Valkenburg resistance

The majority of work done by the movement was dedicated to providing aid to those seeking refuge from prosecution by the occupying Nazi Germans.

These and other factors caused a growing group of people who wanted to resist the occupation, at first through individual acts like non-cooperation.

Small groups united into the Landelijke Organisatie voor hulp aan onderduikers (LO, National Organisation for help to people in hiding), which divided the province of Limburg in ten districts under Jacques Crasborn.

In spite of the name the KP was not necessarily violent, but violence was sometimes needed in (mostly nocturnal) activities like obtaining identification carnets and ration cards and sometimes even German uniforms, which were used for raids.

The LO in Limburg started in Venlo in February 1943 under teacher Jan Hendricx (pseudonym Ambrosius).

But many more people helped, more or less frequently, such as civil servants Hein Cremers and Guus Laeven, who, at the end of the war, 'lost' the population records when the Germans wanted to put all men between 16 and 60 at work digging trenches.

Apart from helping people in hiding, other activities took place, like raiding a store of radio equipment in Klimmen, a train full of eggs, and a dairy plant in Reijmerstok for a ton of butter.

One of the people who did this was Pierre Schunck, who owned a laundrette and simply hid the goblets and such under the laundry and put his children on top.

The many marl mines in South Limburg were also ideal hiding places because they needed a guide to navigate them (especially the ones in Maastricht have a very extensive system of corridors than has been used throughout history for this purpose).

When Pierre's father Peter Schunck, who owned some land with entries to mines, where he knew people were hiding (which he chose to ignore), was asked by the Germans to lead them into the caves, he took them to a section he knew was dangerous and poked his walking stick in the ceiling, causing part of it to come down.

There were also various other hiding places, such as the hide-out Pierre Schunck had created beneath his bath tub (the old type on legs), which he, however, never had to use.

The police sent a message to The Hague saying he was a respected citizen and because the rifles weren't found (they had been quickly moved) he was released.

The manager of the distribution office had chosen to ignore this (another example of passive resistance), but when he was replaced in 1944, the scheme was found out and the ration cards were changed.

The KP had already stolen a car of the Wehrmacht from a garage in Sittard (plus some barrels of petrol), repaired it and hidden it in Valkenburg.

So one night, when the fake envelope was handed to the police, this car, some German uniforms and the real keys were used to empty the vault at the distribution office.

But the personal archive of Pierre Schunck proves the contrary, with photos, real and fake 'Ausweise' (identifications) and ration cards, illegal stencils, a file on Jewish victims and the like.