Gerda Søvang Fiil (30 January 1927 - 26 June 1994) was a convicted member of the
Danish resistance
The Danish resistance movements ( da, Den danske modstandsbevægelse) were an underground insurgency to resist the German occupation of Denmark during World War II. Due to the initially lenient arrangements, in which the Nazi occupation autho ...
, whose father and brother were executed by the
German
German(s) may refer to:
* Germany (of or related to)
** Germania (historical use)
* Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language
** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law
**Ge ...
occupying power.
Biography
Gerda Søvang Fiil was born in Hvidsten on 30 January 1927 as the fourth of five children to proprietor Marius Fiil and wife Gudrun Fiil and baptized 28 March in Gassum church with her grandfather inn keeper in Hvidsten Niels Pedersen as godfather.
That year she lived in Hvidsten Inn with her 72-year-old grandfather as inn keeper, her parents, brother and three sisters and a farm hand, a maid and a manager.
She was confirmed
Palm Sunday
Palm Sunday is a Christian moveable feast that falls on the Sunday before Easter. The feast commemorates Christ's triumphal entry into Jerusalem, an event mentioned in each of the four canonical Gospels. Palm Sunday marks the first day of Hol ...
in Gassum church in 1941, while living in Hvidsten with her family.
During the later stage of the occupation the family and other locals formed a resistance group, the Hvidsten group.
With the group she helped the British
Special Operations Executive
The Special Operations Executive (SOE) was a secret British World War II organisation. It was officially formed on 22 July 1940 under Minister of Economic Warfare Hugh Dalton, from the amalgamation of three existing secret organisations. Its pu ...
parachute weapons and supplies into Denmark for distribution to the resistance.
In March 1944 the
Gestapo
The (), abbreviated Gestapo (; ), was the official secret police of Nazi Germany and in German-occupied Europe.
The force was created by Hermann Göring in 1933 by combining the various political police agencies of Prussia into one orga ...
made an "incredible number of arrests" including in the region of
Randers
Randers () is a city in Randers Municipality, Central Denmark Region on the Jutland peninsula. It is Denmark's sixth-largest city, with a population of 62,802 (as of 1 January 2022).Niels Fiil, her oldest sister
Kirstine Kirstine is a given name. Notable people with the name include:
* Kirstine Fiil (1918–1983), Danish resistance member
* Kirstine Frederiksen (1845–1903), Danish pedagogue, writer and women's activist
* Kirstine Meyer (1861–1941), Danish physi ...
and her brother-in-law Peter Sørensen.
The following month De frie Danske reported on her father again, that he along with other arrestees from Hvidsten had been transferred from Randers to
Vestre Fængsel
Vestre Prison ( da, Vestre Fængsel) is the main jail of the Danish capital, Copenhagen. Erected in 1895, it is Denmark's largest prison with a total capacity of 530 inmates. It primarily houses pretrial detainees, not convicted felons.
History ...
.
In June 1944 a
court martial
A court-martial or court martial (plural ''courts-martial'' or ''courts martial'', as "martial" is a postpositive adjective) is a military court or a trial conducted in such a court. A court-martial is empowered to determine the guilt of memb ...
sentenced Fiil to two years in a juvenile prison.
On 29 June 1944 her father, brother and brother-in-law and five other members of the Hvidsten group were executed in Ryvangen.
On 15 July 1944 De frie Danske reported on the executions, her two-year prison sentence and the life sentence of her sister Kirstine and compared her father to Svend Gønge and
Niels Ebbesen
Niels Ebbesen (1308 – 21 November 1340) was a Danish squire and national hero, known for his killing of Gerhard III, Count of Holstein-Rendsburg in 1340. From 1332 to 1340, Count Gerhard was the lord of both Jutland and Funen. His death me ...
.
Fiil and her sister were imprisoned separately in Germany, but she was soon after pardoned and returned to Denmark.
In April 1945 Fiil was therefore able to join her mother in receiving her older sister in the Danish border town
Padborg
Padborg (german: Pattburg) is a southern Danish border town with a population of 4,311 (1 January 2022)White Buses
White Buses was a Swedish humanitarian operation with the objective of freeing Scandinavians in German concentration camps in Nazi Germany during the final stages of World War II. Although the White Buses operation was envisioned to rescue Scan ...
after also receiving a pardon.
On 2 July 1945 the remains of her father and brother were found in Ryvangen and transferred to the Department of Forensic Medicine of the
university of Copenhagen
The University of Copenhagen ( da, Københavns Universitet, KU) is a prestigious public research university in Copenhagen, Denmark. Founded in 1479, the University of Copenhagen is the second-oldest university in Scandinavia after Uppsala Unive ...
. The remains of her brother-in-law and the five other executed members of the group were found in the same area three days later. The following inquests showed that they had been executed with gunshot wounds to the chest.
On 10 July 1945 her executed family members and the five other executed group members were cremated at Bispebjerg Cemetery.
Gerda Fiil died in Hvidsten on 26 June 1994, survived by her husband Svend Jessen. They are both buried in Spentrup cemetery.
Portrayal in the media
* In the 2012 Danish drama film ''Hvidsten Gruppen'' (
This Life
This may refer to:
* ''This'', the singular proximal demonstrative pronoun
Places
* This, or ''Thinis'', an ancient city in Upper Egypt
* This, Ardennes, a commune in France
People with the surname
* Hervé This, French culinary chemist Arts, e ...