Between the devil and the deep blue sea - University of Canterbury

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internment, along the southern borders to the Field Anny.6 Troops shifted closer to the
frontier in North Brabant, and Division III reinforced the landweer patrolling the Belgian
border? As many French- and Gelman-speaking Dutch soldiers as possible also moved
south, to explain the internment process to foreign troopS. 8
Yet no one envisaged the size and scale of the eventual problem. Alongside
associated tasks, such as seizing, stockpiling and registering all military equipment,
weaponry, vehicles, ships and horses present in Dutch territOlY, intenllnent would prove the
most time-consuming of the anned forces' neutrality duties. In time, it would see 2,000
staff allocated to the specially-created Internment Bureau in the General Staff, 9 thousands of
soldiers involved in guarding camps around the country, Marechaussee officers assuming
responsibility for detecting and catching escapees, and border guards interning border
violators and preventing internees from leaving the country. Their responsibilities were
stretched even further when the govennnent agreed to let Great Britain and Gennany
exchange prisoners of war (POWs) across Dutch territory. Escaped POWs from camps in
Gennany also found their way to the Dutch border; deserters from the German army fled to
the Netherlands; and Belgian and French civilians escaped the fighting on the Western
Front and sought refuge among their northern neighbours.
ALL BUT A PRISONER OF WAR
Military internees were not prisoners of war, although the Netherlands' treatment
of internees, especially at the start of the war, did not differ appreciably from how the
belligerents treated their POW s. This approach followed the Hague Conventions, which
allowed neutrals to place interned troops in camps and do whatever else they thought
6 "Instructie aan Commandanten van onderdeelen van het Veldleger in het Zuiden des lands" [Instructions to the
Commanders of sections of the Field Army in the south of the country] in Vries, "Nederland als non-belligerente
natie" Appendix III, p. 121; Commander-in-Chief, "Bijzonder Instructie voor den Commandant van het Veldleger
geldende van 1 ° Augustus 1914 tot nadere kennisgeving" [Extra-ordinary instructions for the Commander of the
Field Army applicable from 10 August 1914 until further notice] 10 August 1914, in ARA, "Archieven van de
Generale Staf' entry no. 2.13.70, inventory no. 1.
7 Commander-in-Chief to Commander of Division III, 8 August 1914, in ARA, "Archieven van de Generale Staf'
entry no. 2.13.70, inventory no. 75.
8 "Instructie aan Commandanten van onderdeelen van het Veldleger in het Zuiden des lands" in Vries, "Nederland als
non-belligerente natie" Appendix III, p. 121.
9 Ibid. p. 93.