H. van de Brink

About: A forester on the Otterloseweg near Ede, in whose wood the latecomers for Operation Pegasus II hid after missing the column on 17 November 1944, ◐ very probably Murphy's party among them. The SD arrested him six days later; he was held at Kamp Amersfoort until the local B.S. freed him on 15 April 1945.

Unit or role: Forester (boswachter): "de boswachterij van H. van de Brink" in Ede's war history (Ede, manuscript "Het Verzet", p. 46), "de boschwachterij van van den Brink" in Boeree (Boeree, Kroniek van Ede, p. 200).

Where: A little north of De Hartenberg on the Otterloseweg, Ede (Ede manuscript, p. 46); "onder aan de Herteberg aan de weg Otterlo—Ede" (at the foot of the Herteberg on the Otterlo–Ede road) in Boeree (p. 200).

Evidence: ✓ Ede, manuscript "Het Verzet", pp. 46, 48–49 (Gemeentearchief Ede 1006/1160, checked on the page images); ✓ Boeree, Kroniek van Ede, pp. 200–202 (checked on the page images); ✓ J. van Vemde's file, pp. 4–5, 8; ◐ Hardy's MI9 report, for the wood from the evaders' side.

J. van Vemde of the Agneta Hoeve at Otterlo listed three men for the Americans, "ANDERSON", "SCOTSMAN" and "MAN FROM LONDON". Only Anderson's row is filled in: "1ST AIRBORN", shot down at Otterlo on 17 September (the list's shot-down column; its hiding-date column is blank), "3 WEEKS", received from "V D BRINK, BOSWACHT- FROM THE WOODS". His remarks box has "ANDERSON BROKE HIS LEG AND WITH VD BRINK AND KAUFFELD AND KEPT FOR 3 WEEKS", Dr Beumer of Otterlo giving medical help; and the American office noted that Van Vemde "worked with Mr. Kauffeld and the farm v. D Brink in rendering other assistances to approximately thirty evading paratroopers" (Van Vemde's file, pp. 4–5). ⚠︎ Van Vemde's own letter of May 1946 tells it differently: he found the first man, Anderson, himself on 18 September 1944, with a broken calf bone, and hid him with Kauffeld's help in a barn on Kauffeld's ground; Bettink found another on the 19th and a third reported some days later, and all three were handed on after about three weeks. It names no forester (his letter, p. 8). So nothing dates Van de Brink's help to the first days. ◐ The forester of Van Vemde's file and of Ede's history are very probably one man: both are Van de Brink, a forester, working with Kauffeld and Van Vemde.

Ede's war history has the twenty or thirty men due from the north of the Veluwe for Operation Pegasus II gathering on the evening of 17 November 1944 at his forester's house, to join the column on the Koeweg (Ede manuscript, p. 46):

Through all sorts of circumstances, though, they arrived too late and missed the connection. As there was no time left to put them up anywhere, they had to hide all day on the 18th in the wood behind Van de Brink's house. Later they were lodged around Harskamp and in Kootwijkerbroek.

Dutch originalDoor allerlei omstandigheden arriveerden ze echter te laat, waardoor ze de aansluiting misten. Daar er toen geen tijd meer was hen nog ergens onder te brengen, moesten ze zich op de 18e de hele dag schuil houden in het bos achter het huis van Van de Brink. Later werden ze in de omgeving van Harskamp en in Kootwijkerbroek ondergebracht.

— Ede, manuscript "Het Verzet", p. 46 (Gemeentearchief Ede 1006/1160)

✓ Th. A. Boeree's printed Kroniek van Ede (Frouws, Ede; the Koninklijke Bibliotheek dates it 1947) tells the night from the Ede side, and every page below is checked on its image:

• The assembly point. "het concentratiepunt zou zijn bij de boschwachterij van van den Brink onder aan de Herteberg aan de weg Otterlo—Ede" (the assembly point was to be at Van den Brink's forester's house at the foot of the Herteberg, on the Otterlo–Ede road). Frans Hals was to come there with the men from Essen and Kootwijkerbroek, Van Dijk and Van Beek with those from Harskamp, and Huisman of Kootwijkerbroek with a cattle lorry carrying 40 men from Elburg (p. 200).
• The night at his house. Joop van Amstel and Frans Hals sat there with fifteen men, with Martien, the cover name of Abraham du Bois in the same book (p. 161), and Bart van der Hoeden (p. 200).
  • At about ten Rinus brought his men to Frans Hals, too late to join the column, which had passed Westenrode an hour before; at about half past ten they heard machine-gun fire from the column's direction, and Frans Hals went home (p. 201).
  • Bart van der Hoeden then brought the Elburg men, only 24 of the 40, the lorry having stopped too early and unloaded them; "De mannen werden bij de anderen in het bosch gestopt" (the men were put into the wood with the others), and Martien hoped to lodge them the next day in the Schaapskooi or at Kootwijkerbroek (p. 201).
• The days in the wood. "Zondagmorgen 18 November zaten de Tommies onverzorgd in het bosch bij van den Brink" (on Sunday morning, 18 November, the Tommies sat uncared for in the wood by Van den Brink's), and men from the first column who had stayed free turned up among them (p. 202).
  • On the Monday Piet and Rinus (Van Dijk and Van Beek) came on their motorbike, "die zij stalden bij van den Brink" (which they left at Van den Brink's), and found the men hungry and with nothing to drink; six had walked off, meaning to go back to Westeneng, and were stranded at Pol's, who handed them to Bettink (p. 202).
  • That evening "de mannen zaten nu tegenover de boschwachterij van van den Brink" (the men were now sitting opposite Van den Brink's forester's house); at eight a horse and wagon came, fetched by Eb van Ommeren of Kootwijkerbroek (◐ Eb van Omme), with Gerrit van Ee bringing a tarpaulin, and took the men to a cattle shed at Westeneng, from where they were shared out among the farmers (p. 202).
• ⚠︎ Boeree's "Zondagmorgen 18 November" does not match the calendar: 18 November 1944 was a Saturday. ◐ By Hardy the party left the wood at three in the morning of 20 November, which fits Boeree's Monday being the 20th. On p. 201 the morning after the crossing of the evening of 17 November is the 18th, which fits his date and not his weekday, so which of "Sunday" and "18" is the slip is not settled; the Monday is the 20th either way (Hardy; Van Vemde; Bettink).

◐ The latecomers were very probably Murphy's party, though no Dutch source names him. James Hardy's MI9 report has him, Banwell, Branford (Hardy: "Brentford") and Murphy lose their guides at a fork on the night of the 17th and rest on the 18th at a farm near Otterlo; at about 1730 "WILLEM and the Dutch Policeman whom I had met before" fetched them, a lorry never came, and they were led to "another party of evaders, about 20 in all" and into a wood, where "We stayed in the wood the rest of the night and all next day but nobody came near us" (Hardy). At about three in the morning of 20 November five of them, "P/O. BRENTFORD, Pte. MURPHY, JOHN, the other Paratrooper, and myself", walked away; Sgt Banwell "decided to remain with the larger party", and a farmer near Otterlo sent the five to a dug-out (same).

• ◐ Hardy names no forester and no house, so that his wood is Van de Brink's is a fit: the twenty or so men and the lorry that never came match the Elburg lorry in Boeree, which stopped at the wrong place and unloaded about twenty men who met Hardy's group, the link Noordman draws (Noordman, pp. 284–285). The date does not match: Hardy's wood is a day later than Ede's (below).
• ◐ Boeree's six who walked off and ended at Bettink's hiding place are possibly Hardy's five, ◐ at most: the counts differ, and Boeree has the six with Bettink by the Monday morning, while Hardy's party left its wood at about three that morning and reached the farmer at the edge of Otterlo only at first light (Boeree, p. 202; Hardy; more on James Hardy's page); Boeree has "Jimmy, die een beetje Hollandsch sprak" among them, and Hardy has Branford, "who spoke Dutch", talk to the farmer (James Branford).
• ◐ Banwell's party, left in the wood, would be the men Boeree has fetched on the Monday evening (Tex Banwell).
• J. van Vemde, who kept the dug-out, wrote in May 1946 that besides the ten or twelve men he hid, "zich nog 20 man verborgen hielden op een zekere plaats in het bosch" (another 20 men were hiding at a certain place in the wood), whom he and his helpers fed for two days before they were moved by car "door bemiddeling van Willem van Dijk te Harskamp" (through Willem van Dijk of Harskamp) (his letter, p. 8).
  • ◐ His list for the Americans very probably has the same men: "30 ALLIED EVADERS IN NOVEMBER / 20 FOR 3 DAYS / OTHERS FOR 2 WEEKS" (p. 5); the letter has the twenty fed 2 days ("2 dagen") and the ten or twelve kept to 24 November.
  • ◐ He does not name the wood. His move "per auto" differs from Boeree and Noordman, who have the men in the wood fetched by horse and wagon on the Monday evening (above); the sources do not reconcile them.

The same days are told from Murphy's side on Pegasus II and Roekel.

Ede's history has the SD come six days after the failed march:

the SD men Heinemann and Rappard stood with a number of Landwacht men at the house of the forester Van den Brink. Besides himself, his son, Hendrikus, and a man in hiding, J.W. Westerveld of Ede, were arrested.

Dutch originalstonden de S.D.-ers Heinemann en Rappard met een aantal Landwachters voor de woning van boswachter Van den Brink. Behalve hijzelf werden ook zijn zoon, Hendrikus en een onderduiker, J.W. Westerveld uit Ede, gearresteerd.

— Ede, manuscript "Het Verzet", p. 48 (Gemeentearchief Ede 1006/1160), checked on the image

• The houses he was made to show. "Van den Brink en zijn zoon moesten vervolgens met de S.D.-ers mee" (Van den Brink and his son then had to go with the SD men) to point out the houses of Van Vemden, evacuated from Aerdenhout (Ede's history writes "Aardenhout") to Wekerom and living in Krijgsman's house on the Roekelseweg, and of Kauffeld in the hamlet of Roekel (p. 48).
  • "Zij hadden beiden de geallieerde militairen geholpen, die zich op de 18e in het bos schuil hadden moeten houden" (both had helped the Allied soldiers who had had to hide in the wood on the 18th); both were arrested, with Kauffeld's daughter Tonny and their maid, Maria Bunt of Lunteren (p. 48).
• The man in the pit. While Heinemann and Rappard were away, the Landwacht beat Westerveld and made him dig a pit with his hands and crouch in it; "Ze vroegen hem naar de schuilplaats van de parachutisten en toen hij niets wilde loslaten, gooiden ze de kuil dicht" (they asked him where the paratroopers were hiding, and when he would give nothing away they filled the pit in), then dug him out for fear he would suffocate (p. 48).
• The date. Six days after the march of 17/18 November is 23 or 24 November. ◐ J. van Vemde gives his own and Kauffeld's arrest as 24 November (his letter, p. 8), and Boeree the raid on Otterlo and Roekel as the same day (p. 203); Ede's history puts the forester's arrest on the round that took them, so 24 November.

When Heinemann came back with his other prisoners, all were taken to "De Wormshoef" in Lunteren. "Op 12 december werden Van den Brink en Westerveld, samen met een aantal andere gevangenen, op open wagens vanuit Lunteren naar het concentratiekamp Amersfoort gebracht, waaruit ze op 15 april 1945 door de plaatselijke B.S. werden bevrijd" (on 12 December Van den Brink and Westerveld, with a number of other prisoners, were taken on open wagons from Lunteren to the concentration camp at Amersfoort, from which the local B.S. freed them on 15 April 1945) (Ede manuscript, p. 49, checked on the image). Kauffeld and Van Vemden were sent on to the SD at Velp after fourteen days and released on 20 January 1945 (same).

• The manuscript gives as its source for the sentence about Maria Bunt's breakdown (pp. 48–49 carry four notes, 42 to 45, each for a different sentence), Th. J. [sic: Th. A.] Boeree's Aantekeningen bij "De kroniek van Ede", p. 251 G–H–I (its note 43, p. 78); those notes, in the Gelders Archief's Boeree collection, have not been seen (What we still don't know).
• What happened to his son Hendrikus after the arrest is not said.
• Boeree's printed book says nothing of the forester's arrest.

His name. Ede's history writes "H. van de Brink" on p. 46 and "Van den Brink" on pp. 48–49; Boeree has "van den Brink"; Van Vemde's file "V D BRINK" (Ede manuscript, pp. 46, 48; Boeree, p. 200; Van Vemde's file, p. 4). His first name is not given anywhere; the "H." on p. 46 is the only initial, and the son arrested with him was Hendrikus (p. 48), so ◐ the initial may belong to either. Other van den Brinks in Boeree, a police constable killed in the bombing (p. 130), a guide of the first crossing (pp. 179, 185) and the burgomaster of Barneveld (p. 276), are not shown to be this man, and neither is Wouter van de Brink, the guide Ede's history names for the last stretch to the Rhine on Pegasus II (p. 47).

The day in the wood. ⚠︎ Ede's history has the latecomers hide on the 18th; Hardy has his party reach the wood on the evening of the 18th and stay all the next day, leaving at three on the 20th; Boeree heads the morning "Zondagmorgen 18 November" though the 18th was a Saturday (James Hardy). ◐ By Hardy the day in the wood was the 19th, one more case of the one-day disagreement over the night of the march (Still open, item 16).

How many walked off. Boeree has six leave the wood and end at Bettink's hiding place; Hardy has five leave and find more men in the dug-out, ten in all; Van Vemde writes of "10 à 12" (Boeree, p. 202; Hardy; Van Vemde's letter, p. 8). Not settled.

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