This afternoon two memorial poles were placed on the Schelpenbolweg near Slootdorp. The monuments commemorate the crashes of a Dutch Fokker aircraft that crashed in the May days of 1940. The second aircraft was a British reconnaissance aircraft, type Mosquito, which was shot down three years later.
A large audience was again present at the commemoration this afternoon. After being received in the Culture Barn in Wieringerwerf, some of the interested people left with old American army vehicles from the War Museum in Medemblik to the crash sites. The posts were unveiled there by a British embassy representative and two naval officers.
Engine failure
“The Dutch aircraft, a Fokker biplane, had taken off from the airport at Leiden on 12 May 1940 to harass the Germans who were heading towards the Afsluitdijk. But over the Wieringermeer, there was an engine failure. The pilot therefore had to make an emergency landing,” says Mark Hakvoort of the Dutch Crown Memorial Poles Foundation. “The aircraft ended up in an intermediate ditch. Fortunately, the crew members, Evert Hoekstra and Roelof van den Heuvel, were unharmed.”
Fred de Vries of the Wieringermeer Historical Society came up with a surprise. His wife’s grandfather, Piet Kossen, who died a few years ago, had a photo of the plane. He was 15 years old when the Dutch plane crashed. On the back of the photo is neatly noted what had happened.
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mosquito
The other aircraft, the British Mosquito, was shot down over the polder by a German fighter almost three years later, on 9 May 1943. “The men, Peter Hall and William Woodruff were making a meteorological reconnaissance flight over the Netherlands when they were attacked,” explains Hakvoort, “The plane broke into pieces in mid-air. The pieces landed in a large area. rescue with the parachutes”.
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The monuments are number 11 and 12 in a series of about 40 memorial poles that will be placed in the municipality of Hollands Kroon. The Hollands Kroon Memorial Foundation is already preparing for the next unveiling. On June 11, the Polish crew of a Vickers Wellington Bomber is commemorated at the Molenweg near Slootdorp.
Watch a video below with footage of the revelations and the additional stories associated with both crashes. For example, the British pilot of the Mosquito ended up having breakfast at Hotel Smit and ate eggs with bacon…