De razzia van Rotterdam. 10-11 november 1944 - KNAW

2 6 8 SUMMARY
destruction of the harbour works. Reference has already been made to the fact that
on September 17, 1944, a general railway strike broke out in the Netherlands which
was virtually total in the Rotterdam area.
The German Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (Armed Forces High Command)
believed it had reason to fear the Netherlands resistance movement. The decision
was taken to remove 600.000 able-bodied men from the Coastal areas of Western
Holland.
These men might be used in the German war economy. From the beginning of the
occupation the Germans had used various methods to make Dutch manpower
available to the German war economy. The razzias of the famine winter were destined
to be both the last and the most direct of the methods used.
EXECUTION OF THE RAZZIA
The military and other measures taken by the Germans in preparing the razzia
remained unknown to the population of Rotterdam. One of the Rotterdam underground
papers had published several warnings that razzias had been held elsewhere
in the Netherlands. Nobody however, suspected that the Germans would strike such
a heavy blow. A few weeks before November 10, 1944 a German working in the
principal strongpoint of the German military commander of Rotterdam had sent
warning to a certain resistance organisation. As his reports were extremely vague
and as the leaders of the resistance movement were loth to alarm the people without
sufficiënt reason, the warnings were not passed on. It was not until the afternoon of
Thursday November 9, 1944, that this particular resistance organisation received
information that it seemed probable that a large-scale razzia would be held on Friday,
November 10. There was no time to make this report generally known. It was, however,
possible to send a warning to several members of the resistance movement and
also a wireless message to the Dutch authorities in London asking them to urge the
Allied Air Forces not to bomb or to machine gun large groups of men who might
be leaving Rotterdam in the following days. As a result with one unimportant ex-
ception the thousands of men who were marched out of Rotterdam were neither
bombed or machine-gunned.
After the German troops which were to be used in carrying out the razzia, about
8.000 in all, had surrounded the town, all telephonic Communications were cut.
This meant that the people of Rotterdam were unable to warn each other by
telephone. The German troops started to enter the town at 0.00 hours on November
10. They were heavily armed.
All important squares and bridges were occupied. Their movements were not seen
by the population, as a result of the curfew between 8 o’clock in the evening and
4 o’clock in the morning. Some people remarked on the heavy military traffic. This,
however, was no unusual occurrence and besides it was believed in the days preceding
the razzias that the Allied forces would start an attack in the area south of Rotterdam.