Five Brothers and a War

Jan’s Enslavement in Germany

In June 1943, Jan and Wim van Rossum had been ordered to report for the arbeitseinsatz (German for “work activity”, a euphemism for slave labor). Wim was sent first. Jan had considered becoming an onderduiker (“under-diver”—a person hiding “underground”), but was warned that if he did not appear as ordered, his father could be captured in his stead. He therefore did appear on the appointed date. He left with a group of young men from the Dutch province of Zeeland, having no idea where he was going inside Germany, or what he would be enslaved to do. Arriving south of Stuttgart, they were assigned “jobs” in accordance with their stated or supposed abilities. A large group had to work in factories, whether munitions or other wartime manufacturing. Jan and many others were chosen to include horticulture or farming. Jan convinced the Germans that he had experience in horticulture, having come from the west of Holland, which was, as still is, world-renowned as a center for agriculture. Jan then was assigned to be a slave laborer in a flower-growing establishment. The Germans were most interested in maintaining the appearance of normalcy for its citizens, despite the fact that the tide of the war had shifted by this point. Flowers were important, but certainly not important enough to have Germans doing the work. His “employer” was located just outside the town of Tübingen. Tübingen is a university town, with about half the population being students at the University of Tübingen (also known as the Eberhard Karls University, Tübingen). The university dates back to 1477 AD. There is no campus, but rather the town itself serves to host any number of buildings that collectively comprise the university. Among the faculty and alumni are ten Nobel laureates, including Albert Schweitzer. Joseph Ratzinger, the man who would become Pope Benedict XVI was the chair of the university’s Dogmatic Theology Department.

van Pelt

Tübingen is immediately south of Stuttgart, and southeast of Pforzheim.

Five Brothers and a War

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