In the NOS documentary Nieuwlande – unyielding hiding village reporter Martijn Bink goes in search of the story of Nieuwlande during the Second World War. The village is known for the protection that residents offered to Jews. The documentary can be seen tonight on NPO 2.
In the program Bink speaks to a number of people who experienced the war in Nieuwlande, and he examines why residents gave their lives to provide shelter to strangers. Special attention is paid to resistance heroes such as Johannes Post and Arnold Douwes.
Post housed Jews from Amsterdam in Nieuwlande in 1942. His daughter is discussed during the documentary. During the war, Douwes kept a diary in which he described how difficult it can be to find a place for people in hiding, the pressure families experience to take in Jews and about daily life in Nieuwlande and the surrounding area. Douwes eventually housed hundreds of people in hiding in the village.
Attention is also paid to a courier and a Jewish person in hiding who was arrested as a child in Nieuwlande, and a man speaks about the raid on his parents’ farm, in which his mother was arrested and the people in hiding were able to flee.
In 1985, the region was awarded the Israeli Yad Vashem award for acts of resistance from Nieuwlande. Only two villages in the whole world have received that.
The documentary Nieuwlande – unyielding hiding village can be seen tonight between 8.40 pm and 9.25 pm on NPO 2. Later this month, the broadcast will be repeated on TV Drenthe.