Breaking free from shame

You are 76, from after World War II. And yet it has been there all your life, somewhere in your subconscious. The shame, because of your grandfather's war past. The story of Hennie Derks.

The first time Hennie felt that "something crazy" was going on, he remembers it well. "I was still a kid, with my mother in the emergency store of the Hema on Keizer Karelplein. Suddenly I was dragged out of the store by her. She was being pointed at, people were gossiping about her."

In another memory, he visits his grandfather, Anton Wiebe, in prison. "He sat there in a blue everywhere at a table with a rug. In the corner a guard. When my mother would hand Grandpa a swig of gin under the table, that guard would pretend not to see it. Grandpa made toys for us in prison: a doll's cradle, baby carriage or a wooden mill. My z uss and I were happy with them."

What is also strange: Grandma does not have a home of her own. She spends six weeks with Hennie's family, then six weeks with an aunt, then six weeks with another aunt and then with them again. And that for years. At some point it becomes clear that his grandfather did terrible things during World War II. As a police officer in Nijmegen, he was involved in hundreds of arrests of Jews and resistance fighters. After the war, Wiebe was found guilty of the deaths of at least twenty people and sentenced to twenty years in prison.
Hennie's mother loves her father (his grandfather), but also tells disconcerting stories. Hennie: "Grandma was the fascist in the family. She was the evil genius. Grandpa was completely under her thumb. When he came home from his shift, first he had to do everything in the household and cook. If he had done something wrong, he was beaten with the mat beater. "
After the war, Hennie's grandmother also received a prison sentence, two years, for collaboration.
After incidents such as the Hema, Hennie's mother shuns the outside world, feels safe only in small circles. She is suspicious, can never be relaxed. She clearly struggles with a dual loyalty: she loves her father, but despises his actions. Later, visiting Hennie, she shies away from conversations about her parents and the war.
"That history, that shame, always weighs on our family. First on my mother and her sisters, now on us, on me. For a very long time I didn't tell anyone about my grandfather. My one sister still avoids conversations about the persecution of Jews. You subconsciously feel guilty."
Hennie wants to go to the police academy after the war. His big wish: to catch crooks. However, he is rejected: "unsuitable for police service. Whether that has anything to do with his antecedents, the role of his grandfather? "I don't know, but my mother thought so."
If Hennie then chooses to study political science, he is strongly advised against it by his mother: "Politics, stay far from it. Only misery will come from that!" Nevertheless, she is only too proud when her son graduates.
Hennie has worked for decades as a communications consultant, for companies, but also for government agencies. In his own words, except for that one time at the police academy, he has not been bothered by his origins; he has never been addressed about his grandfather's role. "Of course, I also have a different last name, I've always seen that as a layer of protection."
He does once get asked for a board position with an organization dedicated to commemorating World War II. But he is turned down after telling about his grandfather. "I was shocked that precisely a party concerned with remembrance, reconciliation, liberation, took such a position."

His grandfather never spoke of the war again. "Not a word! I do regret that, would have liked to know more about the how and why."

After his death, Hennie and his sisters delved into his grandfather's file at the National Archives. For the first time he can then distance himself from it a bit more. "It sticks to you anyway." Since then, he keeps telling himself more and more often: "You're not to blame for anything, you weren't even born, you have nothing to be ashamed of."

How does Hennie remember his grandfather? "As a big, gentle giant, a loafer, who made beautiful things for us, like that wooden mill." After a brief silence, "Crazy, isn't it, even though he did such terrible things. There is no justification for that. It feels so contradictory!" At first he doesn't want an interview, but decides to cooperate anyway. "I want to renounce restraint, to stop keeping this history quiet. Break free from the shame."

At first he doesn't want an interview, but decides to cooperate anyway. "I want to renounce restraint, no longer conceal this history. Break free from the shame."