The eldest of five children, Pieter Laning was born on 2 Feb 1914 in Groningen to Bart and Janna Laning. They lived above the family's bakery on the main road to Friesland. On leaving school Pieter joined his father to work in the bakery. When the war started in 1940, Holland was quickly overrun as the Germans invaded by land and air, causing much destruction in the south of Holland and particularly in Rotterdam. As Nazi control increased, Pieter decided to join the resistance-whose role it was to frustrate and limit the influence of the occupying forces-to help with the anti-reporting campaign. He soon became a section commander attached to the national intelligence service. Towards the end of 1944, he was arrested by the Schutzstaffel (the SS) and imprisoned in Groningen, where he was held for some months, suffering torture and starvation. On 17 March 1945, Pieter and many others were taken to the nearby train station and crowded into cattle wagons guarded by the Dutch civilian police. They did not know where they were going. This is Pieter's recollection of the events that followed including his incarceration in the Neuengamme Concentration Camp, the bombing of boats in the Bay of Lübeck at the end of the war, and his stay in hospital to recover from malnutrition.