April 10, 1945, at 7:30 in the morning, The Black Watch Regiment of Canada departed from Rijssen, riding on the tanks of the Fort Garry Horse Regiment, toward Nijverdal, from where they would liberate Hellendoorn and advance toward Ommen.

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Vehicles being ferried across the Overijsselsch canal bridge demolished in background. from Rijssen to Ommen. 

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The troops encountered little resistance and soon reached the bridge over the Overijssels Canal at Hancate. The infantry was able to reach the other side using planks laid over the remains of the bridge, which had been blown up by the Germans.

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From the liberation in April 1945, Anton (born June 20, 1941) recalls that he and his father transported a load of pine trees by horse and cart to the canal near Hancate. The trees were supposed to be transferred onto a ship bound for Germany to support the mines there. But that never happened. When they arrived in Hancate, they saw Canadian tanks already crossing the bridge toward Lemele.Anton about that time: "I can still picture it clearly: on top of one of those tanks sat a Jack Russell (dog), calmly looking around. After the liberation, my father found bombs in the meadow near the canal and dug them into the ditch. A farmer from Lemele, who let his cows graze there, discovered the bombs when the cows unearthed them and called officer Tuut, the local policeman in Lemelerveld. The bombs were then dug up and taken away."During earlier air raids on the cargo ships in the canal, Anton, who was nearly 4 years old at the time, still remembers all the windows in their farmhouse shattering: “All the windows were blown out. My twin brother Derk and I had been standing too close to the window trying to see the airplanes and ended up covered in glass. I was bleeding all over from dozens of small cuts in my hands and arms. I think it was around 8:30 in the morning; we had just started eating eggs. Yes, I remember that damn well.”The Barge family Van der Laan was heavily affectedWhile Anton Fokkert survived the events of April 1945, earlier that year, the barge family Van der Laan was tragically killed in an air raid by Allied fighter bombers. On Sunday, January 14, 1945, two cargo ships were moored near the bridge over the Overijssels Canal, ready to be loaded with logs the next day. Both shipping families were forced to transport these for the German occupiers. While three children from the Van der Laan family were playing on the ice of a nearby pond, fighter planes attacked their ship. Their father, mother, and youngest sister Leentje (2) were killed, as were two local residents living near the bridge.

"Dat weet ik nog donders goed!"

Schaddenveldsweg 1 7447 PV Hellendoorn

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