Faces of the attackers and escapees of Transport XX reflecting in the windows of this train leaving Boortmeerbeek station direction Mechelen, during the commemoration May 15, 2011 of Transport XX to Auschwitz.

The night of April 19, 1943, the 20th convoy left the transit camp Kazerne Dossin in Mechelen, with 1631 jewish deportees in circa 33 cattle cars heading for Auschwitz.

After passing the Boortmeerbeek train station, the three young Brussels’ heroes Youra Livschitz, Robert Maistriau, and Jean Franklemon, attacked this 20th convoy, opening one of the cars, and liberating 17 people.

A total of 238 deportees managed to escape from this death train before the Belgian border, by opening the cattle cars from the inside, with the help of some 20 jewish resistance fighters among the deportees, and also a second hold-up shortly after midnight at Korbeek-Lo.

The total number of 238 escapees (data update April 2024) , includes (i) the 17 people liberated during the attack in Boortmeerbeek, (ii) the escape of the 6-year-old boy Aron Luksenberg (a recent finding by Jo Peeters) , and (iii) the escape of Viviane , who escaped in the womb of her three-months pregnant mother Isabella Weinreb-Castegnier, and was born 6 months later in Brussels (Miracles.Media).

Just over half of the number of escapees – a total of 122 – managed to escape permanently — 26 escapees were shot dead when they jumped, and 90 escapees were recaptured and redeported…

Notes

Reflection shows the Transport XX – installation Boortmeerbeek, of four large canvases of three meters high and five meters wide placed ‘wagon-like’ next to each other, parallel to the Mechelen-Leuven railway line, with portraits of deported Jews who managed to escape from the XXth transport on Belgian territory. The first of the four large canvases also features the three young men who stopped the train, Youra (Georges) Livschitz, Jean Franklemon and Robert Maistriau.

The Transport XX – installation Boortmeerbeek was created for the 2007 Boortmeerbeek commemoration of Transport XX, with the theme: ‘Give Them a face’, and later commemoration events, thanks to Marc Michiels (commemoration coordinator) in collaboration with Marjan Verplancke and co-workers of the project “Give Them a Face” of Kazerne Dossin / Jewish Museum of Deportation and Resistance in Mechelen (Belgium) . Portraits of escapees are mostly from the State Archives, Brussels, digitized by Kazerne Dossin. Boortmeerbeek.

Citation info : Resistance | Miracles Moment #2 | Miracles•Media | 20240515 | ISAN 0000-0007-36B4-0002-A-0000-0000-7 | TakeNode bc70ea7c-278e-4f84-982c-4e926030c405