Apologies for the delay in responding.
Have you read Loet Velman's wonderful book?
Terug naar de River Kwai, Herinneringen aan de Tweede Wereldoorlog (Walburg Pers, 2005)
A new English language edition will be published in the USA next month.
Loet was a 17 year old high school student living in Scheveningen with his parents when he and his cousin, Dick Speijer, cycled to the harbour to try and get to Zeeland to continue the fight against the invaders.
Instead they decided to join the students on the ZEEMANSHOOP and go to England.
He described in his book how the lifeboat man guarding the ZEEMANSHOOP refused to allow them to take it but then changed his mind. But they would not have got the engine started without the help of the lifeboat engineer who was fetched to help them. They did not hijack the lifeboat.
So there are good reasons for submitting this story to this Forum quite apart from the earlier postings on the same subject which first persuaded me to do so.
Wim Belafonte also lived in Scheveningen and left a bequest to pay for a new lifeboat at BRESKENS which was also named the ZEEMANSHOOP. I would very much like to know more about him.
My interest was sparked by the involvement of HMS VENOMOUS, my father's old destroyer and the subject of the book I published. I am therefor less concerned with how Engelandvaarders are defined in the Netherlands. But it's certainly true that the older men and the women even if they wished would not be eligible to join the fight against Germany. And many of them were Jewish and some came originally from Germany or Austria. Of those of an age to fight did try and enlist though most, inbcluding gthe students, were initially only able to get jobs on merchant ships.
There was no careful selection process - anybody wanting to go jumped aboard.
Fortunately, it was a flat calm sea or many would have been washed over board during the voyage.
I am not - yet - in a position to say how many of the passengers were Dutch and how many of them were Jewish and what % of the men under the age of, say, 40 joined the fight against Germany after arrival aboard HMS VENOMOUS at Dover.
But, with the help of members of this Forum - or their grand parents! - I might soon be in a position to do so, please take a look at:
http://www.holywellhousepublishing.co.uk/Zeemanshoop.htmlBill Forster
Bill, with all respect to your research, I wish to make the following remarks;
I feel you are making your request on the wrong forum. This site is about Scheveningen and their original locals. The fact that the “Zeemanshoop” left from Scheveningen does not mean that these locals had any prior personal relation to any of the refugees. I can unhesitantly state, giving the names and background of the refugees this was indeed the case.
You are making your request on the topic “Old and new lifeboats”. According to her owners, the “Zeemanshoop” did not sail with their approval. In the May 14 1940 chaos 4 students seized it and nobody knows which criteria where in place to select who was given the privilege to join. Consequently it is very unlikely that anyone connected to lifeboats has any knowledge of the identity and fate of the refugees.
Your site qualifies all 46 persons as “Engelandvaarder”. The Dutch National Archive describes (short translation) an Engelandvaarder as follows:
“a then Dutch or Dutch national who, after the capitulation of The Netherlands on May 14, 1940 against the will of the enemy left from any occupied territory with the intention to give a personal contribution to the allied war”.
All of the 4 students indeed joined the armed forces/merchant navy and put their lives at risk for their country. They can truly be called Engelandvaarders, not refugees. However all but two of the refugees who’s fate is known carried on their business elsewhere just as they did before the outbreak of the war in The Netherlands and thus clearly do not qualify to be named Engelandvaarders.
Nevertheless, I wish you well in your research.
Auteur