War Story: 'There were no cats left in my town...'

'the people needed to eat.'

It's been 60 years since Canada liberated Holland and the news has been full of stories all week about the war, the liberation and the special relationship between the two countries.

They interviewed a gentleman who was a boy during the war. He recalled what it was like to live in an occupied country. There was fear and deprivation. Food was not being distributed. People survived by eating tulip bulbs and cats - whatever they could find.

He also recalled a friend, a fellow 9 year old, who one day just disappeared. He was Jewish. This young boy met the final solution three days before his 10th birthday.

I know that evil will always be with us. Mans' inhumanity to man continues. It's hard to even begin to calculate the atrocities that have been committed since WWII. Why don't we learn? How much horror is enough?

He was in the Royal Canadian Army. He was injured in street fighting and left for dead. When he woke up, all he had on was his shorts! The people were so desperate they took everything he had. Of course, he was still pissed years later that they didn't even bother to take a pulse... :-)

Initially occupied by the Italians in WWII, who had terrible logistical support.

First the horses disappeared, then the dogs. There were ruins behind my MIL's house that had standing water with frogs, and the frogs disappeared and never came back.

Then the Italians disappeared, but unfortunately they were replaced by German troops. The Germans solved the logistical support problem by quartering troops in the homes of the civilians, so that no family got fed before a soldier.

But at least the Greeks in the countryside weren't starving, like the cities. And the soldiers quartered in my MIL's house shared cookies from home and saved her dad from labor conscription.

On edit: her house was in the area below the ruins in the pic.

thanks for sharing

That's the sort of history that is really worth knowing--how events like wars affect average people in their daily lives. Thanks.

his father was in an internment camp for four years. He told me stories about stealing salt for his family because of rationing, and once when he was 12, being hit in the head with a brick as he was running away. No heat, they slept under mattresses. Hardships I hope I never know.