Learning lessons of survival
Published in The Australian Jewish News
May 30, 2019
It was 1942 when Joe de Haan fled his native Amsterdam to go into hiding in Friesland, a northern province of Holland.
His parents already taken away by Dutch Black Shirts, Joe was 19 years old, alone, and in hiding with some other Jews in a remote farmhouse.
Then, in the dead of night, some farm workers frantically banged on his window – “How they knew about me, I never found out.”
They alerted him that they had just seen Nazis arrive in the village.
“I realised I must get out quick, so I shot into my clothes in the middle of the night and bolted out of the farmhouse,” recounted Joe, now 96.
“There’s no streets, no lights, no roads, no moon, nothing. Just meadows.
“I knew there was a bit of a canal at the back [of the farm], so from the back door, I fell to my hands and knees and I crawled down to the water. Then I ran, and ran.”