Swart de Jacobus & Sipkje (Koopmans)

Swart de, Jacobus & Sipkje (Koopmans) From October 2, 1942, until September 1944, Jacobus and Sipkje de Swart sheltered Marianne and Emanuel Krukziener and their two sons, Nico and Bram, in their home in Zutphen, Gelderland. The de Swarts willingly changed their way of life in order to accommodate the Jewish family and made them feel very welcome. For 23 months, Jacobus and Sipkje tactfully managed to keep all their friends and relatives away from their home. They even traveled to Friesland to celebrate their 25th wedding anniversary in order to avoid having to invite guests over to the house. Jacobus and Sipkje constructed a space under the kitchen floor where the fugitives could hide during German house searches. On such occasions, Sipkje heroically stood by the door with a lead-filled typewriter roller, ready to hit any malevolent intruder over the head. Jacobus was a locomotive conductor and participated in the national railroad strike in September 1944. Following this, he had to go into hiding, but in order to use the hideaway under his own kitchen floor he had to ask the Krukzieners to move elsewhere. The underground worker Frederik Bouman* found the Jewish family another hiding place in the area and took care of their ration cards and material needs from then on. On June 30, 1983, Yad Vashem recognized Jacobus de Swart and his wife, Sipkje de Swart-Koopmans, as Righteous Among the Nations.