Knud D.

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Knud D. was working as a police officer in Copenhagen during the war, and was part of the resistance movement. He helped Jewish families escape Denmark by sea to Sweden and participated in sabotage efforts against the Nazi occupiers. For his work, Knud was recognized in 2004 among Yad Vashem’s Righteous Among the Nations.

Excerpt From Video Testimony

Knud describes the efforts of the Danish community to hide its Jewish citizens from the Nazis.


Video Transcript

And the news spread like wildfire all over Denmark, and in just one or two days, all the Jews, I mean seven thousand five hundred in Copenhagen, were out of their homes and into the homes of friends, into farms, into hospitals, into churches, away from their homes, simply. And the Germans at that time, rounding up everybody, driving all over Copenhagen, and having the addresses from, were from the main synagogue in Copenhagen where they had stolen the lists. They only caught about three hundred and forty Jewish people, the oldest of them being an old lady of a hundred and two and the youngest one being a child of two years old.

And the rest of the Jews were sitting in with their friends, neighbors and in the hospitals where they would be put to bed, and I mean there’s a story from the one of the hospitals that one of the nurses said to the doctor, “What do we put on the bulletin here about this patient?” And the doctor just laughed and said, “Why don’t you put German measles.”

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