Aanhangsel
Tekst van de toespraak door Johan Fabricius op 27 September 1944 voor de B.B.C gehouden
For ten cruel days and nights the thoughts of the whole of Holland have been with your men west of Arnhem. And it was not only because of the military advantages a quick crossing of the Rhine would involve for all of us - no, it was because of the men themselves, who were fighting in the heart of our little country for an ideal which is ours as well. We knew what they must have been going through; we know what we owe them; we think of them as if they were our own boys.
This is what I want to say to you. Your men are no foreigners to us. Maybe they never saw Holland before they floated down over it, on a sunny afternoon to liberate her people and the world; maybe they do not speak our language, not one of them, and find it difficult even to pronounce the names of the places where they are fighting, suffering, dying. But they are no foreigners in Holland, and we hope they realize that.
Some of these brave young men will stay behind in our country for ever. They shall not rest in cold foreign soil. The soil of Holland, which, in the course of our long and glorious history, received so many heroes for their eternal sleep, will proudly guard your dead as if they were the deeply mourned sons of our own people.
The word ‘heroes’ has been heard so often during this long and grim war that it is in danger of growing trite. But here it takes tangible shape, before the eyes of our own people who stand in awe and bare their heads.
Auteursrecht onbekend