History of Sorts

George John Lionel Maduro (15 July 1916 – 8 February 1945) was a Dutch law student who served as an officer in the 1940 Battle of the Netherlands and distinguished himself in repelling the German attack on The Hague. He was posthumously awarded the medal of Knight 4th-class of the Military Order of William, the highest and oldest military decoration in the Kingdom of the Netherlands.

The miniature city of Madurodam is named after him, as well as the Maduroplein area in Scheveningen, in The Hague.

George John Lionel Maduro was born on 15 July 1916 in Willemstad in the Dutch colony Curaçao . He was the only son of Joshua and Rebecca Maduro, a couple of Sephardic Jewish descent.

Maduro was 23 and a law student at Leiden University when Germany invaded The Netherlands on 10 May 1940. By a royal order on 21 November 1939 Maduro had been…