these artillery installations were the only Germans still alive on the island. A counterattack was ordered and the intact artillery batteries on the island began firing at sites where rebels were suspected to be. Approximately 2,000 riflemen of the 163rd Marine-Schützenregiment were deployed from the Dutch mainland. Over the next five weeks they re-took the island; fighting was particularly heavy in the northern part of the island at Eierland and around the lighthouse. The German troops then combed the length of the island for any remaining Georgian soldiers, while the Dutch inhabitants sought to hide them. The German commander of the 882nd battalion, Major Klaus Breitner, stated long after the war that the uprising was "treachery, nothing else;" the captured mutineers were ordered to dig their own graves, remove their German uniforms, and be executed. During the rebellion, 565 Georgians, at least 812 Germans, and 120 residents of Texel were killed. The destruction was enormous; dozens of farms went up in flames, with damage later estimated at ten million guilders (US$3.77 million). The bloodshed lasted beyond the German capitulation in the Netherlands and Denmark on 5 May 1945 and even beyond Germany's general surrender on 8 May 1945. The fighting continued until Canadian troops arrived 20 May 1945 to enforce the German surrender, and disarmed the remaining German troops. Aftermath The Georgians lie buried in a ceremonial cemetery at the Hogeberg near Oudeschild. 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. 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. After arrival at a collection camp in the Soviet Union, 26 Georgians were singled out and banished together with their families and others were sent to Gulag. Those still alive in the mid-1950s were rehabilitated and allowed to return home. Until 1991, the ambassador of the Soviet Union to the Netherlands visited the graves of the Georgians on 4 May every year, and, at least during the latter visits, called the Georgians "Heroes of the Soviet Union". The Soviet Union donated a number of memorials to the war dead on Texel, including a pillar in the island's main cemetery as well as various sculptures in the Georgian cemetery.