4th candle: The resistance [2]

Gerda Schunck told about Paul Simons, the pseudonym of father Pierre Schunck, the head of the resistance in Valkenburg

In resistance against injustice
Such was my father Pierre Schunck with the pseudonym Paul Simons.
He was a quiet, kind and social man who, together with my mother, was always ready to help the weaker ones in society.
So too when the war broke out in 1940.

A quote from him was: “You did not choose to join the resistance. Events, sometimes small incidents, led you to assist. The result was that you had done something to help another person, but that was forbidden by the occupier.
That then took you from one thing to the next.”
In the end, he became the leader of the Valkenburg subdistrict of the L.O. (Aid for those in hiding).

Read more about the resistance in Valkenburg. This story is largely based on his notes and interviews from after the war

Another quote from him: “Freedom is something you pass on. Let the fire of freedom burn in us.”

But freedom also includes respecting other cultures, other religions or orientations. Most of us hope that the days of National Socialism will never return. To the few who do, these texts are wasted. Unfortunately, their numbers are increasing again. Perhaps we should still worry that our democracy is losing out to authoritarian currents and that we will have a dictatorship again.

All the more reason to be well informed and learn lessons from organized resistance.

| resistance in Valkenburg | genocide of the Jews in Limburg | genocide of the Romani in Limburg and elsewhere | Germans killed in action in Valkenburg-Houthem |