Another World

Like my own dad, my wife’s step father was also indentured to work in Germany during WW2.  I have reflected in the past on the tragedy of these young men having crucial years stolen from them. (Being Content in a WW2 Workgang)  Today I simply want to include a few photos that give us a glimpse of that time: the good, the bad and the ugly – and the downright strange.

14718932188_99b7c80f4f_z

The striking thing about this photo is both the fact that the young men organised themselves into musical groups but also took pride in their appearance.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

14718992987_c9d3475a3b_z

This this one of the more bizarre photos. Dutch cowboys in a Nazi hall during an entertainment evening.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

14718873230_8fa6ef0a06_z

This was a time of war. The workers’ barracks were bombed by the allies. The Allies may have heard of the appalling costumes in the earlier photo.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

14902483411_d5673df54a_z

So naturally the workers had to rebuild their own accommodation.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

14718983177_dcfda93719_z

My wife’s stepfather worked in a railway workshop. I am intrigued by the presence of a lady in the middle of this photo.

 

 

 

 

 

Categories: Family, History | Tags: , , | 2 Comments

Post navigation

2 thoughts on “Another World

  1. Ron Koerntjes

    Thanks Pieter,

    Like your dad and your wife’s stepfather my dad was also in a German work camp during the war. Maybe a good idea, when we think we’re doing it hard, to reflect on what our parents went through and survived.

Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. Log Out /  Change )

Connecting to %s

Blog at WordPress.com.

%d bloggers like this: