Andrée Geulen, Belgian Teacher Who Helped Rescue Thousands of Jewish Children From the Nazis During the Holocaust

Andrée Geulen was born in Schaerbeek, a suburb of Brussels, on September 6, 1921 into a liberal family of the urban bourgeoisie. After the German invasion of Belgium in May 1940, the country was placed under military occupation and Geulen became a schoolteacher and received a job in a primary school in central Brussels in 1942.

Portrait of a young Andrée Guelen.

Andrée was just 18 years old when the Nazis occupied Belgium.

Her awareness of Nazi persecution began when Jewish pupils in her class appeared wearing the yellow star. In solidarity, she instructed all students—Jewish and non-Jewish—to wear aprons to conceal them.

In 1943, through a friend Ida Sterno of the Committee for the Defence of Jews (Comité de Défense des Juifs, or CDJ), she joined the underground resistance as one of its few non-Jewish members. She operated under the alias “Claude Fournier”. Andrée helped persuade Jewish parents to entrust their children to the CDJ—even though it meant separation—then personally escorted them to safe hiding places like Christian homes, convents, and boarding schools.

She lived and taught at the Gaty de Gamont boarding school, where headmistress Odile Ovart sheltered 12 Jewish students. In May 1943, the school was raided; students were arrested, and Ovart and her husband were deported and later died. Andrée escaped arrest, defiantly telling Nazi interrogators: “Aren’t you ashamed to make war on Jewish children?” She then warned other Jewish pupils not to return to school.

Andrée Geulen on Rue Neuve in Brussels in May 1944, with behind her a German soldier. Hidden under the innersole of her shoe are the names of two children she is on her way to rescue.

Andree Geulen (left) with Ida Sterno (right).

Ida and Andrée.

Over the next two years (until liberation in September 1944), Geulen personally escorted 300 children, though CDJ efforts saved nearly 1,000 to 3,000 Jewish children overall. She maintained coded notebooks listing original names and hiding locations so these children could be reunited with surviving family members after the war.

After the war, Geulen became involved with the Jewish community in Belgium and maintained contact with the children with whom she had come into contact. She was involved in trying to reunite the hidden children with surviving family members and became actively involved in the relief organization Aid for Israelite Victims of the War which supported Jewish survivors of Nazi concentration camps in Belgium. She became involved in activism for pacifist and anti-racist causes. She married Charles Herscovici, a Jewish concentration camp survivor of Roma origin, in 1948.

Geulen was recognized with the honorific Righteous Among the Nations in 1989. She was granted honorary Israeli citizenship in a ceremony at Yad Vashem in 2007, as part of the “Children Hidden in Belgium during the Shoah” International Conference. Upon accepting the honor, Geulen said, “What I did was merely my duty. Disobeying the laws of the time was just the normal thing to do.” She received honorary citizenship of the municipality of Ixelles.

CDJ survivors.

Andrée with some of the 300 or so Jewish children she rescued in Nazi-occupied Belgium.

Andrée with some of the girls she saved.

One of the groups of children hidden by the Committee for the Defense of Jews.

Geulen’s 100th birthday on September 6, 2021 was covered in the press in Belgium. The same year, a creche in Brussels was renamed in her honor. She died on May 31, 2022 in Ixelles.

Geulen’s story embodies moral courage and the power of individual action during dark historical moments. She quietly risked everything to save innocent lives and upheld human decency in the face of oppression.

Her dedication reminds us how even a single compassionate person can change the destiny of hundreds—and inspire generations. When she died, the Israeli Ambassador to Brussels, Emmanuel Nahshon said, “If there were more women and men like Andree Geulen Herscovici, the world would be a better place.”