Freddie and Truus Oversteegen and their mother Trijntje were communists who lived in Schoten, Netherlands, during World War II. The sisters had been raised to always help the underdog, which included sheltering refugees in their home.
When the leader of a Dutch resistance group took notice of their radical bent, he asked Trijntje if she would permit her daughters to join. Freddie was 14. Truus was 16. Without knowing explicitly what they were agreeing to, the three women all said yes. And soon, the teenage girls were doing more than handing out literature. They were luring Nazis into the woods and assassinating them.
Before long, Freddie and Truus supplemented their resistance orders by freelancing their Nazi-killing. They were joined by 22-year-old Hannie Schaft in 1943, making them the real-life civilian girl equivalent of Inglourious Basterds. Read about the exploits of this girl gang at Mental Floss. -via Strange Company
(Image credit: Ministerie van Defensie)
