Six Willem & Arnoldina (Vos de)

Six, Willem Six, Arnoldina (de Vos) The Jewish Elion family lived in Wassenaar, in the Netherlands, when the war broke out. Max Elion and his wife, Mary-Rose (née Nieuwkerk), had four children. In April 1942 their house was claimed by the Germans, and the family had to leave. After temporarily renting a house in the village, they were ordered to move to Amsterdam in July 1942. There they lived with their grandmother until the Germans started systematically rounding up Jews in the street. The Elions did not wait for their turn. Max and Mary-Rose decided to find a hiding place for their children and then flee to Switzerland. The youngest two children, Marianne and Frans, then about 6 and 5 years old, stayed for short periods with several of their parents’ friends, until they went to stay with Willem (b. 1893) and Arnolda (née de Vos, b. 1895) Six and their children in Eindhoven. Willem and Arnoldina’s children were at least 10 years older than Marianne and Frans Elion, but they did not complain about the “intruders” in their family. They helped in the household and accepted their new brother and sister, although the Elion children’s presence implied that they were not allowed to bring any friends home. Willem and Arnoldina cared for Marianne and Frans as if they were their own children. Marianne wrote to Yad Vashem in her testimony that “Mr. Six used to do woodwork at night in his attic room and made a wheelbarrow for us to play with in the garden.” The Elions’ nanny helped the Six family care for Marianne and Frans. It was a dangerous situation for the Six family. The German Ortskomandatur (district commander) was residing in a large building opposite the Sixes’ house. Jan, their son, was sought by the Germans, and there were collaborators living nearby. Sometimes, when there was danger, the nanny took Marianne and Frans to a farm, where they hid in the bushes until the danger had passed. Willem and Arnolda Six never received any financial compensation for saving the Elion children. They knew the children had nowhere to go, and their love and compassion motivated them, despite the danger to them and their family. When in March 1943 it became clear that the situation for the Six family had become too dangerous, they found a new hiding place for Marianne and Frans in Goor with Theodorus and Alberta Jeukens (recognized as Righteous Among the Nations in 1995). They stayed with the Jeukenses until the liberation. After the war the Elion family assembled at the Six family’s home, until the whole family was reunited. Marianne and Frans’s two other siblings had been in hiding with another family and had survived too, and their parents, Max and Mary-Rose, returned from Switzerland. Thanks to the help and bravery of people like Willem and Arnolda Six, the whole Elion family survived and returned to Wassenaar. On July 31, 2012, Yad Vashem recognized Willem and Arnoldina (de Vos) Six as Righteous Among the Nations.