As you all know the 4th of May we remember the casualties of WWII. On the 5th of May we celebrate our freedom. But a lot of people don't know what happened on the 7th of May 1945. Here is the story of my grandma, who was at the Dam on that day.
My grandma worked as a cleaning maid at a dentist and decided to take the day off from work to go and celebrate the liberation on the Dam. She went there with her friend Elsie. She told me there were a lot of people laughing, celebrating and having a good time. Then all of the sudden around 15:00 everything took a turn for the worse. A rainstorm of bullets came over the Dam, killing and hurting people. The shooting came from 'De Groote Club'. A few Germans from the Kriegsmarine had decided to kill as many people as possible. Nobody until this day knows why. My grandma and her friend went down on the ground and started to crawl somewhere safe. Mr. Perlee from the street organ 'Het Snotneusje' grabbed both of them and brought them to safety behind his organ. She saw people falling down, injured, screaming for help. After things calmed down she and her friend ran away as far from the Dam as possible. My grandma is very much traumatized by this. I hope I have educated some of you by telling her story. More information can be found on this facebook page: DeDam7Mei1945 If you have information of your own, please share so we can come closer to unraveling the victims.
source picture: Wil F. Leijns, Collectie Nederlands Fotomuseum Rotterdam
