Behind the Fireplace: Memoirs of a girl working in the Dutch Wartime Resistance
Paperback – January 25, 2016
Description
About the Author The author, Andrew, had only a vague inkling of the role his mother played during World War II, until 1992 when she visited him in Washington for a short holiday. Her family had been recognised by the Jewish organisation Yad Vashem for saving the lives of Jews, and she had been awarded a pension for her work in the Dutch Resistance. She started talking, and vivid fragments of stories started tumbling out. They were confused, fragmented and disjointed, and Andrew started writing notes, trying to piece together the whole story. As he refined the story, more fragments came to light and the story evolved into this book. Tensions in the house where the Jews were hidden, evading a search by the Gestapo, romance in the tulip fields, and a fiery parting. Almost seventy years after the war, fragments continued to come out, and on her 90th birthday the story caught the attention of a local newspaper which published details, leading to further stories in the Scottish press. This was picked up by a dutchman, whose wife was the granddaughter of her former boyfriend. He wrote to the author, confirming more of the story and providing further fragments of the story. Andrew continues to work as a research scientist in a local technology company, and spends his spare time at the local rowing club.
Features & Highlights
- As World War 2 progressed, the Okma family took six Jewish refugees into their house, hiding them in a secret room behind their fireplace. The youngest daughter, Kieks, joined the Resistance, delivering illegal newspapers, guiding British parachutists around The Hague and preparing safe houses for members of the Special Forces who were dropped in from England. As the War continued, she fell in love with a Resistance commander, and worked with him to rescue wounded colleagues, steal weapons from German arms dumps and move weapons around the country. They had a tumultuous parting and she continued her work, acting as a courier with a two hundred km bike ride to the north of Holland. When she returned home, she appreciated how much the war had changed her and her boyfriend, and prepared to try a reconciliation.She escaped a firing squad four times, and survived the war, mentally scarred by her experiences. She sought help, but the help she was offered came in a poisoned chalice, and she kept her secret to herself for almost fifty years.Her family in Holland was recognised by Yad Vashem, the Israeli organisation that records those who saved Jews from the Holocaust, and she was awarded a pension for her work in the Resistance by the Dutch foundation Stichting 1940-1945. It was only when these organisations acknowledged the truth of her claims that she had the confidence to tell her family of the events from long ago.
