The unveiling of a plaque on the Noorderstraat in Hoorn honors the ‘heroine without a statue’, Trien de Haan and her husband Bart and teenage daughter Nellie. She was a figurehead for women’s and workers’ rights in the 1930s, but because of her fighting spirit she ended up in Ravensbrück concentration camp in Germany, from which she was one of the few to return alive.
Second cousin Bart Lankester and Eddy Boom, chairman of the Committee 40-45 from Hoorn, reveal the plaque on the former home of the De Haan-Zwagerman family at Noorderstraat 12. The place where secret meetings are held, underground newspapers and pamphlets, among other things. are distributed and people in hiding are also accommodated.
Resistance heroine Trien de Haan and her family honored with plaque – NH News
Trien, Bart and Nellie were never awarded for their resistance work, they had no need for that. From their political convictions, resistance was self-evident. “Trien de Haan has definitely not received the appreciation she deserved. In fact, after the war she did not receive a resistance pension for thirty years. She lacked help for the camp syndrome, which she suffered greatly from. She felt – rightly so – abandoned by the government. That is why we are committed to this plaque”, explains chairman Eddy Boom of Committee 40-45 Hoorn.
Historian and writer Bart Lankester wrote a biography about his great-aunt in 2017. Together with ten great nieces and nephews, they have financially ensured that the plaque was created. “I also didn’t know what I would bring to the table when I started it, and she is now in the list of illustrious feminists. Very special.”
She didn’t want to be called a heroine, even though she always took the lead. “She remained very modest but came to the fore when the crowd had to be addressed. When she returned to Hoorn, she told her story in a packed Park Schouwburg.”
Who is Trien de Haan-Zwagerman (1891-1986) and her family?
It family De Haan-Zwagerman are outspoken left socialists. Trien is a board member of the Revolutionary Socialist Workers’ Party (RSAP), of the revolutionary NAS Women’s Union and of provincial committees against fascism and the threat of war. After the banned RSAP goes underground in May 1940, Trien is the only woman in the leadership of the first organized resistance group in the Netherlands, the Marx-Lenin-Luxemborg Frond (MLL-Front). Headed by the well-known activist Henk Sneevliet, of whom she is a confidant. Trien arranges false identity cards and hiding addresses in Hoorn, among other things. She set up a birth control office on the Noorderstraat.
Camp Ravensbruck
When the resistance group is betrayed in February 1942 and the male leaders are shot, it ends up in Ravenbrück concentration camp. There she saved, among other things fellow townsman Aaf Dell of execution. In the meantime, her husband Bart and daughter Nellie took at least fifteen people in hiding on the Noorderstraat under their wing.
Because Bart worked during the day, the care for the people in hiding largely fell to Nellie. If it was too dangerous, she had to take them to a safer place. At the risk of your own life. Bart was active in the armed resistance with his left-wing comrades. A weapons depot was hidden in the house. After the war, Bart was added to the Domestic Forces. He was given a year’s leave to become a guard in the Krententuin prison on Oostereiland.
In addition to the unveiling of the plaque, a dance performance has also been made about the life of the resistance woman. On 4 May, De Dansonderneming will present the performance ‘Trien – an ode to the special West Frisian Trien de Haan’ in the Boterhal in Hoorn, based on a poem she wrote when she was in the concentration camp.
In addition to a plaque, the Committee 40-45 also wants to honor the trio with a street name. The committee submitted this suggestion to the College of Mayor and Aldermen in early 2023.