An Engelandvaarder with roots in Aalten –
Gerrit Jan Kuenen
Gerrit Jan Kuenen
13 January 1918 – 1 June 1944 (aged 26)
Cemetery Duinrust Beverwijk, section no. 640
Gerrit Jan Kuenen was Engelandvaarder.
Jan Kuenen was the eldest son of Gerrit Jan Engelbertus Hendrikus Kuenen and Gerritje Johanna Theodora Roelofswaard. Jan was still young when the family moved to Beverwijk. Jan had followed an MTS education and had a job as a technical draughtsman at a machine factory in Beverwijk when he was called up on February 2, 1938 to fulfill his military service. He became a corporal-rifle maker. Due to a damage to his meniscus that he sustained during military service, he was rejected. He then found work as a mechanical engineer at Hoogovens in IJmuiden.
During the invasion of the Germans, 1940, he was at home biting his teeth. Soon he and his colleague Kees van der Poel, also from Beverwijk, came up with all kinds of ways to thwart the Germans. They came up with the bold plan to hijack a Messerschmitt at an airbase near Bergen with a certain Piet Servaas, who was a pilot, and fly it to England. In the end, the plan turned out not to be feasible.
In the spring of 1941, another plan was forged to cross the North Sea in a seaboat. After the attempt had been postponed for a day due to the strong headwind, a sloop left Wijk aan Zee for England on 20 April 1941 in which 10 other people sailed in addition to Jan. Once at sea it turned out to be impossible to continue. Due to the rough weather, Jan fell overboard, but fortunately he could be hoisted back on board. Again they had to turn back. As a result, Jan is a suspect. On May 16, he is arrested, interrogated and released. However, this happens again the next day. He now feels that the ground is getting too hot under his feet and decides to go to England by land, and after a long journey via Belgium and France, in Spain, In Perpignan (France) he runs into his friend Kees van der Poel again, after which they cross the Pyrenees together. In Zaragoza they are arrested and spend a month in prison and two months in a concentration camp in Miranda de Ebro. After a month, they are taken to Madrid by the American Red Cross. Then the journey goes overseas to Curaçao. From there, Jan ended up in Canada via New York and finally arrived in England on 17 December 1942
Jan is eventually recruited and trained as a secret agent, trained at the British secret service SOE, where he becomes a 2nd lieutenant. He receives extensive training as a sabotage instructor. Yet his blazon is not entirely unscathed. He was found several times in an intoxicated state in various bars and even once arrested by the Military Police. He also gets involved with many women, which leads to a venereal disease. For a long time, he was not seen as completely reliable. Partly due to his tenacity and anti-Nazi feelings, he still manages to gain his trust. After a thorough preparation, he was finally dropped near Eindhoven in the night of 31 May to 1 June 1944 together with another secret agent Cees Dekkers. Together with four other crew members, they board the plane, a Hudson (V9155) of the 161 Special Duties Squadron. However, things turn out very differently. The plane they are in flies too close to the anti-aircraft guns near the Gilze en Rijen base. Fierce artillery from the Flak hits the plane, causing it to crash. No one survives the crash and they are buried on the spot.
After the war, Jan Kuenen was reburied with military honours at Duinrust cemetery on 22 September 1945. In 1959 a street in Beverwijk was named after him in his memory.
Sources:
Website ogs.nl, (War Graves Foundation)
© Bernard O’Connor: Sabotage in Holland.
Photo Jan Kuenen: © Aaldert van de Waal
Photo tombstone © War Graves Foundation
Archive © National Hiding Museum Aalten
Gerrit Jan Kuenen
13 January 1918 – 1 June 1944 (aged 26)
Cemetery Duinrust Beverwijk, section no. 640
Grave of Gerrit Jan Kuenen at Duinrust Cemetery in Beverwijk
