Hanna van de Voort
(Johanna Catharina Maria)

∗ 26-11-1904 Meerlo     † 26-07-1956 Utrecht (51)
- Women in the resistance - Aid to Jews - Survivors - Broekhuizen/Tienray -

The adjacent photo is from Wikipedia. [1]
During World War II, Hanna van de Voort was a maternity nurse in Tienray and its surroundings in Limburg. That was in the then municipality of Meerlo, now belonging to Horst aan de Maas. As far as the LO was concerned, it was in the Broekhuizen subdistrict. Hanna’s father was a baker, catering entrepreneur and self-appointed mayor of Tienray.
In Amsterdam, an Amsterdam Student Group (ASG) was especially active in rescuing Jewish children. After their founder Piet Meerburg, the group was also called the Meerburg Group. Their sacred principle was that only the parents should determine what would happen to their children. Meerburg met Karel Ex from Venlo and came into contact with Hanna van de Voort.
Karel Ex from Venlo was also looking for ways to house Amsterdam Jewish children. He struck up a conversation with a cousin of Hanna’s and she immediately thought of Hanna. [2]

Van de Voort knew almost everyone in the area through her work and so, together with Nico Dohmen, among others - a student who had gone into hiding with the Van de Voort family - managed to find a safe haven for 123 Jewish children.
… Aunt Hanna and Uncle Nico picked up the children in Venlo or Venray and lodged them at the Van de Voort family home for the first few days. There they gave the children a pseudonym and familiarized them with the Catholic principles and the city map of Rotterdam. With an identity card from the Centraal Bureau voor Kinderuitzending (Central bureau for the relocation of children), they were able to pretend to be evacuated orphans from bombed-out Rotterdam. [3]
Cammaert writes about her: Under the leadership of the nurse J. van de Voort, supported by the student N.J.P. Dohmen and the 17-year-old Jewish boy K. Löwenstein, who had gone into hiding in Meerlo, over a hundred Jewish children found shelter with foster families in Tienray and the surrounding villages. The Tienray group’s contacts with the L.O. were minimal and informal. [4]
An important role in the group in finding addresses for the Jewish children, as well as being the contact person for the LO, had Toon Peeters.

Arrest
On the night of July 31 to August 1, 1944, Hanna van de Voort was arrested after a betrayal and taken to Eindhoven together with some of the children hiding in Tienray. Nico Dohmen was able to escape. Raids also took place elsewhere in the province, during which children and hosts of families in hiding were arrested. However, the story of the Rotterdam orphans has proven itself in many cases. It appears that eight of the children entrusted to Van de Voort were deported and murdered in Auschwitz in the same year.
Van de Voort was imprisoned for nine days and interrogated harshly. However, she refused to give up any information. She insisted that she had only helped Rotterdam evacuees. Mieke Mees, a medical student who accompanied the children from Amsterdam to their hiding places in the provinces, went to Eindhoven and managed to persuade the German commandant to release Van de Voort. [3]

So this group did in North Limburg what was mainly done by the NV in South Limburg.
Hanna van de Voort is aproof of Herman van Rens’ thesis that it makes a big difference when charismatic people take the lead when it is about offering resistance. In a summary of his book Vervolgd in Limburg, he writes:
In the creation of group norms, the attitude and example of a small number of moral leaders who show the way to the members of the group plays a major role. In Limburg during the war, both the option to help as well as the one to look the other way proved to be contagious. A help-oriented society of enablement seemed to thrive there, especially in safe small societies where the members and their leaders knew and trusted each other. [5]
As a result, many people join in who need just that one push. Hanna van de Voort fulfilled this function for the rural community in Tienray and the surrounding area.

Hanna van de Voort and Cisca de Mulder drove the Germans out of Swolgen during the liberation:
In Swolgen, she helped Cisca de Mulder with a large pump sprayer to supposedly disinfect the farm. The German soldiers thanked her profusely, since they were scared to death of TB and ran away. The Americans could breathe a sigh of relief.
...
She died on July 26, 1956 at Anthonius Hospital in Utrecht during open heart surgery. [6]
There is a plaque in Tienray to remember Hanna van de Voort. [7]

Footnotes

1. Hanna van de Voort, Wikipedia • Nederlands • Deutsch • Français
2. Kinderwerk -hoe ging dat en wie waren de verantwoordelijken?
3. Vera Sýkora, Voort, Johanna Catharina Maria van de, in: Digitaal Vrouwenlexicon van Nederland. [13/07/2016]
4. Dr. F. Cammaert, Het Verborgen Front – Geschiedenis van de georganiseerde illegaliteit in de provincie Limburg tijdens de Tweede Wereldoorlog. Doctorale scriptie 1994, Groningen
   6. De Landelijke Organisatie voor hulp aan onderduikers, Rayon Grubbenvorst en rayon Broekhuizen, Broekhuizenvorst, Wanssum, Swolgen, Meerlo, Blitterswijk en Tienray, p.596
5. Herman van Rens, Vervolgd in Limburg
   1. Samenvatting door de auteur
   2. Download
6. Tienray 75 jaar bevrijd Hanna van de Voort
7. Tienray, plaquette voor Hanna van de Voort
8. geni.com Johanna Catharina Maria (Hanna) van de Voort