Robert Maistriau

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Robert Maistriau (born March 13, 1921 in Ixelles ; died September 26, 2008 in Woluwe-Saint-Lambert ) was a Belgian resistance fighter . For his participation in the attack on the 20th deportation train to Auschwitz , he was honored by Yad Vashem as Righteous Among the Nations .

Life

Robert Maistriau's father, a military doctor, ended the First World War as a general. He advised his son to learn German "because it is the language of our enemies". This enrolled in 1939 at the medical faculty of the Free University of Brussels (ULB).

Second World War

Coat of arms of the Groupe G

In 1942 Robert Maistriau was a senior member of Groupe G ("Groupe général de sabotage de Belgique", General Sabotage Group of Belgium), part of the Belgian Resistance , responsible for national recruitment. After he and Jean Franklemon had been recruited by his school friend Youra Livchitz , the three of them attacked the 20th deportation train to Auschwitz on April 19, 1943 near Boortmeerbeek , which was supposed to transport Jews from the SS assembly camp in Mechelen to Auschwitz-Birkenau in 1618 . He was almost arrested the next day, but was warned by a neighbor and was able to hide. On January 15, 1944, he participated in the sabotage La grande coupure . In the process, 28 high-voltage pylons were blown up all over Belgium , which led to a power outage in most of the country and caused considerable damage to the industrial facilities in the Ruhr area . He was arrested the next day, but remained unguarded in a hotel and was able to escape to Chiny . In Groupe G , he then mainly recruited members from the Belgian Ardennes .

On March 21, 1944 he was arrested again, taken to Fort Breendonk and then to Buchenwald concentration camp , where he stayed for over a year. In early April 1945, he came over Ellrich and Harzungen , two satellite camp of the concentration camp Dora central , to Bergen-Belsen , where he freed on 15 April 1945 by British troops and on a truck to Turnhout has returned to Belgium. When he was freed, he weighed 39 kg.

post war period

In September 1945 he entered the service of the Belgian State Security and dissolved the Groupe G on. In 1949 he moved to Feshi in the Belgian Congo , 200 kilometers from Kikwit . He stayed here for 40 years, initially raising cattle and then planting 200 hectares of forests in a savannah area with seeds from all over the world . In 1989 he returned to Belgium and settled in Woluwe-Saint-Lambert, where he died in September 2008. The Robert Maistriau Foundation was established in March 2011 and continues its work in the Congo .

Awards

The Garden of the Righteous Among the Nations
  • August 31, 1994: Righteous Among the Nations
  • 2005: Honorary doctorate from the Free University of Brussels
  • 2008: One month before his death, he became an honorary citizen of his community of Woluwe-Saint-Lambert, in which a school was named after him in December 2008.
  • 2011: In addition to the foundation in the Congo, a school in Feshi was named after him.

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Address to the ULB on the occasion of Maistriau's honor as Righteous Among the Nations
  2. ↑ Robert Maistriau Foundation (French)
  3. ^ Yad Vashem: The Righteous Among The Nations: Maistriau, Robert
  4. ↑ espritlibre September 2005
  5. ↑ Ecole Robert Maistriau
personal data
SURNAME Maistriau, Robert
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Belgian resistance fighter
DATE OF BIRTH March 13, 1921
PLACE OF BIRTH Ixelles
DATE OF DEATH September 26, 2008
Place of death Woluwe-Saint-Lambert