In 1944, Gerardus Kniest, as a member of a Silbertanne commando, a killing unit of the Dutch SS, murdered Kees Robertus from Groningen. A cousin of Kniest had a Stolperstein placed for the victim.
July 11, 1944, midnight. Three men ring the doorbell at the house of Kees Robertus, director of a transport company, on the Oostersingel in Groningen. Robertus’ wife opens the door. Would her husband like to come along? Robertus walks with the three to the Schuitendiep. Shots ring out and the three men run away. Robertus is seriously injured on the street and dies two days later in the hospital.
SS man escaped from cell and fled to Germany
One of the three perpetrators was Gerardus Kniest, a sports teacher from Gelderland. “My mother’s brother.” Maarten Vrient (76) from Groningen smiles almost shyly. The high word is out, he said it anyway. “My uncle was one of the people who committed this murder. He was also involved in two other murders. He was sentenced to twenty years in prison after the war, but he escaped in 1952 and fled to Germany. I saw him there once as a child. His past was always a big taboo in the family. I’ve been researching him for the last few years. Nothing was actually known about Robertus’ murder, as if it never happened.”
He nods toward the window of his apartment, which offers a sweeping view of the city. “But that murder was only a few kilometers away. You can’t imagine that, can you?” His eyes turn moist red. “I find it bizarre to think that I have the same name. My middle name is Gerardus, that name is common in the family.”
Dutch SS men killing Dutch people
Kniest moved to Germany during the war. “I haven’t been able to find much about his personal history.” In a newspaper article about his trial in 1949 by Newspaper of the North Kniest is referred to as Unterscharführer, a rank of the SS. “At one point he was recruited into the Silbertanne commando.”
Aktion Silbertanne was the code name for a series of assassinations secretly committed by Dutch SS men between September 1943 and September 1944. 45 Dutch citizens who were known to be anti-German or who were suspected of resistance activities became victims. The murders were a punishment for resistance attacks on Dutch collaborators. The Silbertanne command received a list from the SD of potential victims, mostly prominent citizens, who were selected at random.
Vrient: “Robertus was not the only victim that night. It all started after a failed resistance attack on the town hall in Zuidhorn.”
Post office director shot dead in doorway
July 10, 1944, evening. A group of men reports to the town hall in Zuidhorn. A man and a woman say that they want to get married. They brought some friends with them to add some extra luster to the ceremony. Head guard Lourens de Groot lets them in. Does he see that the woman is actually a man in disguise? In any case, he does not completely trust the group. So he locks the door. The ‘partygoers’ are in reality resistance fighters who want to steal ration cards. Someone pulls a gun and a fight ensues in which the police officer is killed. The resistance fighters manage to escape – without ration cards.
The Security Service in Groningen sends a Silbertanne commando. A handful of SS men, including Gerardus Kniest, are flown in from The Hague and housed in a hotel. The SS members receive a list with three names and addresses that they divide among themselves. At the top of the list is a certain Van Gnirrep, but he is not at home. The second on the list is Robertus who is shot by Kniest, among others. Two other SS men cycle to the Paterswoldseweg where Hendrikus Hazelhorst lives. The director of the post office is shot in the doorway and later dies from his wounds.
The next day, July 13, the actions are discussed at the Scholtenhuis, the SD headquarters on the Grote Markt. The management is not yet completely satisfied, because not all people on the list have been liquidated. So the Silbertanne commando, without Kniest, leaves for Grootegast to kill Piet Top, whom the SD thinks is a member of the resistance. But Top, who lives with his parents, is not at home. The SS interrogate his father, who is still in bed. Where is his son? But he refuses to say anything. A second group has now traveled to Marum to shoot Kornelis van der Meulen. The deputy director of the dairy opens the door himself and is then shot dead.
‘Easier to live with family who were in the resistance’
Friend sighs and pets a black cat that has jumped onto the table. He started his research into his uncle in 2021. “I was the eldest at home and that’s why my mother sometimes confided in me. But I had absolutely no idea what exactly he had done, only that he had been wrong. It just started to eat at me. You know, it’s much easier to live with a family member who was in the resistance than with one who was on the wrong side. Then you start looking for extenuating circumstances. Was he forced? Was it entirely his choice?”
He found no real answers. “But I discovered, among other things, that he had killed Mr. Robertus. I never, ever expected that the railway would lead to Groningen! I looked up the address where the widow lived. I thought: I have to do something with this. I have never heard his name mentioned at a commemoration. As if it didn’t happen. That’s impossible? That you shoot someone and that’s it? So I wanted to do something.”
And he did. He knocked on the door of the Stolpersteine Groningen Foundation and was contacted by a grandson of Kees Robertus. He nods, smiling at the memory. “That was a gift, that was really a gift. That family was grateful that something was done for their grandfather. The meeting was very emotional. That also helped me to close this completely.”
Absolutely?
“Well, maybe not quite.”
The Stolperstein for Kees Robertus will be unveiled at Oostersingel 18 on Friday, May 3.
The name Maarten Vrient has been made up for privacy reasons. The real name is known to the editors.
Silbertanne
The name Silbertanne (silver fir) is derived from a pine branch that was placed behind the names of people on the list. For every German or NSB member shot, three anti-German Dutch people living in the area had to be shot dead. Implementation in the three northern provinces was carried out by the Sonderkommando Nord, which was formed in the infamous Scholtenhuis in Groningen. It consisted of five NSB members and Dutch SS members, led by commander Jan van Efferen. The assassinations in the rest of the Netherlands were planned from The Hague. The first Silbertanne murders took place on September 29, 1943 in Meppel and Staphorst. Garage owner Jan Dijkstra and surgeon Engbertus Roelfsema are murdered in Meppel. Teacher Arend Boldewijn was killed in Staphorst. The reason was an attack by the resistance on a farmer from De Wijk, an NSB member who hunted people in hiding.
The so-called Niedermachungsbefehl that Adolf Hitler issued put an end to the Silbertanne murders. From now on, resistance fighters could be killed after their arrest without the intervention of a court. This made the Silbertanne commando, which operated more or less secretly, redundant.
Kniest escaped to Germany
Gerardus Kniest was also involved in other murders. On August 31, 1944 he shot Fulps Valstar dead in Rotterdam. He was government commissioner for food supply in Naaldwijk and was known as anti-German. His son was a resistance fighter. On the same day, journalist Dirk Voskamp was also murdered in Rotterdam. Both were shot dead in revenge for the resistance attack on NSB member Jan Willem Stuit, who was leader of the Labor Office in Naaldwijk.
Kniest was sentenced to 20 years in prison by the special criminal chamber in The Hague in 1949. He escaped in 1952. The Dutch government repeatedly requested his extradition, but without success. Kniest was given German nationality.
Search for family
The Stolperstein Groningen Foundation received the request for a Stolperstein for Kees Robertus last year. “The applicant is not a family member, but this is a condition,” explains board member Ika Hotsma. “So we had to look. We found the name of Kees Robertus’ wife via the ‘War Sources’ website: Ida Boelema. We then found her obituary on the ‘Delpher’ website. It was in it Newspaper of the North of 1985, where the names of children and grandchildren were also mentioned. One of the (presumed) grandchildren bore the name CH Boelema-Robertus. We googled this name and ended up with Kees Boelema who was a commander in the navy. He is now director of the Marine Museum in Den Helder. After that it went quickly.”
Victim’s family moved
Kees Boelema Robertus (63) from Den Helder is moved by the tribute his grandfather Kees receives. “The entire family thinks this is a wonderful gesture, especially because it was requested by the perpetrator’s cousin. We also met him and that was a nice conversation.”
The murder was a topic that was discussed with some regularity. “The manner in which that murder took place, a Silbertanne commando, was also a subject of discussion. But I never heard my grandmother talk about it herself. My mother’s side of the family has also been through some things. My mother’s father was Willem Vastbinder (1900 – 1974) and he was a member of the resistance. As a result, there were some tensions at home. There have been a number of house searches. At the end of the war he was arrested and interrogated at the Scholtenhuis. He was able to bluff his way out.”
Tags: Nephew Dutch man Gerard Kniest murdered Kees Robertus Groningen Stolperstein laid taboo family
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