On January 12, 1942 at 13:30 Jan Campert died in the Neuengamme concentration camp of pleurisy.
Most people will never have heard of this man, he was born on August 15 1902 in Spijkenisse a town near Rotterdam in the Netherlands.
He was a journalist, theater critic and writer who lived in Amsterdam.During the German occupation of the Netherlands in World War II Campert was arrested for aiding Jews. He was held in the Neuengamme concentration camp, where he died.
Campert is best known for his poem “De achttien dooden” (“The Eighteen Dead”), describing the execution of 18 resistance workers (15 resistance fighters and 3 communists) by the German occupier. Written in 1941 and based on an account published in Het Parool, the poem was clandestinely published in 1943 as a poetry card (“rijmprent”) by what would become publishing house De Bezige Bij to raise money to hide Jewish children.
Below is the English translation…
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