SCJ MARTYRS pt. 3

Victims of War Crimes?
The Dutch SCJs in Indonesia

The death of 11 Dutch SCJs in a Japanese concentration camp at Muntok on Banka Island in Indonesia between 1944 and 1945 is a part of a very complex story. It is tied up with the war crimes of the Japanese against the civil population of occupied countries, the fall of Holland as a colonial power, the rise of an Indonesian independence movement, World War II in the Pacific area, and, last but not least, the life and sufferings of individual SCJs. To be more precise, it is the culmination of many diverse elements coming together interdependently making it difficult to give suitable consideration of the witness given by these SCJs. For these reasons they have often been consigned to oblivion.

On February 15, 1942, Japanese troops overran the island of Sumatra, a part of the Dutch colonial empire and occupied the city of Palembang. While many Dutch soldiers and European nationals fled to the island of Java, all the religious and priests decided to remain on Sumatra to continue their mission of running parishes, schools and hospitals. Initially after the invasion the mission work continued unimpeded.

This situation changed radically starting on April 1,1942, when all the European nationals (civilians and religious) were interred. The men were imprisoned in Palembang, while the women and children were quartered in some European homes. Later on the internees were forced to construct with their own hands two concentration camps, one for women and the other for men. They were interred there for the next 17 months and began their first steps toward their own Calvary.

The principal problem initially was the scarcity of both food and medicine. It was only after the first deaths occurred that they were allowed to be seen by doctors and to receive some medication. In the camps, the internees organized their daily lives by establishing a school, running meetings, offering cultural and religious activities, etc. All this was done behind barb wire and under the watchful eye of the Japanese military.

The Japanese looked for ways to ingratiate themselves with the local population and portrayed themselves as allies against European colonialism. In fact the Sumatran people looked for ways to help many of the Europeans and for the first time Indonesians assumed high administrative positions in order to help Europeans, even if it had to be from a distance. In time, this strategy of the Japanese contributed to the Indonesian independence movement to a degree not foreseen by the Japanese.

Soon after Indonesian independence was proclaimed, Christianity was portrayed by the Japanese as the religion of the European colonialists and encouraged the return to traditional religions. Priests and religious apart from their religious functions were suspected of being subversive to the order imposed by the Japanese.

In July and August 1943 the Japanese began a policy of vigorously rounding up of persons suspected of collaborating with the allies. Consequently, many Europeans in the concentration camps in Palembang, and among them many religious, were deported to Muntok on the island of Banka.

Muntok is an arid area with a very harsh climate. The daily ration of rice varied from 100 to 300 grams. This treatment was the practice in Japanese concentration camps to weaken and slowly exterminate prisoners. The lack of nutrition led to the elimination of activities such as schools. Often the internees became too weak to attend camp funerals.

In Muntok, due to the lack of nutrition, 250 out of some 942 men died; similar statistics applied to the women; probably greater numbers of children died. Among those who died were 11 Dutch SCJs: Fr. Heinrich Norbert van Oort, Fr. Peter Matthias Cobben, Fr. Francis Hofstad, Fr. Isidore Gabriel Mikkers, Fr. Theodore Thomas Kappers, Fr. Andrew Gebbing, Fr. Peter Nicasius van Eyk, Fr. Francis John v. Iersel, Fr. Wilhelm Francisc Hoffmann, Br. Matthew Gerard Schulte, and Br. Wilfrid Theodore van der Werf.

In February 1945, the prisoners were transferred one last time to another camp at Belalua in South Sumatra where the conditions were better; but due to the tortures endured at Muntok another 96 men and 59 women died. On August 24, 1945 after 40 months of internment the Japanese camp commander announced the Manila armistice ending World War II in the Pacific. One of the SCJs interned there wrote: "For some moments all remained silent. Then a huge 'Hurrah!' exploded and everyone offered well wishes to one another. In the block where we priests were staying we spontaneously sang the Te Deum after praying the rosary. What a wonderful 'Thanks be to God!'"

In his reflections on a new understanding of what constitutes a 'martyr,' Andrea Riccardi wrote: "Why are they martyrs? The reasons are different and vary from one country to another depending on its history. Politics and strategies come together in anticlerical or anti-religious sentiments, or in simple outbreaks of violence, banditry, or the desire to crush freedom. In the end, the story of martyrs is not a book of heroes, but the story of many Christians living by faith and cut down by violence."