Posters about World War II
Mussert fights for the Netherlands' place in the new Europe. Utrecht, NSB, 1942: 34,7 x 29,6 cm. Request number: KW AE 00149.
The images that were pasted on Dutch walls during the Second World War can be easily traced in the NIOD poster collection, which has been stored in the KB after restoration. There are over 5000 of them.
Mes & Bronkhorst
A.J. Mes (1890-1961) was initially a bicycle dealer, but later worked in Haarlem at a printing company. From 1932 he was a co-partner of Mes & Bronkhorst in the Gaelstraat. J.A. Bronkhorst (1900-1987) was a merchant and managed the administration of the business, where posters for the Polygoon newsreel were printed, among other things. But Bronkhorst joined the NSB in 1933 (Mes in 1936) and since then a lot of NSB advertising work has been done. During the war, Mes & Bronkhorst printed propaganda and books on behalf of the SS Ersatzkommando, the SS training camp Avegoor, the German Wehrmacht and various organisations related to the NSB. This involved an amount of half a million guilders: 80% of the company's total turnover. They had at least seven employees, an offset printing shop, a hand-press printing shop and departments for lithography, zinc grinding and binding. The company also purchased plots of land from former Jewish property.
Bronkhorst was no longer involved with the company after 1942. He had joined the Germanic SS and rose to the rank of Obersturmführer and Ortskommandant in Bromberg. During the liberation in 1945, a large part of the administration was destroyed, but enough remained to convict Mes and his son of collaboration. Both were interned, the company came under the supervision of the Dutch Management Institute. In the meantime, competitors were eyeing (the use of) the printing presses. The appointed manager was guilty of a conflict of interest (he had a printing company himself) and while advertising plates, wool labels, biscuit tin wrappers and reading books were printed again, the business dragged on for years. Eventually, Mes' son was allowed to take over the printing company.
Van Altena
During the war, organisations had to carefully select designers and audiences, because the costs of designing, printing and distributing posters amounted to at least 20,000 guilders, which they could not afford every day. One of these posters was aimed at recruiting more young people, especially from NSB families, to the Nationale Jeugdstorm, a kind of Dutch Hitler Youth, who stood out because of their colourful uniforms, songs and marching music. This poster was printed in 1943 in Haarlem by the lithographic and offset printer Mes & Bronkhorst based on a design by ‘Van Altena’. More than thirty posters bear the name ‘Van Altena’, but it is unclear who this was. Another poster by Van Altena calls for membership of the NSB. The name of the leader, Mussert, is at the top: ‘Mussert strijdt voor Nederland’ plaats in het nieuwe Europa’ (Mussert fights for the Netherlands’ place in the new Europe). This dramatic poster shows the three flags of the NSB, the Netherlands and the German Third Reich floating above the globe. The Netherlands lights up red against a black continent.
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De jeugd in den jeugdstorm. [Utrecht, Nationale Jeugdstorm, 1943: ?? x ?? cm. Request number: KW AE 00694.
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S., Op tegen het bolsjewisme! Meldt u aan bij de Waffen SS (Up against Bolshevism! Join the Waffen SS; c. 1943). Lithografie, 118 x 88 cm. Request number: KW AG/00348a.
By an anonymous designer (referred to only by the initial ‘S.’) is a poster from 1943 calling on young men to join the Waffen SS. A total of 22,000 Dutchmen were said to be part of this branch of the German army. These troops were deployed on the Eastern Front after the German defeat at Stalingrad, to prevent further conquests by the Russian army. The fight ‘against Bolshevism’ was presented in an attractive way to Dutch youth by linking it to the past of the Netherlands as a naval power. The poster features the large head of Michiel de Ruyter – in a deep orange glow. Here, orange is not linked to the royal family, but to the Netherlands and to the naval heroes of the seventeenth century – the fleet in the background will represent that of the famous Battle of Chatham.
The posters show combinations of symbols during the war, initially used in an attempt to Nazify the Netherlands, and later as part of hate campaigns against the Allies, Jews and Russians. The tone became grimmer as the terror increased. Nevertheless, it is completely uncertain what effects the poster propaganda had during the war. However, collectors in various places did already make efforts during the war to collect leaflets, posters and illegal publications. As a result, there are now collections in various libraries, such as those in Deventer, the Leiden University Library, the NIOD and the KB.
