Setting Off
Alice, Jack, Li and Piet set off on Wednesday 25 November 1942, a calm, but chilly and grey autumn day with temperatures of 9 degrees Celsius and a little rain, according to the Dutch Bureau of Meteorology. This departure date follows from calculating back from their date of arrival in the Swiss town of Porrentruy. It also corresponds with the notice that Li received from her employer, the Rotterdam Council. Obviously she had not told her boss that she was going to escape. The notice says that her job was officially terminated on Tuesday 24 November, probably meaning that she had left the job that day. The letter can be found on the page with documents. Fortunately the events of those days are described in the memoires that Piet wrote in 2008. "Jack van Gorkom became very restless and anxious after a couple of gentlemen in long, black leather coats came to his house to enquire about his whereabouts. After these friendly visits Jack very seldom slept at home. On many occasions I was being followed by a member of the black brotherhood. It was time to do something. And we did something, we decided to go on a "holiday" trip to Switzerland through occupied Belgium and France.
It was no picnic. SS and Gestapo were swarming like locusts all over Europe looking for individuals like us.
Jack told me that he had promised a Jewish refugee in Switzerland that in case he would return to Helvetia he would go to Amsterdam and collect a substantial sum of money. And deliver that to a Jewish family in Lausanne. Apart from that he had a secret mission for an English lady, Mrs. Skene, who lived also in Lausanne. Jack never told me the nature of these missions.
Jack had a girlfriend called Li and as we know I had my girlfriend Alice. We told the girls of our death-defying plan, what it really was. And both girls wanted to come with us, I had objections and did not want to take Alice with me and have her death on my conscience, but she was most determined and it is impossible to change Alice's mind. Alice was at home at Zutphen and although I had promised her father not to see her there I broke my solemn oath and went to the lion's den and met my future spouse in the forbidden zone and on a cold winter day we walked and talked and cuddled and kissed and it was decided that we would meet the next morning at Zutphen station.
And so next morning, very early, there was Aly. She had written a note to say goodbye to her parents and put that note under the plate on the breakfast table. The housemaid who was going to serve breakfast discovered the note and raised the alarm. Aly's pappa bolted out the house to the railway station to take the first available train to Geldrop, because that is where he thought we would be. There was a mini drama when he insisted to go through the house trying to find her, he returned to base a very sad man.
Aly and I took the train to Utrecht to meet Jack and Li to go to Amsterdam for Jack to do the things he had to do, but in Utrecht the man in disguise, in black leather coat and black hat was following us from platform to platform, which made us a little nervous, so we took different carriages to throw him of the trail. When I looked out of the window the poor Third Reich agent seemed to be lost, because he lost us and so the adventure started."
It was no picnic. SS and Gestapo were swarming like locusts all over Europe looking for individuals like us.
Jack told me that he had promised a Jewish refugee in Switzerland that in case he would return to Helvetia he would go to Amsterdam and collect a substantial sum of money. And deliver that to a Jewish family in Lausanne. Apart from that he had a secret mission for an English lady, Mrs. Skene, who lived also in Lausanne. Jack never told me the nature of these missions.
Jack had a girlfriend called Li and as we know I had my girlfriend Alice. We told the girls of our death-defying plan, what it really was. And both girls wanted to come with us, I had objections and did not want to take Alice with me and have her death on my conscience, but she was most determined and it is impossible to change Alice's mind. Alice was at home at Zutphen and although I had promised her father not to see her there I broke my solemn oath and went to the lion's den and met my future spouse in the forbidden zone and on a cold winter day we walked and talked and cuddled and kissed and it was decided that we would meet the next morning at Zutphen station.
And so next morning, very early, there was Aly. She had written a note to say goodbye to her parents and put that note under the plate on the breakfast table. The housemaid who was going to serve breakfast discovered the note and raised the alarm. Aly's pappa bolted out the house to the railway station to take the first available train to Geldrop, because that is where he thought we would be. There was a mini drama when he insisted to go through the house trying to find her, he returned to base a very sad man.
Aly and I took the train to Utrecht to meet Jack and Li to go to Amsterdam for Jack to do the things he had to do, but in Utrecht the man in disguise, in black leather coat and black hat was following us from platform to platform, which made us a little nervous, so we took different carriages to throw him of the trail. When I looked out of the window the poor Third Reich agent seemed to be lost, because he lost us and so the adventure started."
