The fallen resistance people in Limburg

Jules Goffin
(Jules Ghislain Hubert Joseph)

nl.wikisage.org …

Jules Goffin was not a resistance fighter in the Dutch province of Limburg, but was in close contact with them and therefore also appears on this list.
While studying during World War I, he was recruited by the secret services in 1915. He was arrested in 1918 at café Phare in Liège by the German military police. He was released after the Allies’ victory. [7]
Since 1925, he was a general practitioner in ’s-Gravenvoeren (Fouron-le-Comte). [1]
In 1940, he became a member of the resistance network Clarence [2], of which he became the local leader. He collected a lot of information, among other things, on railroad movements.

The text below is an extract from La résistance durant la guerre 1940-1945 du côté de Visé. (The resistance during the 1940-1945 war on the Visé side) [3]
After the First World War, in 1920, Jules Goffin studied medicine in Louvain. Five years later, with his diploma in hand, he began practicing medicine in ’s-Gravenvoeren. He practiced in the region and in several Dutch villages along the border. On May 10, 1940, he evacuated to France with his four children, as he was wanted by the Germans because he had already been involved in the resistance during the First World War. After a month spent in the villages of Salvat-sur-Agout and Clermont-l’Hérault, he returned with his family to Voeren, where he resumed his practice as a doctor and pharmacist. He also renewed contact with Walter Dewé. They set up a resistance group called “Service Clarence”. The main aim of this service was to gather as much information as possible on German rail transport, such as the number of vehicles being transported: tanks, trucks, artillery pieces, troops being transported, as well as identifying the insignia of units heading for the front.
…
Dewé and Goffin recruited railwaymen such as Jean Vanwissen, deputy stationmaster in Visé; Henri Syben, signal and point guard in Visé-Haut; and Henri Straet, signal and point guard in Sint-Martens-Voeren. Not all of them were railway workers! There was also Theo Brentjens, commander of the gendarmerie in Sint-Martens-Voeren, vicar Van den Dungen and Alphonse Smeets from Eijsden, Mrs. Mariette, a shopkeeper in the Rue du Pont in Visé, father and son Demain, quai du Halage in Visé…

As a result of the Hannibalspiel he was arrested on October 15, 1942 and locked up in the prison of Saint-Léonard. [4]
Subsequently, he and his peers ended up in camp Vught, were sentenced to death in Utrecht and shot at the execution site of Fort Rhijnauwen in Bunnik. [5]
On this web site, the victims of the Hannibal spiel are included in the Erkens group, following the memorial stone at Fort Rhijnauwen, where they were shot. Actually, Jules Goffin in particular belonged more to Clarence.
See about this also Paul De Jongh’s very readable book on the cross-border resistance between the south of Dutch Limburg and the north of the Belgian province of Liège, published, of course, in two languages. [6]
Jules Goffin is buried in the cemetery of ’s-Gravenvoeren.


Monument Rhijnauwen,
Wikimedia

Footnotes

1. OpenStreetMap Voeren / Fourons
2. Clarence, Wikipedia • Nederlands • Deutsch • Français
3. La résistance durant la guerre 1940-1945 du côté de Visé
4. Prison Saint-Léonard, Wikipédia • Nederlands • Français
5. nl.wikipedia.org Fort Rijnauwen, Bunnik
6. Paul De Jongh @ Brepols Publisher, Turnhout
   Grenzeloos verzet. Over spionerende monniken, ontsnappingslijnen en het Hannibalspiel. 1940-1943
   Résistance sans frontières. À propos de moines espions, de lignes d’évasions et du Hannibalspiel, 1940-1943
7. http://nl.wikisage.org/wiki/Jules_Goffin