Dutch wartime biography pulled from shelves over falsehoods

The biography of 99-year-old Dutchman Willem Wilbrink, Getekend voor het leven in Dachau en Indië (Marked for Life in Dachau and the Dutch East Indies), has been taken off bookshelves and online platforms at the publisher’s request after researchers found his claims of being a resistance hero and Dachau survivor were likely untrue.

The 2023 biography by author Laurens van Aggelen recounts Wilbrink’s claims that he was imprisoned in the Dachau concentration camp at the age of 16, where he allegedly saved 40 people’s lives. He claimed he took people who had been sent to the incineration ovens but were still alive to the infirmary.

But an investigation published in the history magazine Historisch Nieuwsblad earlier this month by Hans Vogelzang, whose wife’s father was imprisoned in Dachau, found no supporting evidence for Wilbrink’s claims in either camp memoirs or archives. He wasn’t even listed in the camp’s complete prisoner list, which is said to be extremely accurate.

Wilbrink is a well-known figure, a regular at Second World War commemorations where he wears medals that have also come under suspicion, including a Polish “hero title”. Several Dachau survivors have no memory of the stories he told.

Lingering doubts

According to GLD news, the Dachau Committee has doubted Wilbrink’s war story since 2024. “We have been closely involved in the article for several weeks,” said Wimar Jaeger, mayor of Zutphen and chairman of the Dutch Dachau Committee. “It’s not a surprise. The biography of Wilbrink that came out… raised a lot of questions for us. We couldn’t believe what was in there. It was almost impossible.”

At the time, the committee tried to get the publisher to withdraw the book. “We’re not out for a publicity wave that harms a 99-year-old man,” Jaeger told GLD. “He is a vulnerable elderly gentleman whose war trauma may have left him with images in his head that are not in line with reality. As a committee, we know what war trauma can do to memories and we are empathetic and understanding about it.”

But as the falsehoods continued to be presented as facts, the committee took more public action. “Then we have no choice but to make clear in this way that it’s not right. Facts and reality must be safeguarded, because if they turn out not to be correct, you no longer have a cautionary tale. That is especially important at a time like this, which in various respects resembles the run-up to the Second World War.”

Author Van Aggelen has rejected the criticism and says he stands by his biography, while Wilbrink himself has called the Historisch Nieuwsblad article “slander and libel” and maintains Dachau’s records were incomplete. The publisher, White Elephant Media in Arnhem, has yet to comment.