[APD] Life and work of Salvationist 'Major Bosshardt' recognised in Dutch commemorative stamp set

[Christian B. Schäffler]

[APD] Life and work of Salvationist 'Major Bosshardt' recognised in Dutch
commemorative stamp set

 

June 20, 2008

Adventist Press Service [APD]

Christian B. Schaeffler, 

Editor-in-chief 

Fax +41-61-261 61 18 

 <mailto:APD at stanet.ch> APD at stanet.ch

 <http://www.stanet.ch/APD> http://www.stanet.ch/APD

CH-4003 Basel, Switzerland

 

 

Life and work of Salvationist 'Major Bosshardt' recognised in Dutch
commemorative stamp set

 

Utrecht/The Netherlands. [APD]   A set of nine postage stamps has been
produced in The Netherlands to celebrate the life of the country's most
famous Salvationist – and one of its best-loved citizens – Lieut-Colonel
Alida M. Bosshardt OF. 

 

Ms. Bosshardt joined the Salvation Army in 1934 and was instructed to work
with women in the city's Red Light District shortly after the end of World
War II.  The colonel died in June 2007 - 94 years old - after a lifetime
serving the poor and needy. She spent more than 50 years working for the
Salvation Army and established a centre in Amsterdam's Red Light District
for prostitutes and drug addicts.

 

The nine stamps, each worth 44 eurocents, feature a variety of photographs
or illustrations of 'De Majoor' ['The Major'] – as she was known even after
promotion to lieut-colonel – in her famous Salvation Army bonnet.

 

Royal TNT Post, the main mail delivery service in The Netherlands, has also
produced a special booklet which includes the new stamps and many more
photographs of Lieut-Colonel Bosshardt through the years. A biography of the
colonel is included in Dutch and English and makes it very clear that her
inspiration to work with the poor and dispossessed came from her love of
God. The front cover includes – again in two languages – the motto by which
De Majoor led her life: 'To serve God is to serve people and to serve people
is to serve God.'

 

Among Ms. Bosshardt's many life time awards were a knighthood in the
Netherlands' Order of Oranje Naussau in 2004. The Israeli Holocaust museum
gave her a "Righteous Among the Nations" award for helping Jewish children
during the war, often taking them on her bicycle to homes where they would
go into hiding.

 

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