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

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means of harnessing these feelings, but also as a way of benefiting from the profiteers' good
fortune, the govermnent introduced a "war profit tax" (oorlogswinstbelasting) in 1916. 184
This meant that incomes and company profits above the average profit and income in the
years 1911, 1912 and 1913 were taxed at a higher percentage. 185 In all, the govermnent
raised 1780 million in "war profit tax", which helped pay for the considerable costs
involved in maintaining the crisis bureaucracy and mobilisation. 186
SOMEWHERE TO LAY ONE'S HEAD
Of all military needs, the most demanding and most controversial was the housing
of soldiers. Because in peacetime, the militmy never had more than a few thousand troops
training at anyone time, it lacked the necessary barracks or billets in place to accommodate
hundreds of thousands of men once mobilised. During the initial weeks of mobilisation,
officers billeted troops with civilians, in public buildings and in tent camps (it was summer
after all). However, by late November, as it became clear that the war would last much
longer, the onset of winter made many of the temporary shelters highly unsuitable. Around
this time, municipal councils requested the return of some of their buildings (especially the
schools), and civilians became less enamoured of the strangers they had hosted for several
weeks already. 187 With the pending deadlock on the Western Front, the Field Army would
remain concentrated in the south, overburdening the hospitality of southern provinces. At
the same time, the thousands of Belgian refugees who remained in the country had to be
accommodated, as did the interned foreign soldiers. 188 That there was an existing general
housing shortage in the Netherlands aggrevated the problem. 189
The govermnent did offer ample compensation to anyone accommodating troops:
from 20 cents a day for a soldier to 11 for officers (who required rooms by themselves and
184 Staatsblad. no. 288,22 June 1916.
185 Ibid. Articles 7 and 26; Flier, War Finances p. 86.
186 Gerbert Scholten, "De belangrijkste gebeurtenissen in het Nederlandsche volk van 1898 - 1923" [The most
important events for the Dutch people from 1898 - 1923] in Bas (ed.), Gedenkboek 1898 -1923 p. 81, fn 1.
187 For problems housing soldiers, see: series of documents in ARA, "Archieven van de Generale Staf" entry no.
2.13.70, inventory no. 129.
188 Inspector of the Infantry to Minister of War, 20 January 1915, in ARA, "Archieven van de Generale Star' entry
no. 2.13.70, inventory no. 166.
189 H. J. Romeyn, "The Housing Problem" in Greven (ed.), The Netherlands and the World War Volume II, pp. 165 -
205.