Easter Greetings from the Concentration Camp

Louis Kiebooms sent this Easter greeting to his wife and four children in April 1944. In the background you can see the city silhouette of Antwerp. Kiebooms' letters from the camp were often decorated with drawings. In one of the letters he writes that these were made by a draughtsman. It is not known whether this was a friendly service or whether Kiebooms exchanged the drawing for food or even cigarettes.

Kiebooms had been arrested in Antwerp on August 8, 1940 and transferred to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp in June 1941. As editor-in-chief of the newspaper "Gazet van Antwerpen" he and the management had refused to continue publishing the newspaper under German management after the occupation of Belgium by the Wehrmacht. Kiebooms belonged to a secret circle of Catholic intellectuals ("Bond van het Heilig Hart van Jezus") in the camp. Together with other Belgians, he also took care of Belgian prisoners who had fallen ill.

Kiebooms survived concentration camp imprisonment and the death march and returned to Antwerp in May 1945. There he took over the post of editor-in-chief of the "Gazet van Antwerpen". In 1946 he was elected to the Belgian Chamber of Deputies for the "Christelijke Volkspartij", later he was elected mayor of his home municipality Wilrijk near Antwerp.

In January 2016, the letter was added to the collection of the Sachsenhausen Memorial and Museum, together with other objects. Donors are Bernadette Kiebooms and Luc Kiebooms, children of Louis Kiebooms.