The bullet that struck the back of her head did not kill her. Hannie Schaft, still standing, looked at the man leveling his gun at her, a Nazi official named Matthijs Schmitz, and spoke her final words, allegedly, “I shoot better. ” Then Martin Kuiper fired another bullet, and this one killed her. She was 24 years old.

It was the 17th of April 1945, just 18 days before the Netherlands was liberated. She had been caught, tortured, and identified. For over two years, the Nazis had hunted for the girl with the red hair, the assassin who had killed at least six targets, sabotaged infrastructure, and seduced high-ranking German officers before luring them into the woods. Adolf Hitler himself had ordered her captured, dead or alive.

Now, three weeks before liberation, despite an agreement between the occupier and the Dutch resistance to halt executions, the Nazis killed her anyway. Her name was Johanna Jannetje “Hannie” Schaft. She was not born a soldier. She came into the world on the 16th of December 1920, in Haarlem, the Netherlands, into a household that had been shaped by grief.

Her older sister, Annie, had died of diphtheria at age seven, and in the aftermath, her parents raised Hannie with extraordinary care, keeping a watchful eye over her. That same household, however, was not a quiet one. Her parents followed world affairs closely and discussed them openly at dinner, and Hannie’s father, Pieter, was a dedicated supporter of the Social Democratic Workers’ Party, the SDAP. His leftist convictions took root in his daughter early, giving her a strong sense of social justice and a deep, abiding hatred of fascism.

At home, Hannie was open and talkative, but at school, she was quiet, a trait compounded by her bright red hair, which made her a constant target of ridicule and mockery. In 1938, after finishing high school in Haarlem, she enrolled at the University of Amsterdam, intent on becoming a human rights lawyer. There she befriended two Jewish students, Sonja Frank and Philine Polak, friendships that made the Nazi persecution of Jews feel personal. The war began on the 1st of September 1939, with Germany’s invasion of Poland.

Hannie’s resistance spirit surfaced early. Through the Red Cross, she sent food and other supplies to imprisoned Polish soldiers. Then, on the 10th of May 1940, Germany invaded the Netherlands. Within days, a civilian administration was installed under SS auspices, and Arthur Seyss-Inquart was appointed Reich Commissioner.

One of his first acts was a series of laws imposing economic discrimination against Jews. In 1940, Jews were banned from the Civil Service and required to register the assets of their business enterprises. In January 1941, all Jews were ordered to register themselves. The Germans claimed this was for their own safety, but the true purpose was future deportations; the registry made it easy to track them down.

A total of 159,806 people were registered, including 19,561 persons born of mixed marriages and some 25,000 Jewish refugees from Germany. In February 1941, with the German grip tightening, Hannie founded a debate group called Gamma, where criticisms of the Nazi occupation and anti-Semitism were frequent topics. She also wrote articles for the university paper, criticizing the segregation of Jewish students. Segregation would soon escalate.

On the 22nd and 23rd of February 1941, German forces raided the Jewish quarter in Amsterdam, arresting and deporting more than 400 Jewish men to the Buchenwald and Mauthausen concentration camps. The Dutch response was unique in all Nazi-occupied Europe: they organized the February Strike, a two-day general strike that began on the 25th of February 1941. German officials brutally suppressed it, and the consequences were severe. Nazi policy hardened.

German authorities and collaborating Dutch officials segregated Jews from the general population, incarcerated 15,000 in forced labor camps, and ordered the concentration of Jews in Amsterdam. Foreign and stateless Jews were sent to the Westerbork transit camp in the northeast, while some provincial Jews were sent to the Vught camp. Daily life for Jews became a catalog of prohibitions. “Forbidden for Jews” signs appeared on the doors and gates of cafes, swimming pools, sports fields, museums, zoos, libraries, theaters, markets, and countless other public places.

Jews were forced to hand over their valuables, and their businesses were confiscated. On the 29th of April 1942, the Netherlands announced regulations forcing Jews to wear a yellow Star of David on their clothing. After the 5th of May, anyone caught without the badge was arrested and detained for six weeks at a Dutch camp called Amersfoort; everyone knew this was effectively a death sentence. The deportations began in July 1942, and in the two years that followed, until the last train left for Auschwitz on the 3rd of September 1944, the Germans and their Dutch collaborators deported some 107,000 Jews, mostly to Auschwitz and Sobibór, where they were murdered.

Only 5,200 survived. Another 25,000 to 30,000 went into hiding, assisted by the Dutch underground; two-thirds of them survived. In 1943, university students in the Netherlands were required to sign a declaration of allegiance to the occupation authorities. Hannie Schaft refused, just as some 80 other students did.

She could no longer continue her studies. In the summer of 1943, she moved back in with her parents in Haarlem, bringing her Jewish friends Sonja Frank and Philine Polak with her. She obtained forged identification papers for them so they could evade Nazi checkpoints. Leaving university did not mean leaving the struggle.

Hannie joined the Council of Resistance, a movement with close ties to the Communist Party of the Netherlands. It was there that she met two sisters, Truus and Freddie Oversteegen. Despite being young and female, the three formed a trio in the Dutch resistance that was feared by the Germans and by Dutch Nazi collaborators alike. In the group, Hannie pursued her career in human rights law and was the intellectual member; Truus was decisive, their practical leader; and Freddie, fierce and feminine, mapped out their missions.

Hannie did not want to be a courier. She wanted to work with weapons. She was responsible for sabotaging targets and assassinating those deemed enemies. It is unclear exactly how many attacks can be attributed to her, but it is believed there were at least six.

Before an operation, she would put on makeup—lipstick and mascara—and style her hair. She once explained her reasoning to Truus: “I’ll die clean and beautiful. ”

She and the Oversteegen sisters gathered vital information, provided Jewish children with safe houses, stole identification papers, and bombed railways. Hannie spoke fluent German and, together with Truus and Freddie, became involved with German soldiers.

They would seduce high-ranking Nazi officers, lure them into the woods, and kill them. Hannie was also involved in killing or wounding a baker known for betraying people, a hairdresser who worked for the Nazi intelligence agency, and a Nazi police officer named Willem Ragut. Soon, she was known as “the girl with the red hair,” placed on the Nazis’ most-wanted list. Hitler personally ordered her capture.

They targeted Nazi offices and Dutch collaborators who gave the Nazis details of Jewish and dissident families. Yet there were lines they would not cross. When resistance commanders asked them to kidnap the three children of Reich Commissioner Arthur Seyss-Inquart, Hannie and the Oversteegens refused. They argued, “Resistance fighters do not kill children.

We only fight against real fascists, not against children. ”

Hannie also worked closely with a founder of the resistance, Jan Bonekamp, whom she greatly admired. He was charismatic, fearless, and handsome; the two were rumored to have shared a romantic relationship. On the 21st of June 1944, Hannie and Bonekamp carried out an ambush of Willem Ragut, the collaborating police officer.

Hannie fired first and hit Ragut in the back. But before he died, Ragut shot Bonekamp in the stomach. Mortally wounded, Bonekamp still managed to kill Ragut. The two resistance fighters fled in different directions.

Hannie got away. Bonekamp was arrested and taken to a hospital. There, in his final hours, he made a fatal error: he gave Hannie’s name and address to nurses who were actually Dutch Nazis, pretending to be resistance workers. Jan Bonekamp died of his injuries.

A week later, Nazis raided Hannie’s parents’ house and sent her parents to a Dutch concentration camp. Grief overwhelmed her; she nearly turned herself in. Resistance comrades ordered her to stay with the Oversteegen sisters until she calmed down. She stopped working for the resistance, overwhelmed by distress and her grief over Bonekamp’s death.

When her parents were released several months later, she decided to return. She disguised herself, dyeing her hair black and wearing wire-framed glasses. She resumed her work: assassinations, sabotage, courier duty, the transportation of illegal weapons, and the dissemination of illegal newspapers. Her dedication was short-lived.

On the 21st of March 1945, Hannie Schaft was caught during a police patrol while in possession of two resistance-friendly newspapers and a pistol. She was arrested and brought to a prison in Amsterdam, where she was tortured and interrogated. When she was forced to wash her hair, the red returned, and the Nazis knew they had finally found the assassin they had been searching for. Three weeks before the end of the war, she was taken to the dunes of Overveen, near Bloemendaal.

Matthijs Schmitz leveled his gun. The first bullet struck her in the head but only wounded her. She remained standing and spoke what would be reported as her final words: “I shoot better. ” Martin Kuiper fired the second shot, and she died.

The place where she was killed became a mass grave for over 400 Dutch resistance fighters, including Hannie herself. On the 27th of November 1945, she was reburied in a state funeral at the Dutch Honorary Cemetery in Bloemendaal. Members of the Dutch government and royal family attended, including Queen Wilhelmina, who called Schaft “the symbol of the resistance. ” Supreme Allied Commander Dwight Eisenhower awarded her a posthumous Medal of Freedom.

After the war, she became known as one of the bravest resistance fighters of World War II in the Netherlands and abroad. Her legacy suffered during the Cold War because of her communist ties. More recently, however, in 2020, Deputy Prime Minister Kajsa Ollongren honored her on the 100th anniversary of her birth. Ollongren said, “Hannie fought for freedom and a society in which everyone has the right to participate.

Her life teaches us that we must not look away from the fight against evil. ” There were many tears shed for Hannie Schaft.