horse – Settela•Com

Silent film — Towards the end of World War I – in the summer 1918 , after the Allies defeated the Germans in the Second Battle of the Marne – large groups of Belgians and French refugees flee in front of the retreating enemy force to the neutral Netherlands.

The Dutch army and Red Cross prepared to receive a possible 100,000 evacuees in the border towns in the south of the Netherlands.

After wandering weeks in the north of France , and next crossing Belgium on foot, the first group of French refugees arrived at the Dutch border October 20, completely exhausted.

At the gate in the electric wire fence at the border to the Netherlands – the so-called ‘Death Wire’ (dutch : Dodendraad ) Dutch soldiers took them over from German escorts.

Some refugees had travelled by tram part of the route crossing Belgium to the belgian border town Molenbeersel.

At the dutch border the refugees were welcomed and ladies from relief committees provide the refugees with food and drinks on the road to Stramproy in the Netherlands.

Within days , thousands of French refugees arrive in the village of Stramproy and are transferred to the city of Weert .

On arrival in the city center of Weert the dutch army registered people and handed out soup and bread.

The weak, the sick, and maternity women were cared for by the Red Cross and taken to an aid post for further care.

The refugees were sheltered the night in buildings like convents and schools in Weert, before being housed elsewhere in the country the following days.

References

Source (video footage) : Belgische vluchtelingen 1e Wereldoorlog. Open Images | Beeld & Geluid (Sound &Vision).

Weert en het einde van W.O.-I. | Jan Henkens | Stichting Historisch Onderzoek Weert | URL http://www.showeert.nl

Noord-Franse vluchtelingen in Weert 1918 in Den Grooten Oorlog | Grevenbroekmuseum vzw | URL https://www.grevenbroekmuseum.be

Citation : French Refugees October 1918 in Holland | 20231031 | Settela•Com | ISSN 2949-9313 | TakeNode bf10307b-fc98-4d67-ad22-82ef8cb3fddd

TAGS #french #refugee #train #tram #steam #horse #woman #WorldWarI #WW1 #Weert #Molenbeersel #Stramproy #Germany #France #Belgium #Netherlands #Holland #Europe #border #electric #wire #Dodendraad #death #war #peace #fence #shelter #flag #flight #evacuation #Red #Cross #army #help #welcome #food #drink #soup #jenever #walk #battle #Marne #1Memo #michelvanderburg #MiraclesMedia #SettelaCom

As discussed with the presentation of the full unedited Westerbork Film recently (Ref. 1), the collection of the film footage was started in 1946 by the ‘RIOD’ Rijksinstituut voor Oorlogsdocumentatie (National Institute for War Documentation).

According to the inventory of the RIOD from 1958 – when the film reels were handed over to the Nederlands Filmmuseum (Dutch Film Museum) – the Westerbork Film (https://youtu.be/8E-IWGjbGZM ) basically consisted of 9 film reels ; and that inventory also mentioned a 10th reel (‘reel 9a’) with scenes of a ‘church service’ and ‘disassembly workshop for motors’. That reel was never again mentioned after 1958, had disappeared, but was rediscovered in the Film Museum with catalog number F1015 during research in the 1990s (Ref. 2). That story and the footage F1015 ( https://youtu.be/-SmYdFLG5N8 ) was posted yesterday (Ref. 3).

That catalog of the Dutch Film Museum also mentioned a 2nd film reel (F1014) with hitherto unknown footage, described as in dutch ‘Restmateriaal, bevattende (o.a.) animatie met voetbal, voorstelling met muziek, het trekken van kiepwagens op rails met paarden. Afvalmateriaal, vermoedelijk origineel uitschot.’ – which translates to ‘Residual material, including (among other things) animation with football, performance with music, pulling tippers on rails with horses. Waste material, presumably original waste.’

Actually very interesting footage demonstrating that Rudolf Breslauer was filming the animation and intertitles (title cards) as listed in the film scenario (pore on that later in another post). Here that unedited (upscaled) footage of F1014.

References

2. ‘Kamp Westerbork gefilmd’ by Koert Broersma and Gerard Rossing (editors Dirk Mulder and Ben Prinsen); ISBN 9023232658

Credit

EN – Unknown Westerbork Film Reel…F1014. Scaled, cropped, otherwise unedited footage F1014.
Source Beeld en Geluid (2-1167 | former cat.nr. F1014) , accessed at US Holocaust Memorial Museum (copy Film ID 2242 RG-60.2105 – License Free – Public Domain) , courtesy of Nederlands Instituut voor Beeld en Geluid. Footage filmed by Rudolf Breslauer in 1944.
Unknown Westerbork Film Reel…F1014 | 20190616 | Michel van der Burg | Settela•Com | ISSN 2949-9313 | CC BY 4.0

Updates

20220604 – Format changes credit line , references

20230518 – Credits and references updated with ISSN