with lesbian resistant Frieda Belinfante. A major detriment to the success of these forgeries was the Municipal Office for Population Registration as its existence made the forgeries less useful, since their legitimacy could be checked against the registration lists and determined to be fakes. Arondeus and van der Veen, along with a number of associates, developed a plan to destroy the registration office. Their attack, which took place on 27 March 1943, was partially successful, and they managed to destroy 800,000 identity cards (15% of the records), and retrieve 600 blank cards and 50,000 guilders. The building was blown up and no one was caught on the night of the attack. However, due to an unknown betrayer, Arondeus was arrested on 1 April 1943. Arondeus refused to give up the rest of his team but his notebook was found, and as a result, a majority of the group were also arrested. Belifante was the sole person from the group to have survived, forcing her to take on a man's identity and go undercover. On 18 June 1943, Arondeus was tried and sentenced to death, along with 13 other men who participated. Two of the group received clemency, but the others were executed on 1 July 1943. Arondeus pleaded guilty and took the full blame, which may be why two young doctors were spared from execution and given custodial sentences instead. Before his execution, Arondeus made a point of ensuring the public would be aware that he and two other men in the group, Bakker and Brouwer, were gay, asking either a friend or his lawyer (accounts vary) to: "Tell the people that homosexuals can be brave!" Legacy In 1945, after the liberation of the Netherlands, Arondeus's family was awarded a posthumous medal by the Dutch government in his honor. In 1984, he was awarded the Resistance Memorial Cross. On 19 June 1986, Yad Vashem recognized Arondeus as Righteous Among the Nations. Gallery Biographies Dantzig, Rudi van: Het leven van Willem Arondéus 1894-1943: een documentaire. Amsterdam, 2003. Entrop, Marco: Onbekwaam in het compromis. Willem Arondéus, kunstenaar en verzetsstrĳder. Amsterdam, 1993. O'Corra, Simon, Arondeus, A Play, Sachet Mixte Press, France, 2017 O'Corra, Simon, Perfidious, A Play, Sachet Mixte Press, Spain, 2019 References External links Biography (in Dutch) 1894 births 1943 deaths People from Naarden 20th-century Dutch writers Dutch resistance members Dutch Righteous Among the Nations Recipients of the Resistance Memorial Cross Resistance