Industrialist kidnapped by IRA returns home after 36-day ordeal

The Sunday Post reported on the kidnapping of a Dutch businessman by the Provisional IRA on November 9, 1975.

“Tiede Herrema was back in Holland last night after his 18-day council house siege ordeal in Ireland,” read The Post. “Five hundred people turned up at Rotterdam airport to cheer him home. In all, Herrema, head of a steel plant in Limerick, spent 36 days a prisoner.

“Before flying home, he took from his pocket the actual bullet that might have blown out his brains if things had gone wrong. Dr Herrema showed reporters the .38 bullet given by his captors, Eddie Gallagher and Marian Coyle. ‘This was in the gun held to my head,’ he said. ‘Maybe, if things had gone wrong, it would have been the bullet which would have taken my life.’

“Dr Herrema had flown from Holland after being woken with the good news. At the airport she said she felt sorry for the kidnappers. ‘They must be very unhappy.’!

Herrema was kidnapped by the terrorists as part of a campaign to secure the release of prisoners. They were traced to a house in Co Kildare, where a siege began lasting two weeks – the longest in Irish history. For their part, the kidnappers were sentenced to 15 years in prison, which Herrema described as too long.