Joseph Bukkens

Name of J. Bukkens on the Memorial erected by OGS in 1986 for the Dutch who perished in Mauthausen. Mauthausen NL Mon 060121-2

Joseph Bukkens, een van de agenten van het Englandspiel heeft naast een dagboek ook een tweetal fotoboeken nagelaten. Hier is een boek van gemaakt en aangevuld met nieuwe gegevens uit speurtochten langs diverse plaatsen en archieven.

Hij ging naar Engeland, opleiding tot vlieger in Soerabaja, terug via de Verenigde Staten, IJsland en Scotland, daarna vliegen op Nederland en Noorwegen, in opleiding tot geheim agent, Englandspiel, SD, Abwehr, Haaren, Assen, Rawicz en komt uiteindelijk in Mauthausen om.

Pas een aantal jaren geleden ontdekte ik het genoemde dagboek en de fotoboeken van mijn oom.

Toen ik het dagboek gelezen had en begreep dat mijn oom Sjef één van de agenten van het beruchte Englandspiel was, wilde ik daarover meer weten. Het bleek al snel dat deze geschiedenis nog steeds omgeven is door een waas van geheimhouding. Al spoedig vond ik in de diverse verzamelde boeken aanwijzingen over het verdere verloop van de gevangenschap van mijn oom. Na zijn gevangenneming heeft hij in Haaren gezeten. Vervolgens overgebracht naar Assen en daarna op transport naar een gevangenis in Rawicz, in Polen. Uiteindelijk wordt hij in Mauthausen omgebracht. Om deze gegevens voor de familie niet verloren te laten gaan, besloot ik alles vast te leggen en de boeken in een kleine bibliotheek bij elkaar te houden. Deze boeken kunnen later dienen om door anderen gebruikt te worden om het verhaal verder te completeren.

A. Wijnen, 'Oorlogsdagboek van Josef Bukkens', ISBN nr: 90 9015745 X

Gerrit van Os

Name of G. van Os on the Memorial erected by OGS in 1986 for the Dutch who perished in Mauthausen. Mauthausen NL Mon 060121-3

M. Elkerbout, J. Bukkens and G. van Os belonged to a large group of Dutch BBO/SOE agents, most of them captured as a result of the 'Englandspiel', and all 43 of them executed on September 6 and 7, 1944, most in Mauthausen. Those who died on September 6^th in Mauthausen, succombed under the torture of carrying heavy stones up the infamous Mauthausen 'Stairs of Death'. Those who died on the 7^th in Mauthausen were killed by machinegun fire when they tried to escape from, or more likely collectively resisted to undergo, a similar torture as on the 6^th . Machine gun fire was merely one of the many ways to get killed in Mauthausen.

The steep Stairs of Death, leading into and out of the Mauthausen quarry. The original stairs were steeper than the present-day reconstruction. At the left is the copper panel, made to order of OGS, with the names of all BBO/SOE agents killed here on 6-7/9/1944. Mauthausen Quarry 060121-15

Wooden backpack with a heavy stone, that prisoners had to carry whilst running up the Mauthausen quarry stairs, under beatings from German guards. A few of such journeys were sufficient to kill healthy and strong young men. Source: Austria Federal Ministry of the Interior

Prisoners had to march up the stairs as a group. If one succumbed, the stone would tumble down and seriously injure or kill the man two steps down. Etcetera.

In Mauthausen, injury was followed by death. The Nazi guards saw to that.

Prisoners carrying stones, most with backpacks but prisoners in the rear group carry the stone on the bare shoulder, up the Mauthausen 'Stairs of Death'. Source: Austria Federal Ministry of the Interior

Memorial plate at the Mauthausen stairs. Translation: Stone quarry. Prisoners of several nationalities worked here. Forgetting about even the most primitive safety measures, the prisoners were forced with all agression to deliver the utmost labour. This offered the best opportunity to kill prisoners quickly. With a stone that often weighed up to 50 kg on the shoulders, running under constant beatings, the victim would soon succomb, to die helplessly in some corner. Mauthausen Quarry 060121-6

The other Dutchmen were:

Ltz 3kl S.D. Aart Hendrik Alblas MWO 4kl, Engelandvaarder, shot 7/9/1944

Sgt Parachutist Leonardus Theodorus Cornelis Andringa BK

Agent Pieter Arnoldus Arendse BK

Cpl Parachutist Arnoldus Albert Baatsen BL

1^st Lt Karel Willem Adriaan Beukema Thoe Water

Bootsman KM Agent Pieter Cornelis Boogaart BK

Sgt Klaas van de Bor BK, Engelandvaarder

Ltz 3kl Cornelis Carel Braggaar BK

Sgt Oscar Willem de Brey BK

Sgt Special Services Johannes Jan Cornelis Buizer BK, Engelandvaarder

2^nd Lt General Services Nicolaas Johannes Celosse BL, KvV, Engelandvaarder, shot 6/9/1944 in Vught Concentration camp

Wmr Johannes Cornelis Dane BK

2^nd Lt Cornelis Drooglever Fortuin, Engelandvaarder

Sgt Jan Emmer BK, Engelandvaarder

Agent Joannes Henricus Marie de Haas BK

2^nd Lt Gerard John van Hemert BK, Engelandvaarder

Wmr Jan Hofstede BK, Engelandvaarder

2^nd Lt Cornelis Elisa Hulsteijn BK

1^st Lt Drs George Louis Jambroes KvV, Engelandvaarder

Ltz 1kl Roelof Christiaan Jongelie BK (M.I.D.), shot 7/9/1944

Wmr 1kl Pieter Kamphorst BK

2^nd Lt General Services Barend Klooss BK

Wnr KM Meindert Koolstra BK

Sgt Arie Johannes de Kruijff BK

Agent Johannes Hermanus Arnoldus Maria ter Laak BL, shot 7/9/1944

Sgt Antoon Berend Mink BK, Engelandvaarder

Sgt Willem Johan Niermeijer BL, Engelandvaarder

Sgt Hermanus Johannes Overes BK, shot 7/9/1944 in Rawicz Concentration camp, Poland

Wmr Michiel Pals

Sgt Laurentius Maria Punt BK, Engelandvaarder

Sgt Evert Radema BK, shot 7/9/1944

2^nd Lt Parachutist Gozewin Hendrik Gerard Ras BK

Sgt Special Services George Lodewijk Ruseler BK

Sld Parachutist Hendrik Sebes BK

Sgt Maj Adm Horst Reindert Steeksma BK

Sld Parachutist Thijs Taconis BK, Engelandvaarder

2Lt Ivo van Uijtvanck BK

Sgt Antonis Johannes Wegner

Sgt Pieter van der Wilden BK

Sgt Willem van der Wilden BK

Source: CAD-MvD 5.050.5220/245

Their names are on a Memorial plate at the foot of the 'Stairs of Death'.

Memorial plate at the foot of the 'Stairs of Death', with the names of the BBO/SOE agents killed here on 6-7/9/1944. Note that the plate mentions A. van Os, who also perished in Mauthausen. But the aviator/BBO agent who perished here was G. van Os. Mauthausen Quarry 60121-16

As all were killed in the course of three days, in concentration camps in Austria, Holland and Poland, a high office order to do so has to be assumed.

All bodies were incinerated at night. Amongst the Mauthausen facilities, there were ovens for this purpose. The Germans erased records of this atrocity, but eyewitnesses reported after the War, and some of those responsible were brought to justice and were sentenced.

Source: Adri Wijnen

Memorial stone at Mauthausen, said to cover the ashes of the BBO/SOE agents killed in Mauthausen on September 6 & 7, 1944

Many more BBO agents were captured and executed by the Germans, including several of other than Dutch nationality, and 11 BBO Dutchmen are still listed as missing-in-action, meaning that the Germans did not record where and when they killed these Dutch servicemen.

One could try to imagine what it was like in Mauthausen from the German perspective. The officers and men, getting up in the morning and shaving clean for another day at work, necktie knotted, boots polished and pistol loaded, the work being the production of stones and horrific death. Someone had told them that they were the Herrenvolk, the Übermenschen. Certainly, they liked to believe that to be true, and polished boots and loaded pistols helped to strengthen that belief. If ever anybody has been in error, then they were. They were simple, sick and sadistic Untermenschen, in great need of extermination. 'Ausradieren' was the powerful word used by Hitler. As so often, the sick were using the words that applied to themselves. If only the rest of the world had understood that earlier. The information had been available as of 1923, when Hitler wrote 'Mein Kampf'. Not only violent mental sickness, but also ignorance, has a price that is counted in millions of casualties. That is the least of the lessons that mankind has to learn from World Wars One and Two. That in itself is sufficient justification for keeping and maintaining Monuments such as the former concentration camp Mauthausen.

2. Site of death

Erinnerungsstrasse, Mauthausen, Austria

The city of Mauthausen lies on the majestic Donau river, close to Linz, that was to be transformed by Hitler into a major 'cultural' center. For that, amongst many things, cut stones were needed. Furthermore, the German armament industry went underground, as war progressed. Cutting caves in mountains, creating bombproof industrial facilities, was slave labour. But above all, Mauthausen served the Nazi's as one of the places where they could imprison and kill at will people that they believed to be a political or racial hazard. The net result was almost 100,000 people killed in Mauthausen. Germans, what have you done...

Mauthausen, the 'Wiener Graben' stone quarry, site of death of tens of thousands of prisoners of the Nazi regime. In all, almost 100.000 perished in Mauthausen and its many subcamps. Mauthausen Quarry 060121-12

Map 97. J. Bukkens and G. van Os died under torture on the 'Stairs of Death' in the Mauthausen stone quarry

Aerial view of Mauthausen Concentration Camp, as it is preserved today. Left of the camp itself, where SS barracks were previously located, many countries have erected Memorials. The French were the first to do so, in 1949. The Dutch were amongst the last, in 1986. In blue the 'Stairs of Death', where Bukkens and Van Os died, and the Ash field, where their ashes were dumped. Source: Austria Federal Ministry of the Interior