EN 
NL 
from 'The liberation of Oudenbosch - extracts from the diary of Sister Caspara (St Anna)' by Sr Caspara
Sister Caspara Franken kept a diary around the Oudenbosch liberation of 30 October 1944, from which extracts were later published four times by the Heemkundige Kring with the permission of the Sisters of St Anna. Some excerpts from it:
Germans had come to ask for sixteen blankets before. Now, what else could you do but sigh silently and say 'yes' out loud. The blankets were fetched and the gentlemen left. But... 'give you a finger, they'll take the whole hand' says a good Dutch proverb and the Germans put the truth of it into practice, for we gave sixteen and some days later they came and demanded four hundred. Yes, what do you do against four-and-a-half-year-old 'protectors'? They are so seasoned in requisitioning that a whole convent of respectable convent women can do nothing against them. Sister Eugenia, however, armed herself anyway with all her eloquence and advanced on the requisitioners. There were four of them in the vestibule and the car was ready to receive the loot. The conversation began.
"We come to requisition blankets for the sick and wounded."
"We have only delivered 16 of them."
"That's too few, we need many more! How many sisters and children are there here?"
"Two hundred sisters and three hundred children."
"Then we must have four hundred blankets."
"That is not work, because the children have not returned yet and have taken the blankets home."
"We have to have four hundred," he said.
"That is not fair. In other places, they collected one per family."
He thought for a moment. "Then we will settle for two hundred, but quickly, because we are in a hurry."
And, surely to bolster his words or increase his prestige, I don't know, but the captain whistled and more guys entered. They pushed open the vestibule door and pushed into the hall.
"Why can't you wait in the vestibule?" said Sister Eugenia, who by now had already skimmed through the '200 blanket claim'.
"Nay, they must wait here!", said the captain. However, when the waiting on the blankets took a bit too long for the gentlemen's liking, a few pushed even further forward. But now it was getting too barren for Sister Eugenia anyway. They might invade the convent by now! So off they went.
"Ordnung muss sein. Euer Kommandant hat gesagt: hÃer warten. Ihr sollt gehorchen, das hat Hitler euch gelehrt."
They looked at her open-mouthed and flinched. They had not expected such wariness from a nun.
Among these companies, Mother Theresa had proclaimed "All sisters must give up a blanket, but you don't have to give the best one." General consternation and indignation, of course. The sisters went on a trot, up stairs, down stairs. They ran down the dormitories, tossing the beds upside down, thinking with an anxious heart of the coming winter without coal, and looking with sad faces at the disappearing blankets. The 'General Staff' of the sisters stood near the hall almost in full, counting and inspecting the blankets. From there, they were passed to the hall, where the Germans counted the stock. But Sister Eugenia, who had been watching the men closely, did not trust the matter much. 'It could be a gang of thieves.
"Where is your proof from the Ortskommandant that you have the right to demand the blankets?" she asked a touch commandingly.
"We don't have that because we don't need that."
"Then I should at least have proof that we delivered the blankets."
He scowled some more, but finally pulled out a piece of paper and gave a signed receipt. By now the other men had counted up to seventy-one and loaded that amount into the car. But suddenly there was a roar of engines in the air, which soon turned into thunder. The requisitioners looked at each other in dismay. The Tommies started firing guns and the men dashed out of the hall and into the street. They turned on the engine and drove off headlong with the one hundred and seventy blankets captured. Thus, with the help of the 'Angels', we were able to keep thirty more blankets. But the joy was short-lived. They did not forget the leftover and came to collect it the following Thursday. But not only that, they also asked for two hundred towels. Fortunately, we could confidently say that most of it was in the wash. And so we managed to fob them off with the remaining thirty blankets and forty-eight towels. They took them triumphantly like true world rulers and we were left to fend for ourselves.
Monday morning (30 October) went rather quietly. In the afternoon, I went for a nap and when I came downstairs - it was just half past three - Sister Conceptiona called:
"Soon, soon, come see, the Americans are coming!"
"If it is true, yes I will come."
"No, really, 'tis real!"
And 't was true this time, for the very first time the pure, unadulterated truth, without fantasy. 'The news went through the convent like wildfire. The wide front door was opened wide and the vestibule was full of nuns in no time. People everywhere were hanging out of windows or flying into the street. A mother across the street had put her baby in the first-floor windowsill with its legs outboard. She held the worm with one arm and waved at the liberators entering with the other. I feared that in her enthusiasm she would start waving with two arms, because then her sprout would become the child of the bill. But fortunately, her motherly care proved greater than her enthusiasm. The rectors were also already on the pavement in front of St Anna. Even Mère Thomasia was not missing. Well, she certainly shouldn't have been missing either, because we actually owe it to her that we all had permission to watch the invading troops once. Too bad it wasn't the grandiose entry of the big army. What came in were only shock troops, only Americans. You could tell immediately by the wide green helmets with the netting over them. They were mainly Yankees or Yanks, as they called themselves, and some Canadians and people from California. There were quite a few Catholics walking among them, as would be seen later. You could hear absolutely no marching. On their rubber shoes, they walked inaudibly on either side past the houses, one after the other, loaded rifle in hand. How dirty and exhausted those poor fellows looked. But when they saw the happy faces of the people and flags and orange bands and bows appearing everywhere, they smiled and waved back kindly. When a halt was commanded, some of them simply dropped down on the pavement and, with their backs leaning against the wall, lit a cigarette. People, including us, gave them apples and pears, but most preferred smoking to eating. They themselves handed out cigarettes, chewing gum and sticky toffees to the girls, who were all over the place and just darted around the little Americans. A little later, in the side street, we heard the thundering sound of tanks over the cobblestones. We waited in suspense for a while and... there appeared the first American tanks, from which smiling soldiers' heads and waving arms emerged here and there. On the back of each tank was an aerial. 'It was a nice sight as you looked down the street. The fathers and brothers were also all outside in front of the main entrance, but the sisters were now ordered back inside: "Americans seen, so door again." Didn't matter, after all, we were now nicely liberated without a fight. All of Oudenbosch was still standing, except for a few houses. There had been quite a change in mood. It seemed as if peace was just waiting to be baked and served. But it wouldn't happen that quickly anyway. We would still have a lot of misery to hear and see.
