Jan and Miep Gies: The Resistance Heroes Who Did Far More Than Hide Anne Frank

Jan and Miep Gies: The Resistance Heroes Who Did Far More Than Hide Anne Frank

Today I want to find out a little bit more about Jan and Miep Gies.

Most people know Jan and Miep Gies as two of the brave helpers who supported Anne Frank and the seven others in the Secret Annex, but their courage went well beyond the Annex.

Jan and Miep first met while working at Schellekens Embroidery and Pleating Workshops in Amsterdam. Miep worked as a typist and Jan as a bookkeeper. When Miep started work as Otto Frank's secretary at Opekta in 1933, Jan would often meet up with her during lunch breaks. Jan got to know Otto Frank, and the two men developed a close friendship.

When the German occupation started to tighten its grip on the Netherlands, Jan and Miep chose to resist.

Miep used her position at Otto Frank's business to move around Amsterdam, gathering food, clothing, books, medicines and other essentials for the people in hiding, all at immense personal risk. She also helped to keep the office functioning as normally as possible, which was incredibly important for the safety of everyone involved.

Jan worked for Amsterdam's Social Services but was also active in the Dutch Resistance, helping to obtain forged identity papers, illegal ration cards and safe hiding places for people being hunted. Together, Jan and Miep also hid a Dutch university student, Kuno van der Horst, in their own home after he refused to sign a loyalty declaration.

After the Secret Annex was discovered on the 4^th of August 1944, Miep even went to the headquarters of the German Security Service in a desperate attempt to secure the release of those who had been arrested. She was sadly unsuccessful, but she did gather up Anne Frank's diary pages and notebooks and kept them until Otto Frank came after the war. Without Miep's actions, one of the world's most important eyewitness accounts of the Holocaust may have been lost forever.

We will never know exactly how many lives Jan and Miep helped to save. But their resistance work almost certainly reached many others through the forged papers, ration cards, safe houses and support that they helped to provide. The true number has been lost to history.

Jan and Miep never considered themselves heroes. They believed that when people needed help, you helped them. Their bravery serves as a powerful reminder that resistance was not always fought with weapons. Sometimes it was a forged ration card, a bag of groceries, an open front door, or the simple decision to stand up for another human being when it mattered most.