1940-1945. The resistance in the dutch province of Limburg

Group Smit

The earliest reports of the Group Smit date from late 1940 and early 1941. It was particularly active in the eastern part of the Dutch coalmine area (Oostelijke Mijnstreek). As with the other early resistance groups in Limburg, with the exception of the Communists, most of them consisted of professional soldiers who had been demobilized after the occupation, mainly from the pre-war 13th Infantry Regiment, a regiment in which mainly soldiers from South Limburg had served and to which Smit had also belonged. They had contacts with the groups Dresen in Maastricht and Bongaerts in Heerlen and developed the same activities. Initially they distributed banned writings, including "Het Vrije Volk," a regional leaflet in which, among others, the surgeon Karel van Berckel wrote. From the spring of 1941, the Gruppe-Smit also engaged in intelligence gathering and the procurement and purchase of weapons, ammunition, and explosives.
Since the arrest of Pierre Dresen at the end of 1941, the SiPo knew of the group’s existence but did not yet want to intervene because they knew too little.
Dutchman H.M.J. Thelen, born of German parents, a former soldier and miner on the Oranje Nassau IV, joined the Smit group in the second half of 1941. In September or October, he wrote a letter to the German plenipotentiary for the province of Limburg, Schmidt, in which he reported his findings. Nothing is known about his motives. Schmidt turned the case over to Nitsch of the SiPo, who instructed Thelen to gather evidence. The Smit file grew thicker and thicker.
On February 2, 1942, almost the entire Smit group was arrested.
On July 16th, 1942, Smit and Treuen were sentenced to death and the other members of the group to imprisonment in a concentration camp.
On this website you can find as a special topic the resistance in Valkenburg. Two members of the group survived the camps there: the vicar Hennekens and the veldwachter (municipal policeman) Van Roy

Sources:

1. Dr. Fred Cammaert, Het Verborgen Front Geschiedenis van de georganiseerde illegaliteit in de provincie Limburg tijdens de Tweede Wereldoorlog, Groningen 1994, Hoofdstuk 2 De eerste militair-civiele verzetsformaties, §III. De groep-Smit, p. 107 e.v.
2. Harry van Dijck Een verraderlijke geschiedenis uit Heerlen over Charles Spreksel en de groep Smit, uit: Themanummer Tweede Wereldoorlog van MijnStreek, 2019 Nr.3, p. 4 ff.
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