[WW II] Very important manuscripts]

Manuscript from the prisoner's camp in Neu-Brandenburg, written there late 1944, the foreword written and signed by De Generaal majoor kampoudste N.T. Carstens (late 1944). 103 single-sided written pages of text with 10 drawings in pen and crayon bound inbetween, many illustrations in the text itself, bound in contemporary green gilt-lettered cloth, 30x21cm.

A note in pen on inside front cover: "Ter gelegenheid van de jaarwisseling aangeboden aan Dr. L. Koster - Officier van gezondheid 1e klasse, Chef M.G.D. Oflag 67, Barakcommandant van Barak 13, Januari 1945." Separately inserted are some memorabilia, including a poem which instructs the one holding the book to do so carefully and with clean hands; a page with the text "Bijeenkomst ter gelegenheid van het 74ste lustrum der leidse Universiteit, gehouden op wosndag 7 maart 1945 in Oflag 67 te Neu Brandenburg" (with 43 original signatures of the participants and a drawing of the city hall tower in Leiden); A neatly written report on grid paper of a game of bridge played on 26 December 1944, a drawing of the barracks where the game was played on the front of the blue paper folder that holds it; an uncompleted, signed menu dated "Neu Brandenburg, April 1944" titled "ter herdenking van de herovering van Stanislau", with a map of the city's surroundings (the prisoner's camp was moved from Stanislau to Neu-Brandenburg just before the reconquest). Next to the foreword and a necrology, the book itself consists of two parts: Part I: "Het wereldgebeuren" (with the political and military developments of 1944) and Part II "1944 achter prikkeldraad" (with the developments, events, and activities in the prisoner's camp). With: a similar album of the same size, in which complete similar text is written out but in a different hand, and differently (even finer than the first album) illustrated, bound in brown cloth with gilt-lettered title "het zesde oorlogsjaar" on the front cover. Two extremely important, touching original yearbooks, where the second has a loose inlay sheet in which the creation of the books is explained in calligraphied text: "(...) Een tenslotte met zeven geheime radio-ontvangers werkende Berichtendienst, met Berichtenofficieren in alle barakken, heeft in "Oflag 67" bij Neubrandenburg deze afzondering verbroken en allen [sic] krijgsgevangenen in dit kamp meermalen daags voorzien van het wereldnieuws, van de geallieerde berichten betreffende het verloop der oorlogshandelingen en van de dagelijksche mededeelingen van Radio Oranje over den toestand in het Vaderland. Deze berichtgeving maakte het mogelijk aan het eind van 1944 een jaaroverzicht samen te stellen, waaraan een overzicht van ket kampleven werd verbonden. Elk der eenentwintig halve barakken verwerkte dit overzicht, op eigen wijze, met eigen zeer beperkte middelen en in het geheim, tot een voor de bewoners der halve barak bestemd exemplaar." Aside from these "normal" specimens the inlay also mentions a copy for Queen Wilhelmina, which brings the total number of copies to 22, of which our lot has two. Considering the elaborateness and the inlay, the brown cloth-bound copy might even be the copy for Wilhelmina. The green cloth-bound copy (the copy for barracks 13) was auctioned in May 1996 at Bubb Kuyper in Haarlem, where it sold for 2800 Guilders.