Thread: Dutch / Netherlands forces - WW2 burials in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia

Lutwyche military cemetery here in Brisbane is the CWGC official burial site and features the Cross of Sacrifice and memorial scrolls for those with no known grave. It also has plaques with a bit of Australian WW2 history and statistics on the burials within it's grounds.

While I was taking some photos there I noticed that besides the Australian commemorations there were a couple of members of the ROYAL NETHERLANDS NAVY interred there, having died in JUNE & JULY 1946 (technically after the end of WW2 but within the parameters used by the CWGC).

All I know about the two of them is what I can see on their headstones - which are of slightly different design to each other. I am sure they are both Navy personnel so I don't know if that indicates they are of different rank, or different religion or if it is just the way it turned out.......

Their names are OVERBEKE, MARINUS & BOCHOVE, P.D. – I can't find anything about them on Australian official sites. The internet wasn't much help, it gave me the first name for one of them and one of those pay per view grave photo sites provided some mis-information on one of them.

I suppose I am curious as to how a couple of Dutch servicemen came to be interred in Brisbane, passing away 12 months after the war had ended. I know that Dutch troops would have still been in action around then, alongside British / Indian forces in what is now Indonesia - but that doesn't really explain how they ended up here.

There were quite a few Dutch navy types in Australia during WW2 and maybe these two members remained here for medical treatment and died within a short time of each other a fair while later.


cheers


Dave


PS - please let me know if these images are too big and I will re-size them and re-post