The Dutch prison-camps during WWII; part 1: Camp Schoorl.

This is a series of five stories about the camps that were in use, by the Nazi occupiers during the war as prison- or concentration camps, in the Netherlands.

Camp Schoorl, was in use as a prison-camp from June 1940 until the end of October 1941.

Camp Erika, near Ommen, was in use as a prison-camp from June 19 1941 until April 11 1945.

Camp Amersfoort, was in use as a prison-camp from August 18 1941 until April 19 1945.

Camp Vught, was in use as a prison-camp from January 1943 until September 1944.

Camp Westerbork, was in use as a prison-camp from July 1 1942 until April 12 1945.

Overview of Camp Schoorl

The first camp that was put into use as a prison-camp by the German occupiers was Camp Schoorl, officially known as; Polizeiliches Durchgangslager Schoorl. It was situated in the dunes, near the west-coast and near the small village of Schoorl, in the north-east of the Netherlands. Schoorl is north of Alkmaar and some 55 km north-west of Amsterdam.

Prisoners.

Camp Schoorl started off as an army camp of the Dutch Army during the mobilization that started in August 1939. The first month of the war, May 1940, it was in use by the German Army. After that it came into use as a prison-camp, first for English, French and Belgian people that stayed in the Netherlands at the start of the war. The French and Belgians were released after 2 months. The English were deported on the 3^rd of September 1940 to a prison-camp near Gleiwitz in Poland. In December some 40 English women were imprisoned at Schoorl and taken, after a few months, to Liebenau (Germany) and Vittel (France). The Nazi's liked the principle of taking hostages as a means of pressure and bargaining chip. In order to get things done from the Allied Forces, the Dutch Government which was exiled to London, the Dutch resistance or Dutch officials still active in the Netherlands.

English prisoners at Camp Schoorl

 From February until October 1941 some 1900 Jewish and political prisoners passed through Camp Schoorl. 1000 of these prisoners never returned home and died in one of the camps in Germany and Austria.

On the 22^nd and 23^rd of February 1941 after razzia's in Amsterdam about 425 Jewish men were brought to Camp Schoorl. Some of them were send home for medical reasons and 4 days later 389 men were deported to Buchenwald (Germany) from which they were send to Mauthausen (Austria) in June.

On the 11^th of June 1941 310 Jewish men arrived at Camp Schoorl. Most of them were German Jews that had worked in the Jewish work-village Nieuwe Schans in the Wieringermeer. They were deported to Mauthausen on the 25th or 26th of June 1941.

Of these 699 men only 2 survived the camps. Very soon after arriving in Mauthausen obituaries appeared in Dutch newspapers after relatives had received death certivicates that their son or husband had died in Mauthausen due to some illness. They had died of hunger, exhaustion, physical abuse and suicide. The circumstances were so terrible that a lot of them saw no other option than to jump into the quarry.

According to the reports of the SD of 28^th of December 1941, 6 months after their arrest, only 8 were still alive. It is estimated that about 96 Jewish men died in the Euthanasie-Anstalt Schloss Hartheim where the Nazi's experimented with killing people by means of poison gas. In total at Schloss Hartheim some 30.000 people were killed in the gaschambers.

On the 9^th of March 1941 176 prisoners were brought into the Schoorl camp from the village of Sommelsdijk. They were arrested as a repressive measure for insulting and slandering personnel working for the German Wehrmacht and Police. They were all released one month later.

Female prisoners, members of the Dutch CPN

Another group of prisoners that was imprisoned for some period of time at Schoorl were members of various socialist and communist political parties. Many of them ended up in one of the camps in Germany for political prisoners. One of these camps was Neuengamme. About 45 Dutch prisoners of Neuengamme were gassed in the Euthanasie-Anstalt Bernburg. This was originally a mental institution and during WWII part of the T4 Euthanasia-program. This program was used by the Nazi's to experiment with methods to kill people by use of gas. Later on many of the people that worked for T4, worked in the extermination-camps like Sobibor, Auschwitz-Birkenau, Treblinka, Majdanek, Belzec and Chelmno. At Bernburg about 15.000 people were killed.

Another group of prisoners that were imprisoned at Schoorl were members of the Christian political party ARP. Many of them were released after some time and the rest of them deported to Buchenwald and later on to the hostage-camp at Haaren, Netherlands.

When Schoorl was closed down, in October 1941, the remaining prisoners were brought to the camp Amersfoort. These were all members of the Dutch Communist Party CPN.

Karl Peter Berg after his arrest in 1945

Command.

The first commander of Camp Schoorl was SS-Officer Arnold Schmidt, he stayed in charge until December 1940. SS-Officer Hans Stöver was the commander of Camp Schoorl, from December 1940 until August 1941. His main assistant was SS-Officer Karl Peter Berg. He took over the command during the last months until Camp Schoorl was closed. Both Stöver and Berg were subsequently transferred to Camp Amersfoort. The prison-guards were members of the German Ordnungspolizei. The food was prepared by a local cook that lived in the nearby village of Schoorl. The prisoners had the same food as the prison guards. So, the food was sufficient and good. Although there was no practice of forced labour, the camp regime could be called fairly mild, certainly compared to the regime at Camp Amersfoort, there are reports of roll calls that took for hours and beatings of Jewish prisoners. Generally prisoners stayed at Schoorl for a short period of time in order to be deported to another camp or to be released. There're no reports that anybody died at Schoorl in the period it was in use as a prison-camp.

In October 1941 the camp was closed because it was difficult to get there by train, it was too close to the Dutch coast and the Germans expected the English troops to land at the Dutch coast. Another reason was that at Schoorl the camp could not be expanded because it was surrounded by high dunes.

Overview of Camp Schoorl in the direction of the dunes

Sources:

• Het kamp Schoorl (The camp Schoorl); by Albert Boer, 1991
• Website: www.kamp-schoorl.nl
• Website: www.aliasmenthol.nl: about Joseph Sylvester from Saint Lucia
• Website: www.pietdouwma.nl: about Piet Douma and other prisoners that died in Bernburg
• Website: www.schloss-hartheim.at: about the Euthanasie-Anstalt Schloss Hartheim
• Website: www.gedenkstaette-bernburg.de: about the Euthanasie-Anstalt Bernburg