Geertruida Wijsmuller-Meijer
Geertruida Wijsmuller-Meijer (21 April 1896, in Alkmaar – 30 August 1978, in Amsterdam) was a Dutch resistance fighter who brought Jewish children and adults into safety before and during the Second World War.
She was the firstborn child of Jacob Meijer, who worked in a drug store, and Hendrika Boer, a self-employed dressmaker.
Her parents taught her to stand up for people[3] and, after World War I, set an example of helping the needy by taking in a homeless Austrian boy.
She joined the Vereeniging voor Vrouwenbelangen en Gelijk Staatsburgerschap ("Association for Women's Interests and for Equal Citizenship").
In addition to this work, Wijsmuller was nominated as number 6 on the list of Liberal candidates for the Amsterdam city council elections in 1935.
Because of the threat of war she founded the Korps Vrouwelijke Vrijwilligers (KVV; "Corps for Female Volunteers") in 1938, which she managed from her home.
From 1933 onward, Wijsmuller traveled to Germany to fetch family members of Jewish acquaintances and bring them safely to the Netherlands.
In November 1938 the British Government decided to let Jewish children under the age of 17 from Nazi countries enter the United Kingdom for a temporary stay.
He responded by giving her permission to travel with 600 children, but it had to happen by the upcoming Saturday, on Shabbat, a deadline he seemed to assume she would not be able to make.
Several times a week, Wijsmuller traveled to Germany and Nazi-occupied territories to pick up children and arrange things on site with the organisers involved.
It was an exceptional operation carried out under great pressure that required the cooperation of parents, guardians and various committees with volunteers in many cities and countries.
She maintained contacts with all of the parties involved in several countries, including the main committees in Vienna, Hamburg, Frankfurt and Berlin (from March 1939 in Prague and Dantzig[11] ) and also the train and boat companies.
Wijsmuller was later quoted saying that the success of the operation was mainly due to the Jewish committees in Vienna, Frankfurt, Hamburg, Berlin and Breslau (and later in Prague, Dantzig and Riga).
[15] The outbreak of the war between Great Britain and Germany in September 1939 put a stop to these transports, as from then on the borders to the UK were closed.
In June 1939, international negotiations took place in Antwerp among European countries about the distribution of nearly one thousand Jewish refugees on the MS St. Louis.
In July 1939 Wijsmuller was involved in the departure of children on the cargoship the Dora which eventually landed with 450 refugees in the then English mandate territory Palestine.
In November and December 1939 she regularly collected Jewish refugees in Bentheim (from Vienna and other places) who had papers for America.
From September 1939 till May 1940 Wijsmuller helped Jewish children and adults stranded in the Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark and Sweden.
Wijsmuller was described as a born tour conductor,[17][18][19]] being able to reassure the refugees and to unearth all the talented children aboard for songs, recitations and performances during the long train journey.
In November 1939 Wijsmuller was arrested and molested by the French in Marseille, suspecting she was the much-wanted German spy "Erika".
Within three days she traveled back to Amsterdam, where she immediately was arrested and questioned by the Dutch police, on suspicion of espionage.
The local garrison commander passed a request on to her from London to arrange for the Jewish children at the orphanage to travel as fast as possible to the coastal town of IJmuiden so they could catch a boat to England on time.
In Paris she had also contact with the French Red Cross and with the OSE (Oeuvre Secours aux Enfants, a Jewish aid organisation for children).
[24] With the Amsterdam Red Cross she traveled with food and medicine to the Gurs and St. Cyprien internment camps in the south of France.
This help came to an end in February 1941, when the Dutch Red Cross terminated her travel permits after Wijsmuller made her criticism known about their representative in Paris.
She accompanied groups who still had permission from the Nazis – having to pay them a lot of money – to leave Europe through Spain and Portugal.
After that Mrs Wijsmuller worked three days a week with others in the Nieuwe Kerk to prepare and send food parcels.
She regularly had brought food to a number of these children in the Amsterdam Huis van Bewaring (house of detention).
When it was no longer possible to send food parcels to the camps, Wijsmuller, as a member of an interconfessional group, organized the evacuation of 6,649 famished children[5] from Amsterdam across the IJsselmeer to the countryside.
[4] After the war Wijsmuller traced displaced children in Germany, as member number 1 from the KVV and as a UNRRA (a precursor of the UN) employee.
