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BIOGRAPHY PAGE
Henry Hugenholtz
Biography
I have been told that a
short description
of my life may help to
bring a closer
understanding and
relationship
between myself and my
readers,
so here goes.
I was born in Saigon, Vietnam (what
was then
called French Indo-China)
on the 26th
January 1928.
I lived on a Sugar Plantation
650 km north of Saigon,
of which my father was
the
Managing Director and
quarter Shareholder.
Both of my parents were Dutch.
I have a sister Tily,
living in
the South of France, who
is four years
older than myself and
to whom I
am very close,
despite the fact that
we were separated for
fourteen
years, during the
Second World War.
My younger brother John is in
Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, having worked
there for the past 16
years.
My younger sister Florence (Fif)
lives in Australia.
When I was five years old my mother
left my father and
took me with her,
touring the Dutch East Indies,
Sumatra, Batavia and
then Europe as a
Concert Pianist.
My sister Tily remained
with my father
and we didn’t meet up
again until 1949.
My mother remarried and was pregnant
with my brother, John, when we
left
Lyon in France to escape from the
Germans in June 1940.
We, my mother, stepfather and myself
aged twelve, arrived in
Bordeaux
to catch a freight
ship sailing
for South Africa.
(My stepfather had
pre-arranged
our passage
beforehand.)
When we arrived at the quayside there
were three boats
docked and we
were to board the
first one to
leave, which would
not be
until the following
morning
because of the tide
In the morning we abandoned our car
and made our way back to
the quayside
but when we got there a
row of Polish
soldiers blocked our way
and
prevented everyone else
from
boarding the ship.
After a great deal of negotiation with
them, we were allowed to
board the
third ship due to leave
the harbour.
It was a great relief to finally find
ourselves leaving the
French shore
on our way to South Africa.
However, we were soon informed
that the two ships,
which had left
before us, had been
torpedoed
with no survivors and
that our
ship had been
commandeered by
the British Navy and
was now
to be escorted to Plymouth
by a British
Destroyer.
When we arrived safely in Plymouth we were
transported by buses to
the Odeon
Theatre, where we stayed
the
night. The following day we traveled
to London, where we were put up in
the Hotel Forty,
Bayswater.
So that is how I arrived in England.
It was there one night that two bombs
landed on either side
of the hotel
and a third
penetrated a large
store called “Whiteleys”. The bombs
exploded in the
cellar, killing
all those sheltering
there.
A year later my mother evacuated me
to Wynstones Boarding School near
Gloucester. My uncle, who was
the
Captain of a Dutch
Destroyer, helped me
finance my schooling
in those
early war years.
I met my wife Doreen in 1947 when I lived
with my mother,
stepfather and my
little brother John in
Sheen,
South-West London.
I married Doreen in 1949. We had
seven
children: Our first beautiful daughter
Francesca, was born with
severe
Hydro-Encephalus,
Spina-Bifida and
twisted legs, she only
lived for
ten days. After that we had a further
two daughters, then a
son, followed by
twin daughters and then another
son.
In 1950 we left for Pernis, near Rotterdam
in Holland, where I worked my way up
to Stillman at a
Caltex Oil Refinery.
Here in Holland our daughter Angela
was born in 1952.
In 1953 we returned to England and
settled in Basildon, Essex where I
started work on Canvey Island for the
Vacuum Oil Refinery
company.
That same year I was at the refinery
when we had a
particularly bad storm
and flood. I recall that my little
Austin Seven car was totally
immersed in the water
but after it
had receded, I was
amazed to turn
the key and the
dripping wet car’s
engine started and I
drove home.
A year later our daughter Carol
was born in January
1954.
We had to return to England from
Holland before three years had
elapsed, in order for me
to be able
to apply for my British
Nationality.
This I needed to do in
order to work
for Bapco Oil Refinery
in Bahrain
in the Persian Gulf (a
British
Protectorate), where I
worked
from 1955 to 1960.
Our first son Stef was born
there in 1959.
During this time my father died and
left me a little
money, so we
decided to go back to
England and
send our two
daughters (Angela
and Carol) to
school at
Michael Hall School (another
Rudolf Steiner
establishment) in
Forest Row, East
Grinstead in
West
Sussex.
I opened a Travel and Chalet Letting
Agency and took on a
Manager to
run the Travel side of
the business,
but he sold me out by
swindling me.
I eventually bought three properties
(with 100% Mortgages) in
East
Grinstead, which I turned into
self-contained flatlets
and I let them
out to
Scientologists. My twin
daughters, Martine and Michele, were
born in there in 1960 and our second
son Rick soon
followed in 1963.
In 1968 the Labour Government stopped
Scientologists from
entering this
country and so I lost
all my tenants and
thus my houses (as
did many others who
were also letting
their properties in the
neighbourhood. Unable to let my
flatlets, I became
bankrupt and was
left penniless.
We lost our home and were forced
to move, leaving
everything we
owned and to find
alternative
furnished accommodation.
I was unable to obtain financial help.
The authorities
considered the rent
of £15 per week, the
cost at that
time for a
three-bedroomed
furnished house, as
exorbitant.
Even though we had to live
somewhere and I had
six children
to feed, they didn’t
even consider
helping me out with
money for
food (not like today’s
world).
I undertook a number of jobs as a
Salesman with
different companies,
selling freezer food
package deals,
unit trust insurance
and by
selling vending
machines.
After a number of years, I finally
started a maintenance
and building
firm of my own. Both of my sons
joined me under our
newly-adopted
British name.
My mother died on the
23rd January 1987.
Doreen by then was very proficient
with her Automatic
Writing, as
mentioned in my
Booklet where I
write about our
holiday tour of
1973. She took down a message
from my mother two
months after
her death. Her words, as follows:
Lieverd = Darling
Coco = is my family’s name for me
21st March 1987 – 9.30 am
“Lieverd Coco,
I cannot express sufficiently how
life is beyond the
living world,
the total ecstasy, the
fulfillment,
love and all that is
in life’s
creation and far more,
one
surely has to believe
in the
joy of the Other
World.
The creation of GOD is incredible.
To be here after all
my misgivings
is an unbelieveable
gift.
Nothing can describe
the total
peace and beauty.
To be with you again, if only in
spirit, and
to be able to be
part of you whilst we
are on
different planes, is a
great
joy in itself.
My love for you has never been
stronger. To be able to share
your life as I have never
done before.
To be able to be in your
home and to guide you
as much
as I can, to see my
Grandchildren
and
Great-Grandchildren in their
own surroundings is
something
I have not been able
to do,
which is a great joy
to me.
My love for you will always
be around you.
My project for you is that I will
try to ease the
burdens of your life.
Life for both of us on the Earthly
plane was not too easy
in the
early days, but I hope
that we were
richer in many other
ways.
You might not have thought or felt
it but I have always
had a special
deep love for you.
As I grew older and through my
health became more
relaxed. I
tried to channel those
thoughts to
you. You are the only one of my
three children that
has this
special bond in our
beliefs and
so this, in itself,
made us
very close.
On this side I have met many
friends and family,
even your
Father, definitely a
changed man,
may I say for the
better.
Oom Piet is still on this plane
and Ooma, your
Grandmother,
is preparing for her
new life
on Earth.
I must leave you now.
Give
yourself and the
children a lot
of love, hugs and
kisses,
especially for the new
baby
(Hayden), a
lovely little soul.
Dag Schatje, Mammie.”
Sadly my wife Doreen died of Cancer
in 1998. Later I re-married. I had
first met Anne in
1942 when we
were both pupils at Rudolf Steiner’s
‘Wynstones School’ in Brookthorpe
near Gloucester. After leaving
school we lost
contact. I met her
again in December
1998 and we
married six months
later.
Well that is enough about me
and mine.
