Tielen Johannes & Maria

Tielen, Johannes Alfons Josef & Maria Johanna Aldegonda Christiaan Tielen, a widower in his seventies, and five of his children, all in their twenties and single during the war, lived in the small, strictly Roman Catholic village of America, Limburg. The daughter, Gonda, and the eldest son, Johannes (Sjeng), who ran the family farm, were involved in the Resistance from the initial stages of the occupation. In mid-1942, when information about the persecution of Jews and others at the hands of the Nazis reached the local priest, he instructed his parish to be ready to come forward and help resist the tyranny. The Tielen family took this message to heart and, in October 1942, welcomed Leonard Marcus and his wife, Hilde, of Zwolle into their home for safekeeping. The Marcuses were accepted into the Tielen home as a natural extension to the family and were treated excellently. Initially, the couple contributed 65 guilders a month towards their expenses but, before long, the Tielens refused to accept any further payment, saying that it was their human and religious duty to help people without receiving any financial compensation. Ten months after their arrival at the Tielens’ home, the Marcuses decided to leave the Tielens and try to join their four daughters, who were hidden at separate addresses across Friesland. The Tielens were sad to see their guests leave. On June 3, 1944, the Tielens were asked to hide a young, Jewish woman from Amsterdam named Kitty Granaat. She had previously hidden with a number of people in Neerkanr, North Brabant. Through friends, Kitty was put in touch with the Tielens, and she arrived at their home on June 3, 1944, and remained there until the liberation. Kitty was relatively free to move around the Tielens’ farm since most of the villagers could be trusted. She was introduced to people as either a student from Amsterdam or a cousin from Eindhoven. In September 1944, the situation around the Tielens’ farm became precarious. It was thelast farm on the Deurne-Venlo railroad and had become dangerously close to the front line. The Germans confiscated part of the farm and laid mines and installed military equipment on the premises. The Tielens also had to contend with various groups of German soldiers wandering through their house. From this point on, Kitty posed as Johannes Tielen’s fiancée, originally from Neerkant, an area that had already been liberated. In addition, Tini van de Bilt* brought a little Jewish girl called Betsie from Helden to the Tielens’ farm in August 1944. On january 3, 1979, Yad Vashem recognized Johannes Alfons Josef Tielen and his sister, Maria Johanna Aldegonda Tielen, as Righteous Among the Nations.