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Anton Mussert

Anton Mussert was the founder and party leader of the National Socialist Movement in the Netherlands (NSB).

Person

  • Anton Adriaan Mussert
  • Born on: May 11, 1894
  • Born in: Werkendam, Nederland
  • Died on: May 7, 1946
  • Died in: Den Haag, Nederland

Anton Mussert was the founder and party leader of the National Socialist Movement (NSB).[1] He was a hydraulic engineer with the Province of Utrecht. Later he founded the NSB and led this movement until 1945. In the pre-war period, Mussert was unsuccessful in growing into a serious power factor.[2] During the occupation, he was little more than a figurehead. He was sentenced to death at the end of '45 for aiding the enemy, attacking the constitutional government and trying to bring the Netherlands under foreign rule.[3]

On 10 June 1944, Mussert said at a large meeting in the Concertgebouw:

'There are those who will ask themselves: And where will you, leader, be when the invasion comes here to our country? Is your car ready? I can tell them, my comrades, I have made my decision. When the invasion comes, I will be in Utrecht under all circumstances. This morning I received a new uniform, that of a volunteer soldier in the German Wehrmacht. This uniform I will put on as soon as the invasion comes here.'[4]

At the time of his arrest on 7 May 1945 in The Hague, he was dressed in civilian clothes.[5]

Footnotes

  1. ^ See: Wikipedia: Anton Mussert.
  2. ^ Anne refers to him as that fat pig. Anne Frank, Diary Version A, 27 June 1944, in: The Collected Works, transl. from the Dutch by Susan Massotty, London [etc.]: Bloomsbury Continuum, 2019.
  3. ^ Voor recente literatuur, zie: Tessel Pollmann, Mussert & Co. De NSB-leider en zijn vertrouwelingen, Amsterdam: Boom 2012.
  4. ^ "Mussert soldaat van de Duitsche Weermacht", Gooi- en Eemlander, 12 juni 1944.
  5. ^ Foto in: Keesing’s Historisch Archief, nr. 725, 7-13 mei 1945.