The teen assassins who lured hundreds of Nazis to their deaths
WITH powdered faces, mascarafluffed lashes and lips glossed ruby red, the trio of young beauties would head for bars and clubs, flirting shamelessly with Nazi officers. After a few drinks the girls led the German soldiers for a romantic walk in the woods, their eyes promising some escape from the horrors of the SecondWorldWar in occupied Holland.
They may have been tenderly holding the hands of the young men they had singled out, but these smiling seductresses were actually luring them to swift and brutal deaths.
For waiting in the forest were gunmen collaborating with the three femmes fatales: the most unlikely killers of the Dutch resistance.
As we approach the 80th anniversary of the German occupation of the Netherlands next year, a dramatic new book reveals the daring exploits of a trio of young Dutch assassins in high heels who beguiled Nazis to their graves – often pulling the trigger themselves – and the terrible toll their heroism took on them.
“Their youth and beauty were their secret weapons,” says Sophie Poldermans, author of new book Seducing And Killing Nazis. “The Germans expected resistance fighters to be older men, so three pretty young girls were inconspicuous as they enticed soldiers to their deaths.
“They would dress up nicely, chat and giggle with German soldiers, coax information from them, and lure them into the woods where they’d be killed.”
Flame-haired Hannie Schaft was 19 when war broke out, and blue-eyed sisters Truus and Freddie Oversteegen were 16 and 14. Horrified by Nazi atrocities, the trio joined the Dutch resistance in Haarlem. Beginning as couriers, hiding refugees and mapping German defences, they quickly graduated to sabotage, bombing Nazi military installations, power plants and trains.
Trained by the resistance to shoot and kill, the girls slipped 9mm pistols into their bags alongside their lipstick and rouge, and began killing German soldiers and Dutch collaborators. “We only shot the real traitors,” insisted Freddie.
But every mission was fraught with danger.
“Resistance fighters were often killed in attacks, and the girls knew they could be next,” says the author. “Before any attack Hannie always combed her red hair, powdered her face and applied lipstick, saying that if the mission went wrong, she wanted ‘to die beautifully.’”
But for every Nazi they killed, the Germans would kill 10 hostages in retribution. They watched in horror as Nazis torched homes and shot innocent victims plucked from the streets after one attack.
“Reprisals preyed on their minds,” says Poldermans, a human rights lawyer in Holland. “That was a heavy burden to bear.”
Assassinations were usually meticulously