The #Righteous amongst us
1/n
Alphonse and Emilie Gonsette and their son Émile, from Gosselies north of Charleroi, are members of the Belgian resistance network MNB. Arrested by the Gestapo in 1942 with seven other students, Émile was shot dead in Charleroi.
1/n
Alphonse and Emilie Gonsette and their son Émile, from Gosselies north of Charleroi, are members of the Belgian resistance network MNB. Arrested by the Gestapo in 1942 with seven other students, Émile was shot dead in Charleroi.
2/n Although their home was under constant Gestapo surveillance, when Mademoiselle Dessent, a member of the Resistance, contacted them in 1943 to ask them to take in a two-year-old Jewish child whose mother had been arrested, they did not hesitate not for a moment.
3/n The young Simon Weissblum is a weak child, who will have to undergo two operations during the war during his stay with the Gonsettes. The surgeon who operated on him, Doctor Perçoit, refused to be paid when he learned that the child was Jewish and kept him in the hospital for
4/n two weeks. Simon will spend more than a year with the Gonsettes who will treat him like their own son, while constantly showing him the photo of his mother, so that he does not forget it. When his mother came back to pick him up after the war, they invited her to stay with
5/n them for a few months. After the war, the Gonsettes declined the offer of financial compensation for hosting Simon Weissblum. The latter will name his son Émile, in memory of Émile Gonsette, the son of his adoptive parents who died in martyrdom, and in tribute to his rescuers
6/6 On November 14, 1974, Yad Vashem will recognize Alphonse Gonsette and Émilie Gonsette-Seymers as Righteous Among the Nations.
• • •
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to
force a refresh
