Date of birth:

January 13th, 1906 (Oosterhout/North Brabant, Netherlands)

Date of death:

January 3rd, 1946 (Balikpapan/Borneo, Dutch Indies)

Nationality:

Dutch

Sld.Ekl.Cav.
KNIL

Petrus was born on 13 January 1906 in Oosterhout. He enlisted in the Royal Netherlands East Indies Army and left for the Dutch East Indies, where he settled in Surabaya. He married Adèle Virgini Willemsen from Tegal, with whom he had one child.

On 8 December 1941, one day after the attack on Pearl Harbor, the Dutch government in London declared war on Japan. The Japanese seized this opportunity to immediately invade the Dutch East Indies. Due to its natural oil reserves and geostrategic location, the conquest of the Dutch colony was one of the Japanese's most important goals in their quest to dominate East Asia. The Japanese campaign, in which the most important strategic points were captured, would ultimately take three months and end with the surrender of the KNIL on 8 March 1942.

It is not known whether Petrus was taken prisoner in the days around the capitulation and transported to the camps, or whether he managed to flee to Australia, from where he continued the fight against the Japanese on the Allied side. In any case, Petrus survived the Japanese occupation.

Two days after the Japanese surrender on 15 August 1945, Soekarno and Mohammed Hatta proclaimed the independence of Indonesia. This marked the beginning of the chaotic Bersiap period, during which foreigners – Japanese, British and Chinese – and European and Indian Dutch people declared enemies were victims of violence. Petrus was called up again to serve in the cavalry of the KNIL and deployed to restore peace and Dutch authority. He was killed in action on 3 January 1946 in the port city of Balikpapan on Borneo. Petrus was 39 years old and was buried in an unknown location in Indonesia.

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• - Petrus Adrianus Oomens | Oorlogsgravenstichting
  - Petrus Oomens | Brabantse Gesneuvelden
  

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