(Rotterdam, 1922)

Member of the 1st Company DNB

Meeting with a Canadian pilot in the night

Henk van Tienhoven was born in Rotterdam on 9 December 1922. To escape the Arbeitseinsatz, he went into hiding, first in Rotterdam, then in Aalten where he slept on the hayloft of a farm.

Early 1944, Henk is woken in the middle of the night. A Canadian pilot had knocked at the farm after an emergency landing. Henk understands English, so acts as interpreter for the resistance. The pilot is brought to a temporary hiding place in Lichtenvoorde. He gives Henk a silk map of Germany and the Netherlands the next day and will then return safely to the airbase in England via the ´pilot escape line’.

Henk knows most of the other fugitives in the area and participates in resistance actions, just like his friend Wim Boxhoorn from Rotterdam. Because he masters the English language, he also becomes involved with the Albrecht spy group.

Henk van Tienhoven and Wim Boxhoorn both become members of the Dutch National Battalion after the liberation, as does Daan Groenewegen (with whom Henk’s sister Antje will later marry).

Henk van Tienhoven dies on 9 October 2018 in Rotterdam.

Henk van Tienhoven