Neutral Nations WW1 - Netherlands

The word neutral derives from Latin ne (“not”) + uter (“whether”), a semantic loan from Koine Greek οὐδέτερος (oudéteros). Only Argentina, Chile, Denmark, The Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Venezuela, Sweden and Switzerland remained neutral during the Great War (1914-1918).

For the Netherlands remaining neutral was in question: commander-in-chief General C.J. Snijders had a strong liking for the 'invincible' Germany.

Maintaining neutrality caused discord among the inhabitants of the Netherlands. The population was divided, as were the politicians. Many people still bore a grudge against England because of the Boer War, some fifteen years earlier, when thousands of Boers (Dutch descendants) in South-Africa had been killed by British soldiers.

Because of General C.J. Snijders attitude the government several times tried to get rid of the general, but Queen Wilhelmina kept on backing her CIC. The queen was fond of the army and often visited the troops and observed exercises.

The small Dutch army exercised continuously. The Dutch government had mobilized 500.000 man to reinforce the regular army. They guarded the borders and filled their days with exercising and polishing. There were many incidents involving warring countries. England accidentally bombed the Dutch port of Zierikzee. And German U-boats torpedoed and sank many Dutch ships, including one transporting German prisoners-of-war from England to the Netherlands.

There was much discontent among the soldiers. Not until the end of the war did they see real action as they were called upon to quell hunger revolts in some of the larger cities.

To maintain neutrality the Netherlands laid mines in coastal waters, to prevent hostile landings. Three times (in 1916, 1917 and 1918) Germany considered occupying the Netherlands. In which case, the allied countries would have invaded the country via the coast.

Germany eventually refrained from invading Holland because of the food supplies  flowed in from the Netherlands. This trade made some merchants in Holland very rich. They were called OW'ers, meaning 'oorlogswinst-makers': war-profiteers. Until this very day OW'er is considered a harsh term of abuse in Holland.

From the Holland's eastern border with Germany to German-occupied Belgium to the south, heavy gunfire in Flanders could be heard in Holland. The Belgian battlefields were no more than 40 km's away (about 26 miles).

More than one million Belgian refugees fled to Holland when the war broke out. Thousands of soldiers, from both sides, followed. The enemy had encircled them, just as happened to 2,000 British marines at Antwerp.

All foreign soldiers arriving in The Netherlands were disarmed and interned in camps where they were to stay during rest of the war. 

In spring 1915 the Germans erected an dreadful electric fence between occupied Belgium and the Netherlands. The 2,000 Volts wire ran almost 200 Km (125 Miles) long through villages, orchards, meadows, woodland, over brooks - even over the river Meuse. The height of the construction was over 3 meters. How many people the fence killed is unknown. Estimates vary from 2,000 to 3,000.

The Netherlands has cemeteries in which victims of the Great War are buried. Many were sailors who fell at sea. Others are civilians or navy-personnel who died at the beaches where countless mines washed ashore.

modified from: https://greatwar.nl/frames/default-nederland.html .