TO SAVE ONE LIFE: Max Windmueller and the Dutch Rescue-and-Resistance Movement Max Windmüller, a Jewish Holocaust hero, was born in 1920 in Emden, Germany, on the border with Holland. In 1933, shortly after Hitler came to power, Max's parents and four children moved across the border to Groningen, Holland. Max finished his schooling there. Hoping to emigrate to what was then Palestine, he trained on Dutch farms to acquire the necessary agricultural skills. It was during that time that he met and fell in love with Metta Lande. In July 1939, the ship "Dora" was anchored in Amsterdam harbor to bring young Jews to Palestine. As Max stood on the quay, waiting to board the ship, a Dutch Zionist leader pleaded with him to remain in Holland, to coordinate rescue activities for Jewish youths. Heeding that plea, Max stayed behind. The Dora was to be the last ship to leave Amsterdam for Palestine. Soon after, in May 1940, the Nazis invaded Holland. Under the guidance of Joop Westerweel, a non-Jewish Dutch pacifist, Max and other Jewish resisters worked to move Jewish youngsters to safety outside of Holland. That involved finding safe-houses and escorting small groups across three borders, ending in the dangerous climb over the Pyrenees Mountains into Spain. In January 1944, Max and Metta linked up again. She joined the resisters, and they became lovers. When some of the resisters were arrested and deported, Max, still in his early 20's, moved into a position of prominence, continuing to bring Jewish youngsters to the French-Spanish border. In July 1944, Max and most of his remaining comrades were arrested in Paris and deported to concentration camp Buchenwald, on the last train heading eastward before the Allies liberated Paris. On April 18, 1945, Max and other prisoners were forced to march away from the Flossenberg concentration camp, which lay in the path of the Allied advance. Weakened by typhus, Max collapsed on that death march and was shot by a German guard, one day before the column of prisoners was liberated by American forces. Since Max did not live to describe these events, the author has encased the book's true story inside a fictional frame: a German author is commissioned to write a book about Max. She travels to Haifa, Israel to interview a man who grew up with Max, accompanied him in his rescue activities, was arrested with him and was alongside him when he died. An Epilogue describes, in broad terms, the decades-long efforts of citizens of Emden to honor Max's memory, by educational activities and by giving his name to an Emden street and to the local Gymnasium. Daniel Sachs sachs11md@gmail.com
About the Author: Daniel Sachs was born in Madrid, Spain, of German-Jewish parents. They had received their Ph.D's from Berlin University in 1932, but realized early on, when the Nazis came to power, that no teaching positions would be open to them in Germany. With the assistance of the Spanish Ambassador in Berlin, the author's father obtained a position at the Universidad Complutense in Madrid. The author was born there, in 1934. In July 1936, with the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War, the university closed down for the duration, and the Sachs family became refugees again. They emigrated to the United States and settled in New York City, where the author grew up. After graduating from Cornell University and a stint in the US Army, the author received a law degree from the George Washington University Law School. He devoted his career to the development of affordable housing, first in New Haven, Connecticut, and then in Montgomery County, Maryland. He is the author of a 2014 memoir, Through Turmoll to Tranqujility. He also translated and edited a volume of letters written by his great-grandfather, Louis Lewin, entitled Across the United States and Canada in 1887. He and his wife, Ruth, have three children and five grandchildren.