Vries de Jan

Vries de, Jan Jan de Vries single-handedly saved the lives of many co-workers in the Jewish family business that employed him. In 1942, a wholesale company in Groningen run by Jacques Wallage employed Jan as a junior clerk. Soon afterwards, the Jewish employees and the Jewish family who ran the business began to receive orders to register for deportation. Jan de Vries decided to act quickly. He found a hiding place in Amsterdam for Jacques Wallage’s wife and their son Benjamin. When they had to leave it, Jan brought them to Rie and Rinse Boersma* in Rohel, Friesland, where they stayed until the end of the war. Meanwhile, Jacques had been arrested and taken to the Westerbork camp. Jan managed to visit him there, and in October 1942, he helped Jacques escape and took him by bicycle to join his wife and son at the Boersmas. Jan de Vries also found hiding places for a number of Jacques’ relatives, including his wife’s sister, Martha (de Beer) and her husband, Salomon Israels, of Rotterdam, whom he also knew through work. Jan also tried to persuade other members of the Wallage family to go into hiding, among them Sophia Grunwald-de Beer and her husband, Salomon, from Amsterdam. At the beginning of 1943, Jan managed to get false papers for Sophia’s husband and persuaded them to move with their young son to Surhuisterveen, Friesland. Jan also found a hiding place for Jacques’s brother Philip Wallage and for Philip’s wife and son. First he took them to the Reitsma* family in Eernewoude, Friesland, and later to a family in Rohel. He also provided most of the Wallage family members with false identity cards. In addition, Jan acted as an intermediary between the various members of the extended Wallage-de Beer family. He also managed to bring them food coupons and, occasionally, some money. At the end of 1943, Jan de Vries was arrested by the Germans and interrogated. He managed to smuggle out a note from prison to the various families, assuring them that the Germans hadnot been told their names. De Vries was taken to a concentration camp in Germany. He was liberated by the Americans in 1945 but wounded by shrapnel. Jan de Vries was motivated by his belief in justice and his intense hatred of the Nazi regime. He knew the risks involved in resistance and he suffered greatly for his convictions. He never asked for financial compensation. After the war, Jan was employed in the reestablished Wallage family business. On July 7, 1986, Yad Vashem recognized Jan de Vries as Righteous Among the Nations.