Commonwealth War Graves General Cemetery Crooswijk

Crooswijk General Cemetery in Rotterdam contains 1 Commonwealth burial of the 1914-1918 war and a further 124 Commonwealth burials of the 1939-1945 war, 5 of which are unidentified. There are 11 Polish burials from the Second World War, including one American war volunteer in the Polish Air Force.

In May 1941, the local civil authorities set aside for Allied war casualties a plot in the immediate vicinity of the Dutch war graves on Crooswijk General Cemetery in Rotterdam. A number of British airmen were moved to this plot from other parts of the cemetery and from scattered graves in the surrounding countryside; and subsequent Allied casualties were buried there.

These graves were constantly tended and provided with flowers by the people of Rotterdam, in contrast to the German graves which were ignored. The enraged Germans therefore caused them to be removed, in May 1943, to the remotest corner of the cemetery. They were fenced off by wooden hurdles and even for a short time guarded by an armed sentry to keep away visitors.

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Source

• Text: TracesOfWar
• Photos: Dick de Bruijne (1, 2, 3), Arie van Wijngaarden (4, 5)
• LEEUWEN, M. VAN & STAARMAN, A., Tastbare Herinneringen 1914-1918, Western Front Association Nederland, 2008.