. From the beginning onward the Jeugdstorm ordered its members in separate boy and girl sections under either female or male kader-members. The ideological debates that dominated the leadership, were probably of lesser importance to the Jeugdstorm girls than to the
Jeugdstorm boys, since regardless of the Diets or Duits orientation of their kader-members, the membership of girls was primarily meant as a preparation for the life as a good housewife and mother. For example, the Duitse idea of weerbaarheid for NJS girls was essentially different than the weerbaarheid for boys, since it referred to a powerful and proud life attitude by which the girls were encouraged to fulfil their womanly-duties. The family was regarded to be the most important pillar – the fundament – of society. Therefore, the womanly duties in the family where the center of gravity for the educational activities of the stormsters and meeuwkes.74 The other ideological considerations of the NJS were only of secondary
importance for the education of the girls. As Driessen puts it: ‘Boys were the future defenders of the nation, the soldiers. The girls took care of reproduction and the conservation of the nation’s people, the future mothers.’75 In line with this organizational differentiation between
boys and girls, it can be argued that what at first sight seems to be an absence of NJS ideology in the diaries of the stormsters and meeuwkes, might just as well be a confirmation of the
73 NIOD 244, 728: ‘Diary B. W.’.
74 J. C. H. Blom, “Een Harmonisch Gezin en Individuele Ontplooiing. Enkele Beschouwingen over
veranderende opvatting over de vrouw in Nederland sinds de Jaren Dertig,” BMGN 108, no. 1 (1993): 34-35.
ideological influence of their NJS membership. However, none of the girls make any
reference to either the desire to fulfil their maternal duty, or the national socialistic knowledge which lay at the base of their future role in the new order. They simply seemed to be occupied with day-to-day life – with choirs and school, with family and friends – instead of with the preparation of their future national socialistic maternal duties. Real ideological commitment to NJS ideology thus seems to be missing in their diary writings.
Other diary writers showed more commitment to the NJS cause, by not only reporting the fun activities they participated in, but to varying extents also writing about the ideological side of membership. The stormer J. L. S. (age unknown), for example, used his diary solely to report on his Jeugdstorm activities in the period between October 1941 and June 1944. The boy used Jeugdstorm slogans, like: ‘Front Care is Duty’ and ‘Be Brave, Become Stormer!’ in reference to his activities in the organization.76 However, most of the boy’s writings revolved
around the role of the Jeugdstorm within the Dutch society, whereby he enthusiastically reported on the occasions were non-members seemed to be interested in the activities of the NJS. While the wish for national unity isn’t explicitly written down, the writings of J.L.S. seem to suggest that he was somewhat aware of the Dietse ideology of the NJS. Another, more explicit example of an ideologically influenced Jeugdstorm member is the anonymous Amsterdam stormer (age unknown) who went into German voluntary labour service in 1944. While the boy only wrote little about his time in the Jeugdstorm, he did mention that he volunteered to work in Germany, based on his national socialist convictions. In reference to his time spend in Germany the boy stated: ‘Voluntarily I have put this force and slavery upon myself. Nevertheless, I will stay, because I am national socialist’. Despite the fact that the boy only scarcely made such references in relation to his worldview, it is very probable that the
76 NIOD 244, 1330: ‘Diary J. L. S.’.
boy went into labour service while he was influenced by Duitse ideology of the NJS, since the more radical section of the organization actively encouraged such behaviour.77
The diary author A. P., who wrote a most comprehensive overview of his time as stormer in the period between 1941 to 1943, reported on all affairs he found of the ‘utmost interest’. The boy collected the official messages of The Führer and Mussert, made negative references on the Oranjes in exile, posted the developments on the Eastern and Western fronts and collected ideological newspaper pieces that elaborated on the New Order. In addition, under the category of “personal news”, A. P. reported on his Jeugdstorm membership and the NJS ideological teachings. The persistent interplay between and partial influence of both the Duitse and Dietse ideology within the NJS seemed to have influenced A. P. throughout the entire Second World War. While the boy seemed to have been involved in the military developments of the German forces from 1941 onward, he also frequently reported on the Dutch NSB and NJS and their ideological considerations. In the Summer of 1942, after the stormer participated in a kader-training, the boy started to refer to weerbaarheid of
Jeugdstorm members. A. P. repetitively mentioned the that ‘we have to work together with all Germanic peoples’, and he reported on the ‘heroic courage’ of the German soldiers, but at the same time kept referring to the ‘European Revolution’ and the national developments.78 A.
P.’s worldview thus shows similarity to the inconsistency of the NJS ideological currents. The role of external ideological indoctrination of kader-members as a source of radicalization of individual members hereby seems very plausible. F. G., who was a kader-member of the Jeugdstorm of around 30 years of age, for example, wrote on his willingness to spread more radical ideological teachings within the Jeugdstorm. The man attended several formative scholarly camps in Germany and even (unsuccessfully) prepared for front service. It is notable that F. G. after his attendance to these camps, increased his references to the more
77 NIOD 244, 1164: ‘Anonymous, Amsterdam NJS-member’. 78 NIOD 244, 1014: ‘Anonymous, Amsterdam NJS-member’.
radical ideological teachings within the NJS. For example, the man in 1944 described how he attempted to realize the “SS-thought” within the Jeugdstorm, hereby preaching the
militarization of the younger NJS members. 79 Similar perceptiveness and willingness to
spread the more radical Duitse ideology was written down in a collective diary, by kader-members who visited the AuslandsFuhrerschule Der Hitler-Jugend in Potsdam in 1941. The authors of this collective diary regularly refer to propaganda materials that they absolutely ‘have to show’ to the stormers and seem to agree with the need of the ‘most close form of cooperation’ between the Dutch Jeugdstorm and the German Hitler Jugend.80
Altogether, the analysis of the writings of the diaries authors shows different levels of ideological commitment within the community of Jeugdstormers. While some stormers saw themselves as national socialists and made references to Duitse and Dietse ideological notions, the stormsters and meeuwkes only reported about the NJS as a leisure providing organization. On an organizational level the representatives of the Duitse and Dietse currents battled to gain the upper hand in the NJS ideological teachings. On an individual level this resulted in diverse ideological influence. Some children hint towards Dietse teachings, while others act upon the Duitse NJS orientation. However, while the NJS held a very specific ideology, this did not mean that the ideology landed in the minds of the young NJS members (certainly for the younger members, like B. W.). The notion of differentiation seems to be appropriate. There are those who were perceptive of the ideology of the NJS, and who made sense of their environments according to the by the Jeugdstorm presented worldview. And there were those who attended the meetings, but whose writings didn’t show any big signs of indoctrination whatsoever.
79 NIOD 244, 1037: ‘Diary F. G.’.
