Heroes Of The Faith: Major Bosshardt (Short Read)
Estimated reading time: 13 minutes
Alida Bosshardt was a Salvation Army officer from the Netherlands whose life was dedicated to serving people most in need. Major Bosshardt is a hero of the faith. She worked in places others didn’t want to go, and she loved and cared for people that others rejected. Her life and ministry is an example of Christ-like love in action.
I first came across Alida Bosshardt when I attended the Catherine Programme in 2016.
I spent a week in the Netherlands with Salvationists from across Europe to learn more about the history of the Army and its theology whilst sharing the different cultures of the Salvationists there. Part of that included learning about the Army in the Netherlands, and at the heart of that story was Lieutenant Colonel Bosshardt, popularly known as Major Bosshardt.
I found her story inspiring, and I wanted to share it with you in the hopes that it might inspire you, too.
Early Life
Bosshardt was born in Utrecht on the 8th of June 1913 into a lower-middle-class family. Her father was a converted Roman Catholic, and her mother was part of the Dutch Reformed Church. She was one of three children, with two brothers, Henk and Jan.
It was a loving home that encouraged the children to achieve their potential. When her father converted to Catholicism, the children were occasionally taken to Sunday School, although religion did not play a major part in their life.
She was a problem child at school, not always well behaved and sometimes struggling in her lessons. She said, “When my teacher told me the school was much nicer on the days when I was at home sick, my parents decided they would look for another school, but I didn’t want to go anymore.”
Bosshardt never went to high school, and it was not until much later in life that she gained a degree in social work, writing her thesis on prostitution.
She was often sick, which affected her schooling and early development. She initially wanted to be a nurse, but with limited education, she had to apply for nursing apprenticeships. However, her frequent illness meant that no one would accept her onto a programme.
When she was 18, in 1931, Bosshardt went to a Salvation Army open-air meeting with a friend and felt compelled by what she saw to join the Army. She described the experience as being… “deeply touched by God’s love.”
At 19, she joined the Army and became a soldier. She said that the most profound experience of God’s love transformed her understanding of the people around her, saying, “The God who loves me also loves you.”
She applied to go to training college to become an officer, but again, her health proved to be a barrier. She would only be accepted to training if her father agreed to be a financial guarantor of any medical costs she incurred as a cadet or an officer. On that condition, she was accepted for training and, as a cadet, worked in an Army children’s home.
Bosshardt was commissioned in 1933 and appointed to Rotterdam. She served in Rotterdam for a year before being transferred to Amsterdam, where she served in a children’s home called Zonnehock, situated in the heart of the Jewish Quarter.
Second World War
The Nazis invaded the neutral Netherlands and occupied it throughout the Second World War.
In 1940 the Nazis ran a project in the Netherlands called Winterhulp which was a replica of the charity donation scheme already running in Germany.
It was used to educate the occupied population about National Socialist values and portray the occupying power as a benevolent power. They co-opted other charities and faith groups and tried to get them to join the programme.
The Salvation Army refused to cooperate with the project, and in return, the Nazis banned them from running charitable projects and children’s homes.
The Army changed the registration on their children’s homes and listed them as private property rather than public services in order to get around the confiscations.
As the Nazis started to transport Jewish families, many brought their children to Bosshardt to keep them safe. She took them into the children’s home and protected them from the Nazis.
A pregnant mother brought her three children to Bosshardt to keep them safe and soon after gave birth to her baby, who was then also brought to Bosshardt. Hendrina, Helena, Dimphina, and Roosje, stayed with Bosshardt throughout the Second World War, travelling with her and staying in her house. After the War, she stayed in contact with ‘her children.’
In 1941 the Nazis banned The Salvation Army from operating its projects, wearing uniforms, collecting money and preaching in the street. Many of their buildings were confiscated by the Nazis as well.
The Zonnehock children’s home was forced to become part of the Winterhulp programme and so Bosshardt fled north, taking with her the 70 children living in the home, most of whom were Jewish.
They travelled from safe-house to safe-house until they entered the countryside where Bosshardt arranged for the Jewish children to be taken into ten houses which the Dutch resistance had told her they would be safe.
Bosshardt worked against the dehumanising Nazi ideology in whatever way she could, but especially in making the sure the Jewish children she looked after knew they were worthwhile and valued for who they are.
The Nazis were making Jewish people wear yellow identifying stars on their clothes, but Bosshardt tore them off, saying, “We do not do this kind of thing.”
She would not accept that the kind of hatred on display was something which children should be subject to, even at the risk of her own life.
She rode all around the Netherlands, into Amsterdam and the countryside, accepting Jewish children from families and bringing them to safety. At times she would hide a baby in the wicker basket of her bike, riding past Nazi checkpoints where any noise at any moment would have led to her capture and possibly being sent to a concentration camp.
One day, when travelling by bike to collect food for the Jewish children and the families sheltering them, she was betrayed to the Gestapo by a Nazi sympathiser. She was arrested and imprisoned for interrogation for two weeks.
Her guard ‘forgot’ to lock the door at one stage, allowing her to escape and return to looking after the children. Territorial Headquarters ordered her to go into hiding, and she did so for a few weeks before carrying on with her work again.
Red-Light District
After the end of the Second World War, Bosshardt was appointed to Territorial Headquarters as an administrator. THQ was at the edge of the Zeedijk in the Old City of Amsterdam, where the red-light district was situated.
She became increasingly passionate about the needs of the women working in the district and spent much of her time going into the district to sell the War Cry and talk to the women.
On the 4th of October, 1948, Bosshardt received official orders to begin the Goodwill work in the red-light district of Amsterdam. She said, “With 100 guilders, a flag, and a blessing, we began the work.”
In 1951, she was given her own room and office in the headquarters of the Goodwill service in the red-light district, where she lived for the rest of her life.
Salvation For the Whole Person
Through her hard work and passionate advocacy, the Goodwill work in Amsterdam grew to 4 buildings and a staff of 135 social workers, district nurses, and home helpers. It undertook pioneering work with alcoholics, drug users, and sex workers, beginning the kind of work which today is known as harm reduction.
Her favourite Bible verses came from Acts 3. She said, “Where the lame man is healed at the gate of the temple. That man was helped in his totality. He wasn’t begging the next day. He went out and got a job.” She believed deeply that to save a person was to save the entire person, including their social and economic situation.
In 1962, her service to God and the Army was recognised as of the highest calibre. On the orders of General Kitching, she was admitted to the Order of the Founder, the Army’s highest award.
In 1965, she gave a guided tour of the red-light district to Princess Beatrice, who would later become Queen of the Netherlands. She got to know the Dutch Royal Family and met with them on several occasions.
She also got to know members of the underworld, gangsters, and crime-lords. She could walk completely safe through the most dangerous parts of the city and challenge hardened criminals to improve their behaviour.
She was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel, although she was always most popularly known as Major Bosshardt. She was interviewed on the Dutch version of This Is Your Life and frequently appeared on the news or gave public lectures.
Despite the fame that came her way, she said, “I serve the Lord to serve people. He, not me, should be praised.”
Critical of the Government
She was fiercely critical of the double standards held by the government for prostitution.
She said that if the government profited off of prostitution, then they should also provide proper health care and security for them. Helped to bring about changes to the law regarding the health and safeguarding of prostitutes. Ensuring they could be protected and receive proper healthcare.
While she disapproved of the profession, her ire was turned against the men who oppressed and used women, not the women who were desperate enough to enter sex work. She argued that, while it would be better for there to be no prostitution, since it did exist, it was important that the prostitutes were looked after and could receive proper health care.
Personal Life
She remained unmarried throughout her life, regarding her calling as the most important thing in her life. She raised and looked after many children and cared for a huge family of people who regarded her as a mother.
She said that she had been in love with one woman in her life, but did not pursue a relationship because she felt it would contradict the promises she had made a Salvation Army Officer.
She fell in love with two men over the years, but both were already married. She said that she wanted a family, and if given the right opportunity, she would have married and had children, but she just never loved the right person.
Later Life
Bosshard retired in 1978.
In retirement, she continued to give public lectures, both in the Netherlands and internationally, about social problems and the work of the Army.
She was direct and fierce in calling out hypocrisy and demanding that people do better. When lecturing about prostitution, she would state the percentage of men in the room who were likely to have used a prostitute’s service.
She tirelessly reminded people that their anger should be directed against the people who use the services of prostitutes and the pimps that abuse them, not against the women who are the victims.
Her increasing fame and the authority in which she was held meant that she had the opportunity to attend conferences and meet significant figures worldwide. On one occasion, she met Mother Theresa but found her somewhat conservative and a little boring.
In 2004 she was recognised by Yad Vashem, Israel’s official memorial to victims of the Shoah, as ‘righteous among the nations’ for her work in rescuing Jewish children from the Nazis.
This is a very rare honour and recognised the very grave risks that she took during the Second World War to rescue and protect Jewish children from the violence of the Nazis.
Death and Memorial
Lieutenant Colonel Alida Bosshardt was promoted to glory in Amsterdam on the 25th of June 2007
Her funeral was proclaimed a national day of mourning and the funeral service was televised across the Netherlands on the 30th June 2007. She was buried in the Nieuwe Ooster cemetery for Salvation Army Officers.
Her memory survived through statues, projects, and the Bosshardt House Museum, but most significantly in the continued commitment of the Army in the Netherlands to serve people whoever they are, wherever they are, in the name of Jesus.
Impact for Today
Bosshardt’s legacy remains influential for the Dutch Army, but for the Army internationally, to this day.
She was accepting of homosexuality, including hiring a gay Salvationist Soldier as an intern in the Goodwill service. But she struggled to accept gay marriage as something that was according to God’s desire. She said she was only concerned, “whether the person was happy with it themselves, and if they were, then it’s ok.“
Her approach to social reform issues was both principled and pragmatic. She was strict with herself and her own behaviour but flexible and compassionate with others.
She could be fiercely harsh with people she regarded as hypocrites, and she reminded people that being subject to God’s judgement should make them more compassionate, not less.
She said Everyone is equal before God, including me, which also applied to people who did not live by God’s rules or who followed a different faith.
Her approach to homosexuality, prostitution, abortion, and other social issues meant that she was criticised by some Salvationists, but she maintained her beliefs throughout her life.
Her criticism of hypocrisy was not limited to those outside the Army but also directed at those people and elements of the Army that she regarded as falling short of the standards God had called them to.
This was particularly true for female ministry. She said, “From the beginning, women were leaders in the Army, but now I think a lot of women are willing to let the men do it. I don’t like that.”
Her demonstration of selfless service and sacrifice, taking a pragmatic stance on the care and wellbeing of people in need, and fighting for justice for those without a voice, remain a call to action for The Salvation Army today. She was ready to adopt the latest theories and she continued her education throughout her life.
While she employed social workers and nurses, she was also very critical of Salvationists who did not get involved in the social mission of the Army. She argued that soldiers should be volunteers in the Army’s programmes and that if they did not do so when they had the opportunity then they were not living up to the calling God had given to them.
I have been inspired to learn more about Alida Bosshardt when researching this story. I hope that reading about her life and ministry will inspire you to. But, I think what she would have wanted me to finish by saying is, I hope you are most of all inspired by the wonder of God at work in the world to serve people in God’s name.
If you liked reading about Major Bosshardt, try another ‘Heroes of the Faith’ post here:
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