The fallen resistance people in Limburg

Yvonne Tonka
(Yvonne Anna Augustine)

On geneanet.org it says about her marriage: Married August 30, 1932 Eisden (P-B), to Raymond Louis Pierre DEBATTY 1910-1938. [1]
On openarchieven.nl it says about this: Bridegroom: Raymond Louis Pierre Debatty, born in Ougré (Belgium), aged 22. Bride: Jvonne (!) Anna Augustine Tonka, born in Liège (Belgium), aged 21, coiffeuse [2].

She was thus widowed at an early age and had a hairdressing salon in Liege during the war.
Her father was clarinetist of the Sainte Cécile wind band in Eijsden. [3]

Arthur Renkin was a Belgian military bandmaster from Liège, who after his discharge from prisoner of war became again conductor of the Sainte Cécile wind band in Eijsden and started to help fugitive French prisoners of war come home.
He had created a line in Belgium to take them across the Belgian-French border.
In Belgium, Arthur Renkin had yet to organize shelter for the refugees who came across the border via Eijsden.
For this purpose, on August 10, 1940, he enlisted Yvonne Debatty-Tonka, a young widow who owned a hair salon at 100 Rue des Champs in Liège. Although her mother tongue was French, she spoke and wrote Dutch fluently. That made her a perfect liaison between the Dutch from Eijsden and the Belgians of Renkin’s group. The refugees could spend the night at her home; she could welcome them in their native language and then lead them on. In addition, she delivered to Arthur Renkin intelligence from both Holland and Belgium. [3]
According to cometeline.org, she helped only 5 or 6 refugees onward on command of Renkin of Luc/Marc, sector VN/H. [4]
But on tracelimburg.nl/ we read something completely different:
The hair salon Yvonne is one of Luc-Marc’s main intermediate addresses. Yvonne Debatty herself was born in Eysden, she regularly crosses the border to pick up spied stuff. She also hosts many dozens of refugees, sometimes for one night, sometimes for days. [5]
That Yvonne would have been born in Eijden does not match the records, see above. But she married there and apparently lived there as well.

Two Dutch agents of the Marine-Abwehr from Groningen infiltrate the group. By Renkin and Erkens the two are fully trusted. By Yvonne they are not. She wonders, for example, why one of the two always has gasoline for his motorcycle. One does not take her suspicions seriously. Dozens of arrests by the SiPo Maastricht follow in mid-October.
Mrs. YVONNE DEBATTY-TONKA: “Initially six weeks in Liège, then five days in Maastricht and then for a time in Haaren. From Haaren I was brought to Scheveningen and then from Scheveningen to Utrecht and there I was tried and sentenced to death. From there I went to Germany, to Lübeck, Kottbus, Ravensbrück and Mauthausen.”
Fortunately, Yvonne Debatty can recount it. The others can’t. Only Arthur Renkin, the chapel master and head of Luc-Marc from Liege, was able to avoid being arrested. [5]
Read more: the Hannibal Game

Foto: [3]

Footnotes

1. geneanet.org Yvonne Anna Augustine TONKA
2. openarchieven.nl Huwelijk op 30 augustus 1932 te Eijsden
3. Paul de Jongh
   • 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
4. cometeline.org ABC helpers
5. www.tracelimburg.nl/sites/default/files/maaslandse-monografieen/MM 10 def.pdf