Stories about 13 June 1944

The six crew members who were killed were buried on 15 June 1944 in the cemetery of Hall (Municipality of Brummen). A neighbor belonging to me - Jan Lebbink died in January 2015 at the age of 96 - who lived at about 400 meters from the cemetery, was picked up by the Germans to help dig the graves. The father of Jan Schut from Hall helped as a municipal worker to coffin the corpses. Joop Teunissen 12 years old in 1944 - van Hallseweg in Hall has seen the corpses lying on the edge of the sandy path. They were covered with a green sail, while the burned boots still protruded. After the war, the mother of Joop Thomassen from Hall on 13 June put flowers and a Christmas piece on the graves at Christmas. After she died, Dinie and Joop Thomassen do this twice a year and i.v.m. 70 years of liberation in 2015, also on 4 May. I visited the family. When they no longer live, their daughter will continue the tradition.

Starting in 2017, students from grade 8 of primary school "De Vossestaart" will take care of the flowers on the graves.
The six graves in Hall with the flowers on 4 May.

In 2003 Henk Witteveen from Loenen was approached by the Zonneveld family from Loenen. They had talked to an Australian who was looking for his father's grave, who died in the war with a Lancaster bomber crash. Moments later they were standing on the doorstep with Peter Cocker at Witteveen and he took him to the cemetery in Hall. It was an emotional event for both of them at Eric Royston Cocker's grave. The long-cherished wish of son Peter finally came true. Then his sister Marguerite - living in England - also visited her father's grave. Three of Peter's five children then visited their grandfather's grave.

The story of Mietje Frenk

At the same time as the crew, the Jewish girl Mietje Frenk (19 December 1896) was buried.

Mietje and her six year older sister Kaatje (13 December 1890) were in hiding in a holiday home on Coldenhove, Eerbeek. They belonged to a wealthy Orthodox Jewish family and were both born in Zierikzee and later left for Rotterdam, where Mietje became director and Kaatje head of the household of the Jewish hospital. On June 12, 1944 - probably by betrayal - they were picked up by members of the Sicherheitspolizei. Mietje asked if she would like to go to the W.C. if and there she made an end to her life with cyanankali, which she always carried with her. Kaatje did go with the Germans and was killed on 11 November 1944 in Auschwitz concentration camp. The two sisters also had an approximately 4-year-old boy with them. Nothing is known about him, he is almost certainly put on transport and immediately gassed after arrival at the camp. Mietje and Kaatje had 6 brothers, two of whom died young and three died in German concentration camps. Of the two sisters, one died in Auschwitz in 1944. The parents had already died before the war. Eighteen years later, the Dutch-Israeli community from Rotterdam requested Mietje to be allowed to bury her again at the Jewish cemetery in Rotterdam. That happened.

Source: From the archives of J. Zengerink

For more information about the LM158 and the crew:

www.kinderen-in-eerbeek.nl/Information-LM158.htm

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