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The Great War (1914-1918) Forum

Remembered Today:

Frankenstraat - where is / was it?


Kate Wills

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Can someone point me to the right town or village please?

I'm trying to locate the venue of a show in mid-May 1918, which took place in the Theatre of Varieties, No 4 Group, Frankenstraat. That's all I have.

Many thanks

Edited by Kate Wills
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Can someone point me to the right town or village please?

Many thanks

The only two Frankenstraat's in Belgium today, that I can find, are in Etterbeek (Brussels) and Diest. There are many more in the Netherlands.

Edited 15.58: Having just read your other Frankenstraat post (Count Limburg) I see the 1918 date is in May, so that would rule out both these locations.

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But Antwerp, like Brussels, was occupied.

Was there one in Poperighe?

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Here's my second attempt.

During WW1 several Dutch cities gave shelter to a number of British POW's.

One of those cities was Den Haag (The Hague).

The first pic shows a group of British soldiers who lived in the Van Aerssenstraat (no. 52-34) during 1917-1918.

The name of the street following the Van Aerssenstraat: Frankenstraat.

This street even today has an old theater, since the 60's mainly used for puppet-shows (Koomans Poppentheater) at Frankenstraat no. 66 (3rd pic)

This could very well be the location for the Theater of Varieties.

Roel

post-5443-0-78475600-1357354523_thumb.jp

post-5443-0-69299800-1357362519_thumb.jp

post-5443-0-01265400-1357362524_thumb.jp

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  • 4 weeks later...

Roel,

That is brilliant!

You have also solved something that was puzzling me, which was No. 4 Group. POWs / internees explains that.

I understand that the men who had been captured early in the war were given preference for the move to Holland. That is certainly the case for the one officer on the programme, Lt RAD Moseley of the Munster Fusiliers, who was captured in September 1914.

I was reading a book yesterday of letters home from a POW officer at Clausthal who mentions a fellow officer captured in 1914 who was listed for transfer to The Hague, but the negotiations and organisation took a long time to finalise. This particular officer spent his prolonged imprisonment improving his Welsh. Many wives went across to The Hague and spent weeks awaiting their husbands' arrival.

Internment in Holland an interesting aspect of the war that seems little documented.

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Internment in Holland an interesting aspect of the war that seems little documented.

There is actually quite a bit already on the forum -It's just a bit scattered as there is no one logical place to post it.

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Cent,

I have just moved this thread to POWs, now (thanks to Roel) I know that my query concerned POWs.

Since internees in Holland were effectively POWs (such as the RND at Timbertown) or POWs transferred from Germany, then the POW forum is the obvious place for threads.

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  • 2 months later...

I was born at Van Aerssenstraat no. 50, and my mother still lives there. (think its the house at extreme right of the photo, since # 52 has its gateway on the right side of the house.)

Ive seen the photo above numerous times, and have indeed known there were english troops in our house in 17/18.

Does anyone have an idea if it would be possible to find out which troops they were? Theres also photos of the same period of a Scottish regiment parading through the neighborhood...

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  • 1 year later...

Hi Mirko, I accidentally stumbled upon this thread again, reading your answer. Would it be possible to post those photo's?

Roel

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Hi roel, I found two of them on the old hard drive. I remember one of a group of officers posing in front of a house on the van Boetzelaerlaan, hopefully I'll come across it later...

Im still planning to visit the National Archives this summer to see if I can find out what regiment was interned in which street/house...there were about 5500 british soldiers interned in The Hague in the late summer of '18.

A Scots regiment parading through my old neighborhood (scheveningen/statenkwartier)

Afbeelding1_zps9d2ce8fd.png

Having a pint at the famous ZHB brewery (now sadly gone to make place for really ugly social housing)

6WObier84_zpse33fd8b9.jpeg

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The picture of the interred soldiers posing in front of a The Hague house of which I can just not figure out the number. Maybe some sharp eye can make out the cap-badge?

British_TheHague_1918_zps90cd53e1.jpg

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Thanks Mirko. Lookin at the house I'd say taken in the same neighbourhood as the last photo in post #5. Problem is most houses there have front gardens.

Roel

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