Louis de Jong

Louis de Jong’s (1914–2005) 29-volume book series Het Koninkrijk der Nederlanden in de Tweede Wereldoorlog (The Kingdom of the Netherlands in World War II), serves until this day as the foundational work of reference in the Netherlands about World War II, German occupation and Dutch collaboration.

De Jong at work for the radio programme of the Dutch government in exile, London, 1943.

Before the outbreak of the war, de Jong worked as the foreign editor for a political publication, De Groene Amsterdammer.
In 1940, while in London, de Jong was the director for the radio programme of the Dutch government in exile. He convinced the exiled government to establish an archive and research centre on the German occupation.

De Jong organizing and cataloguing documents at the Institute for War Documentation in Amsterdam, 1950.

Upon his return to Amsterdam in 1945, de Jong headed this newly established Reich Institute for War Documentation, which today is called NIOD, Instituut voor Oorlogs-, Holocaust- en Genocidestudies (Institute for War, Holocaust and Genocide Studies). He repeatedly defended his pursuit of documenting the years of occupation against any intent to shut down this institute.

Simon Wiesenthal, Richter Roegholt and Louis de Jong (from left to right) at the presentation of Roegholt’s biography on Ben Sijes, Amsterdam, 1988.

Beginning in 1955, and spanning over three decades, de Jong began to write what would become his life’s magnum opus: the book series about the history of the Netherlands during World War II. He maintained that a deep-rooted anti-Semitism was to blame for the destruction of European Jewry. De Jong combined his work as a trained historian with that of an experienced journalist to influence and shape public opinion.