Berendina Annagena “Dien” Freese was among the women recruited for the VK-KNIL in Western Australia in 1944. She subsequently travelled from Perth to Camp Columbia with Joan Butler and Johanna Mol. After undertaking military and medical training, she performed nursing duties in Brisbane, Sydney and Casino before travelling through Singapore to Sumatra, where she cared for people released from Japanese internment.
Her remarkable story survives in a detailed memoir written in her own words. It encompasses not only her military service but also her family’s migration to Western Australia, her Christian faith, nursing career, marriage and contribution to Perth’s developing Dutch community.
From Groningen to Western Australia
Dien was born in Groningen on 15 December 1905. Her father, Jurjen Peter Freese, operated a joinery factory manufacturing doors, window frames, cupboards and church furniture.
The family’s circumstances changed dramatically when money entrusted to a solicitor for improvements to the factory was lost. The solicitor had gambled away money belonging to several clients before taking his own life in Monte Carlo. Jurjen was left bankrupt and had to sell the family’s factory, home and possessions.
At the age of fifty, he decided to begin again overseas. After initially considering Canada, he was persuaded that his carpentry skills would provide opportunities in Western Australia.
Jurjen sailed first and arrived at Fremantle aboard the SS Orvieto on 24 January 1928. He spoke no English but, with assistance from a Baptist minister and members of the local community, found employment and began building a family home in Mount Hawthorn.
Dien, her stepmother and her young half-brother Dirk followed aboard the SS Oronsay, arriving at Fremantle on 26 November 1928. Dien was almost 23.
The house in Anzac Road was still under construction. Only one room had a completed floor, but the family moved in and gradually established its new life overlooking what was then called Monger’s Lake.
Establishing a life in Perth
Dien had studied dressmaking, embroidery and art in Groningen. In Perth she found work with Miss Kneebone, a dressmaker who made clothes for wealthy clients. Dien later established her own dressmaking business in the Royal Arcade at the corner of Hay and Barrack streets.
The Depression created hardship for the family. Her father took government work in the country, including construction of the Wanneroo Road, while Dien supplemented her income by providing evening lessons in cutting and dressmaking.
In 1937, Dien returned to the Netherlands hoping to visit her grandfather. He died shortly before she reached Groningen, but the journey allowed her to renew contact with relatives and friends. She returned to Australia before the outbreak of the Second World War.
Red Cross and nursing preparation
After Germany invaded the Netherlands in May 1940, Dien and her family anxiously followed the news by radio. The Japanese advance and fall of the Netherlands East Indies brought the war much closer to Western Australia.
The Freese family helped accommodate two women and their young children who had escaped from Ambon. Dien and her stepmother also joined the Australian Red Cross.
Dien trained as a Voluntary Aid Detachment nursing auxiliary. She acquired practical experience at St John of God Hospital in Subiaco and Royal Perth Hospital. Her training included basic nursing, military drill and the use of gas masks.
She also helped teach Dutch to Australian women who had married or formed relationships with Dutch servicemen. The Dutch consul supplied books for these classes.
Recruitment into the VK-KNIL
In 1944, a representative of the Netherlands East Indies government visited Perth to recruit Dutch women for the newly established women’s corps. The recruits would be trained for specialist duties and sent to the Netherlands East Indies after the Japanese occupation ended.
Nursing was among the available roles, and Dien volunteered.
Dien travelled east with two other Western Australian recruits, Johanna “Jo” Mol and Joan Butler. Other women who applied in Western Australia included C. J. Leeman and Hazel Whitton.
Dien recalled changing trains several times because of Australia’s different railway gauges. The steam locomotives also left the passengers covered in soot.
Training in Brisbane
In Brisbane, the women were accommodated in Nissen huts at what Dien described as an American women’s camp. Dien and Jo Mol shared a hut, which Dien remembered as comfortable.
They undertook basic military instruction, including marching and drill. Because Dien had volunteered for nursing, an army doctor also instructed her in tropical medicine and nursing.
Her account does not name the Brisbane camp. It should therefore not automatically be identified as Camp Columbia. The description is more consistent with the women’s accommodation and training facilities associated with Yeronga Park, although this remains to be verified.
Dien befriended an American missionary couple, Mr and Mrs Post, who had come from New Guinea and were working as translators for the Netherlands East Indies government. She also remembered attending Baptist and occasional Dutch church services.
Nursing in Sydney
Dien was subsequently transferred to Sydney. She worked at what she called the “Willemina Hospital” and at the Princess Juliana Clinic. The clinic served Dutch naval personnel and members of the local Dutch community.
She formed friendships with several Dutch and Netherlands East Indies families. Among them was the Visser family, refugees from Ambon who had escaped from Timor to Australia in a small sailing vessel. Mr Visser served as a pastor to Dutch people living in Sydney.
The military hospital at Casino
Dien’s next posting was Casino in northern New South Wales. She and the other women lived in an old boarding house rather than at the nearby Dutch military camp, where women were not permitted to be quartered.
The hospital operated from Nissen huts outside the town. Its patients included people from New Guinea and the Netherlands East Indies, while male nurses and orderlies came from Ambon and surrounding islands.
Dien’s recollections provide an unusual picture of daily hospital life. The floors were so rough and frequently wet that the women wore military boots while working. An army doctor visited each day to inspect patients and prescribe treatment.
Dien held the rank of sergeant. During a flight home to Perth on leave, an Australian servicewoman mistook her for a Dutch officer because of her impressive American-style uniform.
She was back in Casino when news of the Japanese surrender arrived in August 1945.
From Australia to Sumatra
Dien expected that her unit would now be sent to the Netherlands East Indies. She packed clothing, soap, toothpaste, washing powder and small gifts intended for people being released from Japanese camps.
The group flew first to Singapore. Dien was shocked by the destruction and by the condition of newly released British prisoners of war, whom she described as “walking skeletons”.
After delays caused by the shortage of aircraft and the disorganisation following Japan’s sudden surrender, the group was flown to Sumatra.
For approximately a week, Dien travelled each day to a women’s internment camp. She helped assess the health of former internees to determine who could be repatriated and who required hospital treatment.
She encountered women and children dressed in rags and suffering from severe malnutrition and illness. Some received news that their husbands had survived; others learned that their husbands had died in captivity.
Dien later accompanied a group of patients to a hospital in Medan.
Nursing former internees in Medan
Dien was initially assigned clerical duties in Medan, despite having little office training. After meeting the hospital matron, she was transferred to nursing because the hospital desperately needed staff.
She worked there for approximately eight months. Many of her patients were former internees suffering from the effects of hunger, forced labour, beatings and prolonged imprisonment. Some continued hiding food because they could not believe that their freedom and access to regular meals would last.
Dien recorded individual stories told by these women. One mother had entered an internment camp with a week-old baby and two toddlers. Her health deteriorated so severely that she later had to learn to walk again. Jewellery she had hidden inside her daughter’s doll before internment was eventually returned to her.
Outside the hospital, the political situation was changing rapidly. Dien saw banners bearing the word Merdeka—freedom—and became aware that Indonesians were fighting for independence from Dutch rule.
As hostility towards Dutch uniforms increased, she was advised not to wear hers in public. At times, shooting could be heard, and hospital doors and windows were barricaded for protection. Japanese soldiers, still under Allied control, were used as armed guards around the hospital.
Dien’s memoir reflects her understanding at the time. It also records her gradual recognition that the end of the war against Japan had been followed by a different conflict between Indonesian independence supporters and the returning Dutch authorities.
Recognition and return to Australia
At a hospital gathering, Dr Smook announced that Sergeant B. A. Freese had qualified for the Remembrance Cross for services rendered in the Netherlands East Indies. No medal was then available, so he ceremonially pinned a small Dutch flag to her uniform. Dien finally received the cross in 1994 after applying for it herself.
After approximately eight months in Medan, Dien decided not to extend her service. Trained nurses were arriving from the Netherlands, and she believed it was time to return home.
She travelled to Batavia to complete her discharge. While staying at the Ursuline convent, she became seriously ill with hepatitis. Her departure was delayed while she received treatment in a civilian hospital.
After recovering, she flew to Darwin, continued through Cloncurry and eventually arrived home in Perth.
Nursing, marriage and family life
Dien found it difficult to settle immediately into civilian life. She had grown to love nursing and was accepted for midwifery training at King Edward Memorial Hospital. After qualifying, she worked at Kensington Private Hospital and later at Hawthorn Private Hospital.
Through St Andrew’s Presbyterian Church, she met Sijbe Knol, a former Royal Netherlands Navy marine who had served aboard the cruiser Tromp. They shared northern Dutch origins, wartime experiences and a commitment to the Reformed faith.
Dien and Sijbe married on 12 November 1949. Three years later, their son Neil was born. In 1957, the family moved into a new home at Dianella.
Contribution to Perth’s Dutch community
During the post-war migration period, Dien and Sijbe welcomed newly arrived Dutch migrants into their home. Together with other Dutch Reformed families, they helped sustain Dutch-language religious and community life in Perth.
Dien’s memoir records the development of the Reformed Church in Western Australia and the friendships formed among migrant families. Her faith remained central throughout her life and shaped her nursing, hospitality and community service.
Dien died on 25 August 2001, aged 95.
Her life connects several important strands of Dutch-Australian history: pre-war migration, the wartime Netherlands East Indies community in Australia, women’s military service, the liberation of Japanese internment camps, the Indonesian independence struggle and the development of the post-war Dutch community in Western Australia.
Dien’s memoir
This article is based principally on Dien Knol-Freese’s own memoir, Memories of Our Life in Australia. The complete memoir, including her detailed family, migration, military, nursing and church history, should remain available below as a downloadable primary source.
Dien wrote many years after the events and occasionally used terminology common to her period that is no longer considered appropriate. Her wording has been retained in the original memoir as historical testimony. The article above provides contemporary context without altering her account.
Read Dien Knol-Freese’s complete memoir below.
This article forms part of the VK-KNIL Research Portal – Dutch women in military service from Australia to Indonesia.
