Father Jacques KerssmakersThe Catholic Herald reported the execution by the Nazis of Quarr Abbey monk Jacques Kerrsemakers in the Netherlands on 10th December 1943. Jacques was born on December 16th 1896 in Eindhoven, Netherlands. He expressed his desire to become a monk from a young age. He took his first vows in 1923 and joined the Benedictine order. From 1930 to 1938, he worked in the United Kingdom, first in Farnborough, then at Quarr Abbey, where he taught philosophy. In 1938, he returned to his home country to train in nursing care. The outbreak of war in 1939 prevented his return to the Isle of Wight. When the Netherlands were invaded by the Nazis in May 1940, Jacques joined the Dutch Resistance, helping to hide Jews from the security services and copying plans of German military sites to forward to the British authorities. Jacques committed his first act of resistance soon after the invasion when he helped a French soldier – a priest who had been taken prisoner of war by the Germans – to escape and return to France. In 1942, Jacques helped the Jewish couple Benjamin Gokkes and Eva de Bock find a place of refuge in his monastery, St. Paul’s Abbey. Unfortunately, both were discovered by the Nazi Security Services and died within a year in the concentration camps. On the same day that the Security Service captured the hidden Jews, the Nazis came for Jacques. All the brothers were eating at that time, silently as usual. The abbot Dom Mähler told Jacques that they were there for him and gave the monk the choice of leaving through the front door or the back. Father Jacques chose to go with the Nazis to avoid endangering the other monks who were also members of his resistance group. Whilst imprisoned, the monk sent a letter to his abbot, describing in painstaking detail where his underwear was located and asking him to bring it over. It was there that Abbot Mähler found secret drawings of the local airfield, which he could pass on to the Dutch resistance. Father Jacques’ gravestone Jacques and fellow members of his group appeared before a German court-martial on 30th March 1943. All but 2 were sentenced to death. He was said to have been distraught for the first 2 days after the verdict was pronounced, but then calmed down. In a farewell note, he wrote:
“I shall immediately lay down my life for God and Country.”
After sentencing, other members the group were reprieved and spent the remainder of the war in German labour and concentration camps, but came out alive. However, the death sentence of Father Jacques and a further member of his group was carried out on the morning of 7th May 1943. Some years after his execution, Father Jacques’ urn was found by chance in Germany. Since 1958. he has been buried in the cemetery of the Oosterhout Abbey.
Very interesting but very sad story. Keep them up IE thank you
Jingo
2 years ago
Odd how vile a civilised race became and perhaps even more strange how one man is ‘used’ to blame eg Hitler.
Whilst no one person alone could have held such sway, most of the rest have been forgiven, yet the west is never ever allowed to be forgiven for slavery which was a hundred years before the Nazi party terrible crimes.
And the working people never gained at all only suffered by having slaves here, as unless they worked as hard for as little they too were left to starve.
History is odd how some are quickly forgiven others wrong doing is never allowed to be forgotten by the media.
Very interesting but very sad story. Keep them up IE thank you
Odd how vile a civilised race became and perhaps even more strange how one man is ‘used’ to blame eg Hitler.
Whilst no one person alone could have held such sway, most of the rest have been forgiven, yet the west is never ever allowed to be forgiven for slavery which was a hundred years before the Nazi party terrible crimes.
And the working people never gained at all only suffered by having slaves here, as unless they worked as hard for as little they too were left to starve.
History is odd how some are quickly forgiven others wrong doing is never allowed to be forgotten by the media.
It’s very simple, and a well trodden and well used route to power.
You single out certain sections of society as the source of your country’s problems and convince the uneducated masses to rise up against them.
Sound familiar?
What a load of tripe.
your comments generally are…
Jingo is writing his own version of history and it is just racist garbage. Grow up man.
Bravest of the Brave