Students from the Technical University (TU) Delft have found texts by an NSB member on a wall in a cell of the Oranjehotel. “It is as if an obliterated part of the cell’s history has been revealed,” historian Bas von Benda-Beckmann told the Volkskrant.
It concerns the scratching of Daniël de Blocq van Scheltinga. The inscriptions were linked to him because he wrote down the date when he heard that the death penalty was being demanded against him, on September 11, 1945.
The man’s lyrics are under a plastered piece of wall. Published in a previous week research the students explain how they discovered it. For example, the wall is illuminated with light from the side and a thermal imaging camera has been used.
Incidentally, the NSB member never received the death penalty. He was sentenced to 20 years on appeal and was eventually released on 1953 as a result of a petition for pardon.
During the Second World War, approximately 25,000 people were imprisoned by the Germans in the prison in Scheveningen. This included many resistance fighters, which gave the prison the nickname Oranjehotel. Erik Hazelhoff Roelfzema, among others, was imprisoned here.
The student’s supervisor, Professor of Materials Science Joris Dik, tells the newspaper that he hopes for a follow-up of the research into inscriptions on the walls.
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