11 October 1944
Allied Forces Bomb Zeeland
October 1944 in Walcheren, Zeeland
BG T 2/22
The British Royal Air Force bombs the dike of Walcheren in the Dutch province of Zeeland on 11 October 1944. Walcheren is still occupied by the Germans. The bombing is part of allied military strategy to secure access to Antwerp. It is the last of four bombings to flood Walcheren. The people in the villages accept their fate with resignation. A journalist on his way to one of these villages notes: "we paddle in canoes. . . the seal now replaces the farm dog and takes a nap on one of the dwelling mounds." Walcheren emerged from the flooding in 1946, and suffers only little from the great flood of 1953. The IISH was presented with an album with unique photographs of the 1944 inundation.
Today in the Biographies Dutch Labour Movement
Born on 11 October
• Antonius Theodorus van Rijen |