Additional information about my 3rd book;
- Oct 16, 2019
- 2 min read
Hello to all. As I just released my latest book; My Jewish Journey Part III, only months ago, I have just received information which I wished I would have had available to me as I was writing it.
A great portion of the book is filled with findings about my own family during the years of World War II in the Netherlands. I am proud to have found the information I shared. However, now after publication, the following information came my way;
My uncle Jan Van Den Bergh passed away on September 15th, 2019. He was the husband of my mom's sister. I have fond memories of the man, I remember from when I was growing up, but I did not see him in recent years, since I live in the USA and he lived in Holland. Even when I was still in Holland I never got to see him that often since their side of the family lived on the other side of the country. Visits were usually limited to birthdays. However, this is irrelevant to what I am about to share with you.
When the funeral service was held, days after his passing, his brother Gerrit read his eulogy, and my cousin pointed out to me that Gerrit mentioned that my uncle Jan's father was a hero of the resistance!
How come I never heard of this?
I looked it up and there was even widely available information about him.
Resistance Hero Jan Wernard Van Den Bergh
I found a website that has most of the story already translated into English. Apparently he also was one of the "18 Dead"....Something I remember hearing about, I just never knew my own Uncle's father was among them. It's amazing to me this man was connected to my family. Again, I wish I knew about this earlier, so I could have included it in my book and even better; perhaps in my younger years I could have actually talked with my uncle about this.
In the city of Schiedam, there is even a street named after him. (See picture above)
Borgert, If you read this, thank you for bringing all this to my attention!
Here is the link to the website with information about Jan Wernard and about the resistance group and their capture and execution by the Germans.
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