A commemorative plaque was unveiled on 11 September 2016 at the site of the former Lille-Fives freight station, in tribute to the 25 railway workers who, at the risk of their lives, helped save 45 people, including many children, from deportation in 1942.
On 11 September 1942, a large-scale round-up was organised against the Jewish populations of Nord and Pas-de-Calais, two départements then placed under the German military command in Brussels. Several hundred people were arrested in various towns across the region, notably in Lens, Valenciennes, Douai and Tourcoing, before being taken to the Fives freight station. They were then to be transferred to assembly points and on to deportation.
In this context, several railway workers decided to intervene. Making use of their knowledge of the site and of working conditions at the railway premises, they managed, despite German surveillance, to get 45 people out of the station grounds or off the train, shortly after the convoy’s departure. Among them were many children. Those thus spared from deportation were then hidden and looked after clandestinely until the Liberation.
The action of these railway workers illustrates the concrete forms that resistance to persecution and deportation could take. The plaque unveiled in 2016 at the Lille-Fives site now recalls this episode and pays tribute to the women and men who, at the risk of their lives, helped save people threatened with deportation.
