ANZAC Day each year is an annual opportunity for Aussies to learn about the sacrifice of those involved in our wars.

It’s rare, however, to hear about war seen through the eyes of youngsters who lived overseas under occupation and subsequent liberation.   

For background the family home in south Holland was sited opposite a key railway station which saw passing petrol and coal trains on their way to Germany regularly being attacked.

That led to a rush for the safety of bunkers until the danger passed.

The following first-hand account is taken from the Beks Family History.

WW2 AS EXPERIENCED BY KIDS

 FOR us Beks pre-teenagers the war years were fascinating, more than frightening.

Too young to understand the inherent dangers, we left it to our parents to do all the worrying.

 Officially, World War II started on September 1, 1939.

It would have been soon after that time, that our township of Geldrop was all excited, when a never-before-seen Zeppelin (a large silver-looking, cigar-shaped, dirigible airship) slowly and silently drifted over our part of the town.

 Little did we know that this was the Graf Zeppelin on a mission to take aerial photos of the landscape below, without awareness or permission of the local authorities.

 On Friday, May 10, 1940, Germany invaded Holland.

 On Sunday, on our way to church, we encountered a large column of German troops (pictured) passing through Geldrop on their way west.

 Apart from the odd motorbike and officers’ cars, all troops moved on foot, with supply wagons, guns, artillery etc, being pulled along by horsepower. This included wagonloads of hay.

Much to the concern of local farmers, in due course their best horses and available fodder were commandeered for the German war machine.

 The marching troops would be very impressive, pounding their hobnail boots on the pavement, whilst singing their popular war songs at full voice.

 Slowly, a year or so along, the war in the sky, of course, to us was always something spectacular.

 Mostly at night times, forewarned by sirens, we could hear the drone of allied bombers to or from their excursions into German territory.

 On one occasion, a bomber in some trouble, released its load of bombs over our town.

Before crashing one explosive landed some hundred or so yards just across the railway line, opposite our house.

 As a result, all the windows at that side were shattered, with all the glass outside, rather than inside as expected.

 Apparently, the air pressure building up against the glass only did the damage, when suddenly subsiding.

Due to glass shortage, for the duration of the war, our large butcher shop windows were boarded up with plywood.

• * *

 AS a youngster, one could not help to be impressed, when seeing fighter planes involved in a dogfight overhead, but not being able to tell which side to barrack for.

 With large petrol shipments regularly parking under the nearby station’s roof, during the early months of the war, this was considered to be an unsafe environment.

 Therefore, for some months, we all used to pack up each evening to walk (a couple of kilometres) to go and sleep in an out-of-town farmhouse, belonging to a considerate business client.

 As kids, at first, for us this made life all the more interesting, however, the novelty of sleeping on straw in the farm loft soon wore off.

 The next best and logical option was, at the back of the house, to build an air-raid shelter, basically consisting of four sewerage pipes of about two-metre diameter, laid end to end and covered by a metre of earth - the entrance was protected by a slope of dirt, held up by a wall of railway sleepers.

 An emergency exit at the back completed the structure. Simple, but effective.

 A thick layer of straw provided the only degree of comfort, apart from a few old blankets, just in case of extended durations.

 Many a night, at 10-15 minutes notice by the air-raid sirens, we would file into our hide-away, until the all-clear alarm was given. Sometimes that did not happen for hours.

So as not to give incoming planes clear bearings on the exact location of built-up areas, total black-out was enforced.

 Towards the end of the war, the Germans had developed a rocket with a warhead, named V1, followed by an improved slightly more reliable version, the V2.

 When successful, they tended to terrorise the British, when landing on London or other English soil.

When travelling overhead, we knew we personally had nothing to worry about, if the loud engine kept roaring. But if, on approach, as often happened, the engine cut out or started to splutter, it was anyone’s guess or fear, as to where it might land.

 To confuse the only recently invented radar, allied planes used to drop thousands of strips of silver backed black paper.

 We understood that they were intended to interfere with the radar signals.

• * *

 SCARCITY of suitable metals prompted the Germans to confiscate all church bells, to be melted down to produce armoury.

It was a sad sight, to see the half a dozen or so mighty bells of our St Brigida’s Church lined up on the footpath, some a good deal taller than we were.

Similarly, all copper coins were taken out of circulation, and replaced with zinc.

 A memorable consequence of the war, also, was the fact that the occupying Germans were short of hospital space, so schools were commandeered as military hospitals.

 Meantime, we continued our primary education by being relocated all over town in small groups.

 It was exciting times, when, after rumours of their advance, the liberating American troops entered Geldrop in early 1944.

 Firstly, a trickle of scouts on foot, followed by larger groups supported by tanks, artillery, trucks etc.

What a contrast in comparison with the German invasion four years earlier.

Many of the big Mac vehicles were driven by black Americans, grinning from ear to ear due to the welcome they received.

Dutch youngsters like us had never seen dark-colored people before. Some of these African Americans loved a joke - like running to a group of kids with a knife between their teeth.

Not long after we saw a wave of planes overhead many towing gliders loaded with war materiel.

With the advance of allied forces it became necessary for them store back-up tanks, vehicles, guns and so forth, and find somewhere for fighters to live while they waited to be sent forward.

The big block next door to our house became an army camp and our parents housed five soldiers in two spare rooms.

We were fascinated seeing them toast bread in the fireplace and hearing of their lives back home. Soon they were almost family.

One day five were called up to the front. Three of them didn’t return.

Whilst as kids we only saw the war through our innocent, ignorant eyes.

 We couldn’t begin to understand the full reality and real consequences until much later.