Henk Sneevliet - Chronology
13 May 1883
Hendricus Josephus Franciscus Marie (known as Henk) Sneevliet born in Rotterdam
1895-1900
Secondary school (HBS) in 's-Hertogenbosch
Photo: M. van der Heijden
1901
Employee state railway company in Zutphen
1902
Member SDAP [Social Democratic Workers' Party] and NVSTP [Netherlands Federation of Rail and Tramway Workers]
1903
Big strike by railway workers, fiercely crushed by the authorities
1904
Appointed in Zwolle; selected secretary SDAP branch. Contact with Dutch poetess and socialist Henriette Roland Holst and moving in an intellectual Marxist group around the magazine De Nieuwe Tijd.
1906
Marriage with Maartje Visser
July 1906
Member management NVSTP
1907
Member city council Zwolle representing SDAP (until 1910)
September 1907
Chairman SDAP Zwolle
End 1907
Divorce from Maartje Visser
July 1909
Marriage with Betsy Brouwer, teacher
November 1909
Becomes vice-chairman NVSTP
1910
Moves to Utrecht, the central seat of the NVSTP
1911
Elected Chairman of the NVSTP
March 1911
Birth twin sons Pim and Pam
June 1911
Big international seamen's strike
August 1911
Defeat international seamen's strike in Amsterdam
1911-1912
Political crisis labour movement on support of strikers
1912
Leaves SDAP and joins Marxist SDP [Social Democratic Party] for six months
July 1912
Dismissed as Chairman NVSTP under pressure of the right wing of the federation
1913
Leaves the Netherlands for the Netherlands East Indies; first journalist in Soerabaja, later secretary of the Chamber of Commerce Semarang
May 1914
Co-founder and leader ISDV [Indies Social Democratic Association]
1914-1915
Editor De Volharding, organ of the Dutch East Indies VSTP [Federation of Rail and Tramway Personnel]
1916
Final break with SDAP; becomes member again of SDP (from 1918: Communist Party of Holland)
March 1917
Publication article Zegepraal [Victory], making a strong plea to the Javanese to follow the Russian revolution
1917-1918
Propaganda and agitation among navy men and soldiers
April 1917
Dismissed by Chamber of Commerce Semarang because of his political agitation
June 1917
Propagandist VSTP
November 1917
Trial at court of justice Semarang due to his article Zegepraal [Victory]; after appeal acquittal by supreme court of Batavia
November 1918
Formation of councils of navy men and soldiers in Soerabaja
December 1918
Expulsion from Dutch East Indies by authorities, leaves for the Netherlands
1919-1920
Position as propagandist NAS [National Labour Secretariat]
1920
Co-organizer transport workers' strike
July-August 1920
Representative CPH [Communist Party of Holland] to the Second Congress Comintern; elected as secretary for the committee on nationalities and colonial questions
June 1921
Mission to China, arrival in Shanghai
July 1921
Participant First Congress Communist Party of China
December 1921
Meeting with Sun Yatsen
1922
Return to Europe to assist Comintern; got to know Sima Zolkovskaja
July 1922
New mission to China together with Joffe
August 1922
Participant plenary assembly central committee Communist Party of China
December 1922
Return to Moscow for discussions within the Comintern about the question of cooperation with the Kuomintang
June 1923
Back to China to participate at the Third Congress of the Communist Party of China, which accepted the Comintern directives on cooperation with the Kwomintang [Guomindang]
August 1923
Leaves China definitively and stays in Moscow until March 1924
April 1924
Returns to the Netherlands
May 1924
Elected as chairman of the NAS, joins opposition within CPH
September 1924
Divorce from Betsy Brouwer
December 1924
Marriage with Sima Zolkovskaja; Sneevliet and Zolkovskaja had a daughter, born in 1923
1927
Split between NAS and Red International of Trade Unions; Sneevliet leaves the CPH and breaks with the Comintern
June 1928
Divorce from Sima Zolkovskaja, who returns to Soviet Union
1929
Establishment RSP [Revolutionary Socialist Party]; chairman RSP
1931
Marriage with Mien Draaijer
March 1932
Suicide Pim Sneevliet, son of Sneevliet and Betsy Brouwer
November 1932
Meeting with Trotsky in Copenhagen
February 1933
Leader solidarity campaign with mutineers on board of the cruiser De Zeven Provinciën; arrest and sentenced to months imprisonment
July 1933
Released from prison to become elected member of Dutch parliament until 1937
August 1933
Meeting with Trotsky near Royan (France)
1935
Merger of the RSP and the OSP [Independent Socialist Party], under the name of RSAP [Revolutionary Sociallist Workers' Party]
1936
Voyage to Catalonia, Spain, to support the Spanish socialists in their struggle against Franco during the Spanish Civil War
February 1937
Suicide Pam Sneevliet, twin brother of Pim who died in 1932
July 1940
Founder and leader of the Marx-Lenin-Luxemburg-Front [MLL-Front] to resist Nazi German occupation of the Netherlands
March 1942
Arrest of Sneevliet and six other members of the MLL-Front
13 April 1942
Execution of Henk Sneevliet and his six comrades at the Leusderheide near Amersfoort