On April 29, 1945, U.S. troops liberated the Dachau concentration camp. I could share thousands of images of the atrocities committed there, but most people would likely only glance at one or two before turning away. The horror is simply too overwhelming to endure. The human mind struggles to comprehend such profound evil.
Instead, I have chosen to focus on a single victim who was murdered in Dachau: Chaplain A.S.A.A. van Lierop, also known as Noud van Lierop. He was a Dutch Catholic priest, born on September 25, 1897, in the small town of Steenbergen in the south of the Netherlands.
Three things struck me when I first learned about him. First, when I saw his name, I assumed he must have been from my hometown, as “van Lierop” is a well-known name in Geleen, once associated with a small chocolate shop and factory. However, Noud was not one of my town’s residents. Second, I had never heard of him before—neither about his life prior to the war nor his fate during it. Third, there is no mention of him on his birthplace’s Wikipedia page. Several notable figures are listed, yet his name is absent—a fact I personally find deeply disappointing.
So, who was Chaplain A.S.A.A. van Lierop?
He began his work as a chaplain in the city of Breda in the Netherlands and later became the chief editor of Katholieke Wereldpost, an influential Catholic magazine.
As early as the 1930s, van Lierop recognized the growing threat in Germany. He warned about the rise of the Nazi regime and spoke out against its crimes. The magazine he led served as a Catholic counterweight to both fascism and communism, employing several exiled prominent German Catholics. Its headquarters in Breda soon came to be seen as a center of anti-German resistance and thought.
After the Nazis invaded the Netherlands in May 1940, agents of the Reich Main Security Office (Reichssicherheitshauptamt) raided the offices of Katholieke Wereldpost. Van Lierop was arrested and deported to Dachau as a political prisoner. On November 27, 1942, he was killed there at the age of 45.
He may be a largely forgotten victim, but from now on, he will always be a hero to me—and, I hope, to others as well.
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Sources
https://brabantsegesneuvelden.nl/persoon/noud-van-lierop-steenbergen-1897
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