Dutch Girl

by Robert Matzen

  Audrey in 1943. (Dotti Collection.)

  Inside the Dansschool, Audrey and Elisabeth Evers (center) practice for Winja Marova (right) in December 1943.

  After each performance Audrey would be showered with bouquets. A calling card was attached to each, like the one from her opa, the baron, and another from Tante Arnoudina, youngest of her aunts, the baronesses. Audrey cherished them all her life. (All photos, Dotti Collection.)

  Costumes and poses from the January and February 1944 recitals are captured in the studio. These performances would be Audrey’s last during the war.

  Audrey Hepburn’s Arnhem revolves around the Lauwersgracht at right in the photo. Once part of the moat around the city, this small lake sits below the grand Musis Sacrum; to the left is the Stadsschouwburg; below is the Muziekschool. (Copyright Aviodrome Lelystad.)

  Parachutes fill the sky of the Netherlands on a quiet Sunday. (U.S. Library of Congress image ww2-109.)

  Prisoners from the 1st Airborne Division are marched through Velp for days. (Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-S73820/CCBY-SA 3.0.)

  Frost’s men occupied these buildings during the battle, so the Germans pounded them with artillery before setting many ablaze. By the end of the battle for the Arnhem Road Bridge, all of central Arnhem is destroyed. (Spaarnestad.)

  Audrey’s beloved Muziekschool, which stands within the bridge battle zone, could not be saved. (Gelders Archief: 1584-1339, N. Kramer, CC-BY-4.0 license.)

  Castle Rozendaal, home of the van Pallandts. The van Heemstras spend many cordial evenings here—until the war comes calling. (Gelders Archief: 1613-720, H. ter Hall, CC0 1.0 license.)

  Nine die the night of 27 March 1945 when a malfunctioning V1 falls on Oranjestraat in Velp. The threat of V1s ratchets up the terror level for months. (Brouerius van Nidek.)

  On the beech-lined Ringallee looking toward Rozendaalselaan, Canadian armored vehicles rumble through on 16 April 1945. (mevr. C.L. Bosma-van het Kaar.)

  Wilhelmine Visser ’t Hooft (left) chats with her neighbors while a Canadian soldier drinks from a bottle of wine offered by Dr. Hendrik Visser ’t Hooft, who is smiling and looking at the camera. Another bottle of wine from his secret collection is stuffed in his pocket. (Visser ’t Hooft Family.)

  Canadian armor on Hoofdstraat signals the end of the occupation. In the right foreground is the Hotel Naeff, which the SS burned to destroy records during Market Garden. Past the hotel, damage from Allied fighter attacks on German columns can be seen in a building’s wall and roof. (mevr. W.G. Matser-Wassink.)

  Audrey returns to Velp for a 25 April 1946 dance recital to raise money for the Red Cross. That same day she poses for publicity photos at an Arnhem studio. (All photos, Dotti Collection.)

  At the Cambridge Theatre in December 1949, dancers Gillian Moran and Adele pose with Audrey in a publicity shot for Sauce Tartare. (Heritage Images/Keystone Archivers/akg-images.)

  Ella and Audrey take a stroll in London. (Copyrighted material; Dotti Collection.)

  On 5 November 1954, the last day of their whirlwind tour of the Netherlands, Mel and Audrey Ferrer step away from a wreath they laid at a memorial to the British 1st Airborne Division in Oosterbeek. (Nationaal Archief/Collection Anefo.)

  In 1957 the stress of a day in Switzerland with “Fritzi” and Otto Frank is visible on Audrey’s face. He had asked her to portray his daughter Anne in an upcoming film; she will tell him that, for a variety of reasons, she can’t. (Eva Schloss, photographer; Anne Frank House.)

  Chapter Notes

  1. Rapture

  Many sources provided context for the heady times of the 1935 Reichsparteitag in Nuremberg. First and most important were the two short pieces that Ella wrote for the British fascists, which captured her point of view as a European looking at Hitler’s accomplishments. At this time, Ella’s thinking mirrored that of Diana Mitford, who as Diana Mosley wrote A Life of Contrasts: The Autobiography of Diana Mosley, a book that clearly described the Munich and Nuremberg of 1935 and especially provided a perspective on Hitler that contrasts the hindsight of today. Leni Riefenstahl’s Triumph of the Will set the scene and the mood for events of September 1935 because it had been shot just a year earlier at the same locations. The Nuremberg Rallies by Alan Wykes provided logistics on the week of activities. Ella blithely stumbled into a crossroads in history, met Hitler, and then watched the world come apart in the intervening ten-year period. And as events unfolded, her daughter came of age.

  2. The Blood of Frisia

  Various family trees and Dutch histories were consulted to develop the history of the van Heemstra family. The Gelders Archief in Arnhem provided birth and marriage registrations for most of the van Heemstras who lived in Gelderland. Background on A.J.A.A., Baron van Heemstra, and his cousin, Schelte, Baron van Heemstra, was courtesy of Huygens ING and various clippings from the Arnhemsche Courant. Ella’s description of her father appeared in an unpublished autobiographical novel that she wrote. Barry Paris’s landmark Audrey Hepburn was the starting point on Ella’s marriages and the globe-trotting of her youth. Several sources provided depth on Sir Oswald Mosley and the BUF movement, primarily Nicholas Mosley’s Rules of the Game and Beyond the Pale, plus Robert Skidelsky’s biography Oswald Mosley and Anne de Courcy’s Diana Mosley. The published letters of the Mitford sisters were extremely valuable, as was Diana Mitford Mosley’s memoir, A Life of Contrasts. And of course, Ella van Heemstra’s two published pieces on behalf of the British fascists speak for themselves. Background on the Reichsparteitag came from The Nuremberg Rallies by Alan Wykes and from Leni Riefenstahl’s Triumph of the Will.

  Sean Ferrer provided his mother’s memories of going gliding with her father in Audrey Hepburn, An Elegant Spirit. Various documents in the Gelders Archief prove Baron van Heemstra’s ownership of Villa Roestenburg on the Pietersbergseweg in Oosterbeek in the 1930s, and site visits there with my guide, historian Robert Voskuil, provided rich detail about the “playground” of Ella’s children during this period. Audrey Hepburn’s reminiscences about the departure of her father are recounted here from various interviews, primarily for US magazine, 17 October 1988, and Parade, 5 March 1989. It was in the later interviews that Audrey felt more comfortable psychoanalyzing herself about the traumas of childhood. Luca Dotti provided perspective on his mother’s relationship with Joseph Ruston in my June 2018 interview with him.

  3. Exile

  Ella’s writings detail her involvement in the Nuremberg Rallies and visit to Munich. Unity Mitford’s 19 September 1935 letter mentions “Heemstra” by name and places her at the Osteria Bavaria, the restaurant Hitler visited daily. Every letter sent by Unity was on Nazi stationery with a swastika, and each ended, “Heil Hitler!” Meanwhile, back in England, six-year-old Audrey lived in a suddenly less colorful world, as described in a 2 May 1996 newspaper article from County Kent as well as the March/April 2015 issue of Bygone Kent magazine. Audrey spoke about her school and life in Elham in a November 1953 interview for Modern Screen. The Gelders Archief provided details about the van Heemstras in Oosterbeek and the Arnhemsche Courant noted the passing of the Baroness.

  Documents in the Gelders Archief settled once and for all the idea that the elegant old Castle Zijpendaal of Sonsbeek, Arnhem, “belonged” to Ella’s father, or as Hepburn biographer Robyn Karney put it, that Zijpendaal was “one of the comfortable family estates just outside the city.” The reality was, well, reality: The baron was a pensioner and merely rented rooms at Zijpendaal for three years. He wasn’t forced out by Nazis; Nazis didn’t confiscate his property or bank account.

  Research work done by the Airborne Museum of Oosterbeek in preparation for the 2017 “Ella & Audrey” exhibit determined that the date of Audrey’s passage from Gatwick to Schiphol on an orange DC-3 was 14 December 1939. There is some anecdotal evidence suggesting that the flight occurred earlier in the autumn because at least one person remembers seeing Audrey in Arnhem in October, but nothing concrete can be determined. Audrey recounted the experience of the
airplane ride for Dominick Dunne in Vanity Fair’s May 1991 issue.

  4. Edda

  While in the Netherlands, I asked several people of the war generation what it meant to be Dutch, and what made them special. Their answers provided some of these descriptions; other parts resulted from reading Dutch war diaries and from visits to various homes and churches. Audrey spoke testily about the lack of van Heemstra wealth in the Philadelphia Inquirer’s 13 May 1990 issue and about her need for love in Richard Brown’s 1991 article for the My Fair Lady restoration program. Descriptions of the apartment building on Jansbinnensingel in Arnhem Centraal come from my site visits and from Miepje Quarles van Ufford’s description in the 23 December 1993 issue of De Gelderlander in an article entitled “The Foggy War Years of Audrey Hepburn” by Hélene van Beck. Some authors have described this address, Jansbinnensingel 8A, as a house, but it was and still is a storefront with apartments above it. Robert Wolders’ description of Ella was found in the Barry Paris papers at the University of Pittsburgh. Wolders sat for a lengthy interview about Audrey conducted after her death. Audrey’s descriptions of the Holland of her mother were taken from Ivo Niehe’s 1988 interview with Audrey for AVROTROS television in the Netherlands, an extended version of which was broadcast on 6 August 2018.

  The concept of “Edda van Heemstra” was puzzling to me—the popular mythology is that Edda was an invention to keep the occupying Germans from knowing that Audrey was English. But Audrey was enrolled as Edda in grade school five months before the Germans marched in. On the other hand, documents in the Nationaal Archief confirm that the baroness was very much pro-German before and after the 10 May 1940 occupation, so Ella herself must have wanted to downplay the fact that her daughter was English because her Nazi friends would look upon it with disfavor—Germany and England were then at war. Audrey was quoted about her early Dutch school experiences in Ian Woodward’s biography, Audrey Hepburn. A very interesting Dutch source was the 3 October 1953 issue of Het Vrije Volk in which her teachers and classmates were interviewed at the time of Audrey’s appearance in Roman Holiday, just a dozen years after Audrey/Edda attended the Tamboersbosje school.

  Biographers haven’t understood the importance to Audrey Hepburn’s life of the 29 December 1939 war benefit at the Schouwburg. It was here that she first experienced a ballet performance in Arnhem—and a performance by her eventual teacher, Winja Marova, at that. The evening’s activities were covered extensively in the Arnhemsche Courant, and supporting documents in the Gelders Archief placed Audrey in the Queen’s Gold Circle seats. My April 2018 tour of the theater and its two balconies gave authenticity to the narrative. Documents related to the Sadler’s Wells Dutch tour were found in the Paris papers, including Annabel Farjeon’s diary. Margo Fonteyn’s memory of standing on the bridge appeared in Autobiography: Margo Fonteyn, and Audrey’s reminiscence about the ballet evening were found in the May 1991 Vanity Fair interview. I couldn’t help but foreshadow the battle of Arnhem because of how tied to the “Bridge Too Far” the van Heemstras were. All three of the structures beside the bridge ramp had been inhabited by van Heemstras or van Limburg Stirums and all would be destroyed in the thick of the fighting on 18 and 19 September 1944.

  5. The Unthinkable

  My site visits to Arnhem Centraal are the backbone of this and all the other Arnhem chapters. Audrey was eloquent in describing the day of German occupation. She discussed it in Vanity Fair with Dominick Dunne and was quoted in Ian Woodward’s Audrey Hepburn as well as in the 6 August 1994 issue of the Sydney Morning Herald.

  Time and distance have sapped the drama of the time, and I thought it important to present to the reader the tension and unreality of German troops in Arnhem after they had so carefully avoided setting foot in the Netherlands in the Great War. Detail about 10 May in Arnhem and elsewhere in the Netherlands came courtesy of Robert Kershaw’s A Street in Arnhem and several eyewitness reminiscences, including Sid Baron’s The Way It Was and Cornelia Fuykschot’s Hunger in Holland.

  6. Dancer

  Loe de Jong’s masterwork, Het Koninkrijk der Nederlanden in de Tweede Wereldoorlog, provided the backbone of the Dutch perspective on the war and a day-by-day account of the deepening German occupation. The Lion Rampant, the account of the Nazis in Holland written by de Jong and Joseph W.F. Stoppelman and published during the war, was also invaluable. Audrey spoke of “hearts and minds” in her Donahue TV appearance in 1990. Information about Ella and the Diaconessenhuis was found in CABR dossier number 108579 on Ella van Heemstra in the Nationaal Archief at The Hague. The quote from Marova about Audrey appeared in the 1953 Het Vrije Volk article, and Audrey’s about Marova appeared in Paris’s Audrey Hepburn.

  Another myth to be dispelled about Audrey Hepburn concerned the supposed use of the name Edda throughout the war. In truth, she was billed as Audrey Hepburn-Ruston in every dance program, in the newspaper, and in other advertising about the Dansschool and its performances from 1941 on. Ella had no problem promoting her daughter using a very English-sounding name.

  Site visits to Zijpendaal helped me paint a picture of this peaceful setting, and my interview with Joop Onnekink set the scene for the baron’s rooms inside. Audrey’s descriptions of her childhood reading habits appeared in Woodward. Mevrouw Zegwaart’s papers related to Zijpendaal are housed in the Gelders Archief and provided colorful detail about the back and forth between her and the baron.

  Two of the most important people of Audrey’s youth have all but disappeared from history—her aunt and uncle, Meisje and Otto. As Audrey grew into adolescence and had neither a father nor an affectionate mother, her uncle and aunt filled these roles. She would mention Otto often as an adult but never speak in emotional terms about him in life. I believe she had to shut out the loving memories because they were too painful, given what happened in August 1942.

  7. Pencil Scratches

  It seemed to me that showing Audrey at various points of her life would help readers to understand just how much a product of the war she was. She became who the war made her. This chapter is based on information about her personality gleaned from all the research. It also contains information from Lindsay Anderson’s production diary that became the book Making a Film: The Story of ‘Secret People’ and from viewings of this interesting, important, and overlooked picture in the early career of film star Audrey Hepburn.

  8. Unacceptable

  Information about Otto Ernst Gelder, Count van Limburg Stirum, was found in the Gelders Archief, and articles on his cases appeared in various issues of the Provinciale Drentsche en Asser Courant. A description of the seemingly silly case of the man accused of singing a song—the case that was Otto’s undoing—was found in “Rechters in oorlogstijd: de confrontatie van de Nederlandse rechterlijke macht met nationaal-socialisme en besetting,” compiled by the Boom Juridische Uitgevers of The Hague and published in 2007 by the Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen.

  Information about Draaisma’s involvement with the NSB was found in dossier CABR 108802 in the Nationaal Archief at The Hague. The Monné description of Ella came courtesy of the De Gelderlander article. Audrey’s professional debut at the Wehrmachtheim was covered extensively in the Courant, and the memories of Marova were found in Het Vrije Volk. Because of the extreme post-war backlash against anything Nazi, Audrey was careful never to mention that she first danced for an audience of German soldiers. It was a fact that could do nothing but harm her career. She carried no guilt about this; she was a dancer and she danced, but would the world understand that?

  The Mozart celebration organized by Ella proved conclusively that she was pro-German and working with the Arnhem NSB at this point in the war. Articles in the Courant detailed the preparations for this event and then its execution, and lavish praise was heaped upon the baroness for her wonderful work to honor the German hero, Mozart. The Gelders Archief provided background on the various van Heemstras and their roles. Loe de Jong’s work led to understanding of the reason for Otto’s autumn 1941 dismissal f
rom the Arnhem court as ordered by J.J. Schrieke.

  9. Born for the Spotlight

  Audrey discussed her mother in the November 1953 issue of Modern Screen magazine. The quotes from Ella van Heemstra and Alfred Heineken III were found in Paris. Evidence that Audrey attended the H.B.S. Meisjes School in Arnhem was provided in the family history of one of her classmates, Koosje Heineman. Ella’s letter to Chiel de Boer is in the collection of Theater Instituut Nederland in Amsterdam. Audrey’s quote about wanting to dance solo roles was found in Alexander Walker’s Audrey: The Real Story. Annabel Farjeon’s diary was found in the Paris papers, and Margot Fonteyn’s quote about the rigors of dance was taken from her Autobiography. I followed the route Audrey walked from Jansbinnensingel 8A to the Muziekschool in Arnhem during site visits.

  Rosemarie Kamphuisen of Velp connected me with information provided by her friend Koosje Heineman, whose family historical record settled the matter of whether Audrey had attended secondary school in Arnhem.

  Steven Jansen’s dagboek, or diary, is one of the most important sources to the Dutch Girl narrative. Jansen was a resident of Oranjestraat in Velp and kept a running account of daily life in the village through the war years, which was published in 1945 as Velp en de Oorlog 1940–1945. Details about the winter and the institution of the Kultuurkamer were found in The Lion Rampant by de Jong and Stoppelman. Seyss-Inquart’s quote was found in his Nuremberg testimony. Details about Draaisma were taken from CABR 108802, dossier E12945 PR. A. Arnhem 7462 in the Nationaal Archief at The Hague. Information about the baron’s decision to leave Zijpendaal and about his new home, Villa Beukenhof, was found at the Gelders Archief; this includes the fact that he didn’t own this villa but rather rented it from the Reformed Church after it had been bequeathed by a private party. Descriptions of the house found in this book are based on photos and blueprints also filed at the Gelders Archief, and descriptions of Rozendaalselaan in Velp are the result of several site visits. Details of the arrest of Otto, Count van Limburg Stirum, were found in his diary, which is filed at the NIOD, the Dutch War Archive in Amsterdam.