Posted on Sep 21, 2021
World War Two: The brothers who fled Nazi occupation by kayak
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PO1 William "Chip" Nagel
..."'He thought today was the day'
A keen university rower, the 22-year-old Henri Peteri had heard of fellow Dutchmen trying to escape to the UK by fishing boat.
He also knew that many had either been caught before reaching the coast or killed when Nazi coastal patrols sank their vessels.
But he had also heard of people managing to reach the UK from Scandinavian countries by canoe.
Might he too, he wondered, cross the North Sea in a craft far smaller than a fishing boat?
Henri talked his brother Willem into taking a chance.
He bought a folding German-made kayak in the Dutch port city of Rotterdam before the pair made their way to a guest house in the village of Katwijk, a village the brothers knew well because they had holidayed there previously.
As night fell, the brothers began putting the kayak together."...
..."'He thought today was the day'
A keen university rower, the 22-year-old Henri Peteri had heard of fellow Dutchmen trying to escape to the UK by fishing boat.
He also knew that many had either been caught before reaching the coast or killed when Nazi coastal patrols sank their vessels.
But he had also heard of people managing to reach the UK from Scandinavian countries by canoe.
Might he too, he wondered, cross the North Sea in a craft far smaller than a fishing boat?
Henri talked his brother Willem into taking a chance.
He bought a folding German-made kayak in the Dutch port city of Rotterdam before the pair made their way to a guest house in the village of Katwijk, a village the brothers knew well because they had holidayed there previously.
As night fell, the brothers began putting the kayak together."...
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