Image: Hannie Schaft (Public Domain)

On this day in history, March 21, 1945, Dutch resistance fighter Hannie Schaft is arrested by Nazi Police at a military checkpoint in Haarlem, Netherlands. Early in the war, Schaft became an active member of a Communist resistance cell, hiding and assisting Jews who were being rounded up for “resettlement” to the death camps of the East (1941); with Freddie and Truus Oversteegen, carried out assassinations and became known to the German forces as the “red-haired girl” (1942-1943), and encouraged student solidarity that led to closing down of Dutch universities in 1943. She was so deadly and destructive that Adolf Hitler ordered her capture and elimination.

Hannie Schaft was born on September 16, 1920, in Haarlem, Netherlands.

Due to her parents’ socialist leanings Hannie, from a very early point, developed a very keen hatred of fascism. Schaft would often discuss politics and social justice with her parents, thus encouraging her to pursue a law degree and to become a human rights lawyer working for the League of Nations (forerunner to the United Nations). When the Nazis overtook the Netherlands in 1940, Schaft studied law at the University of Amsterdam. There she became friends with Jewish students Sonja Frenk and Philine Polak, which made her feel strongly about actions against Jews. By 1941, the mistreatment of Jews by the Nazis convinced Schaft to join the small, Communist-leaning Raad van Verzet (Council of Resistance) cell in Haarlem, one of the many illegal groups organized to resist the Nazi occupation forces and their Dutch collaborators. It was also the most militant. Although not officially a Communist organization, the group was allied with the Communist resistance movement, and its members were sympathetic to the political Left.

In 1943, university students were required by the Nazis to sign a declaration of allegiance to their overlords. When Schaft refused to sign the petition supporting the occupation forces, like 80% of the other students, she had to stop her studies. In the summer of 1943, she moved in with her parents again, bringing Frenk and Polak, who went into hiding.

Schaft’s work at first involved assisting Jews who were trying to escape the tightening dragnet as the Germans gathered them up to be sent to concentration camps and eventually to extermination facilities farther to the East. Sometimes, like with her university friends, she would hide Jews in her parents’ home, where they were given food, encouragement, and false documents. She also collected funds from sympathetic individuals in Haarlem to support these activities. She learned to speak German and became involved with German soldiers.

Over time, Hannie, Truus, and Freddie began more radical resistance, specializing in assassinating German Nazi officers and Dutch traitors. The Germans began taking and shooting many Dutch hostages in retaliation. There were even objections within the resistance movement, and some members felt women should not be assassins. Schaft and the Oversteegens’ strongly disagreed with this viewpoint, and in time the trio became notorious in German and Dutch Nazi circles for their bold effectiveness. They were branded as dangerous terrorists, and Hannie in particular – the “red-haired girl” – was singled out as a special target, and many resources were committed to her capture.

Schaft did not, however, accept every assignment. When she was asked to kidnap the children of a Nazi official, she steadfastly refused. If the plan failed, then the children would have to be killed, and Schaft felt that that was too close to the Nazis’ brand of horror.

On June 21, 1944, Schaft and Jan Bonekamp, a co-resistance fighter, were assassinated in Zaandam by a Dutch police officer and collaborator, Willem Ragut. Schaft hit Ragut with a shot to the back, but it failed to kill him. Bonekamp was hit by a bullet in the stomach by Ragut before finally killing him. Mortally wounded, Bonekamp left the scene but was captured shortly afterward and taken to hospital. There he was drugged into giving a Dutch Nazi nurse faking to be a resistance member the home address of Hannie Schaft. To force a confession from Schaft, German authorities arrested her parents and assigned them to the Vught concentration camp near Den Bosch. The anguish of this situation and her grief over Bonekamp’s death (with whom she had feelings for) caused Schaft to stop resistance work for a brief while. Her parents were released after two months.

After recovery, Schaft dyed her hair black and began to wear glasses to hide her appearance, and she then returned to resistance work. She once again started committing assassinations and sabotage, courier work, the transportation of illegal weapons, and disseminating illicit newspapers. On March 1, 1945, NSB police officer Willem Zirkzee was murdered by Hannie Schaft and Truus Oversteegen near the Krelagehuis in Haarlem. On March 15, they wounded Ko Langendijk, a hairdresser from Ijmuiden who provided information for the Sicherheitsdienst (SD), a Nazi intelligence agency. He survived that attack, and in 1949 he was sentenced to life in prison.

On March 21, 1945, Schaft was bicycling to Ijmuiden when she was stopped at a German military checkpoint and could not get rid of her handbag, which contained copies of the underground Communist paper De Waarheid. Worse, she was also discovered to be carrying a pistol. Taken to a prison cell, she maintained her composure through relentless interrogation but was then sent to Amsterdam and interrogated by Emil Ruhl. Recognized as the “red-haired girl,” she was warned that five Dutch girls would be executed without a complete confession, and Hannie broke down and confessed. After the war, Ruhl noted that despite the harsh treatment, the longtime resistance fighter behaved with dignity throughout her ordeal.

On April 17, 1945, Hannie Schaft was executed by Dutch Nazi officials. Even though there was an agreement between the occupier and the Dutch resistance to stop any further executions, she was shot dead three weeks before the cessation of the war in the dunes of Overveen, near Bloemendaal. Mattheus Schmitz and Maarten Kuiper escorted her to the execution site to be killed. Schmitz fired the fatal bullet into her head at close range. However, the bullet ended up only grazing Schaft. She is said to have allegedly told her executioners: “Idiots! I shoot better,” after which Kuiper delivered the final shot to the head. Schaft’s murder was directly ordered by Willy Lages, who would end up being freed from prison in 1966 for health reasons, and he would spend the rest of his life in Germany.

On November 27, 1945, Hannie Schaft was reburied at a state funeral at the Dutch Honorary Cemetery Bloemendaal. The Dutch government and royal family members attended, including Queen Wilhelmina, who referred to Schaft as “the symbol of resistance.”

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