On September 12, 1944, the villages of Mesch, Mheer and Noorbeek in the far south of Limburg were liberated. At the time, no one thought it possible that liberation would come for the rest of the province six months later, nor that it would be by sharp contrasts.
Most of South Limburg got off relatively easily in the absence of German resistance. However, a fierce battle soon broke out in the centre and north of the province. Thousands of soldiers and civilians were killed. Artillery shelling, bombings, looting, raids, deportations and forced evacuations defined the everyday for months. Places like Venlo, Venray and Gennep turned into a wasteland of rubble. People lived in miserable conditions in cellars. Famine always lurked about.
It was not until March 3 1945 that Allied troops arrived in the northern Limburg villages of Arcen and Velden, Bergen and Well. That marked liberation of the entire province as a fact. The price of freedom had been immense and had left an indelible mark. Hundreds of monuments, plaques and other memorials keep the memory alive so that we never forget.
