The men of the rebellious battalion were former Red Army soldiers from the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic captured on the Eastern front.

They had been given a choice: the captured soldiers could choose either to remain in the prisoner of war camps, which would have meant abuse, starvation, and very possibly death, or to serve in the German military and be allowed a degree of freedom.

Preparations then started in late March 1945 for the transfer of several companies of the Georgian battalion to the Dutch mainland to oppose Allied advances, triggering the rebellion.

Approximately two hundred German soldiers were killed in the initial uprising, in their quarters or while standing guard, walking the roads of the island in groups or individually that night and the following day.

[7] The German troops then combed the length of the island for any remaining Georgian soldiers, while the Dutch inhabitants sought to hide them.

The survivors may have feared facing the same fate as most Soviet collaborators: forced repatriation, under the terms of the Yalta Conference, often followed by incarceration and banishment and, for officers, execution.

[8]: 114  According to another one, the 228 Georgians who survived by hiding from the German troops in coastal minefields, or who were concealed by Texel farmers, were turned over to Soviet authorities.

[citation needed] In the late 1960s, the Soviet memorialization of the Texel rebels culminated in the release of a feature film known as Crucified Island.

In 1949 they found their final resting place at Ysselsteyn German war cemetery, Limburg province, the Netherlands.

Canadian troops led by Lieutenant Colonel Kirk landed unopposed on Texel on 17 May 1945, effectively liberating the island.

A Canadian report prepared for the commander of the SMERSH contingent recorded 470 Georgian and 2,347 German casualties on Texel.

The "other sources" comment in all probability refers to the Canadian report to SMERSH that lumped together under "casualties" the 1,535 disarmed Germans with their 812 dead.