Wiggers Hendrik & Lievers Aleida (Meinen)

Wiggers, Hendrik Wiggers-Meinen, Aleida The Jewish Meijler family, Sally and Paula and their two sons, Arthur and Hanri, in their early twenties, lived in the village of Aalten in the eastern part of the Netherlands (prov. Gelderland). With the start of the orders to report for ’work in the East’, in the summer of 1942, they started to look for hiding places instead. They turned to a number of farmers in the area, but each of them was too afraid to take the risk for their own families. They finally were put in touch with Hendrik and Aleida Wiggers, farmers in their own village, very close to the border with Germany. The Wiggers had heard in church about the predicament of the Jews. Once back home, Hendrik mentioned to his wife that they didn’t expect any Jews to knock on their door for help, but if that would happen, he would accept them in as that would be their religious duty. And so it happened that the Meijlers, parents and two sons, indeed knocked on their door late in the summer of 1942. The Wiggers kept their promise to God and took all four of them onto their farm. Hendrik and Aleida Wiggers, both in their sixties, had a large family with six children. The Meijlers were given a hide-out in a store room, and could come into the living quarters when out of sight of strangers. The Wiggers took care of all their needs, and found ways to get enough food for all, making sure that they did not bring them pork meat as this was forbidden by Jewish dietary laws. No remuneration was ever requested. All four Meijlers stayed on until April 20, 1944, when the farm was searched as a result of betrayal. The Meijlers managed to flee into the adjacent forest in time and were not found. Nor were a number of weapons that were hidden by the Wiggers family on its farm. Yet, not believing that Hendrik was innocent, the Germans arrested him and sent him to the Vught concentration camp (KZ Herzogenbusch), in the south of the Netherlands, from where he wastransferred to various camps in Germany in September 1944. He perished in the Dora Camp on February 21, 1945. A few weeks after the raid, Aleida Wiggers allowed Arthur and Hanri to return to the farm, where they stayed until the liberation of the area in April 1945. Parents Sally and Paula found shelter elsewhere, and also survived. On February 29, 2012, Yad Vashem recognized Hendrik Wiggers and Aleida Wiggers-Meinen as Righteous Among the Nations.