Cato Bontjes van Beek

Cato Bontjes van Beek (; 14 November 1920 – 5 August 1943) was a German member of the Resistance against the Nazi regime.

Early years Born in Bremen, Cato was the eldest of three children. She spent her childhood and youth in the nearby Fischerhude artists' colony around her uncle Otto Modersohn. Her parents, the Dutch-born potter Jan Bontjes van Beek (1899–1969) and dancer and painter Olga Bontjes van Beek ( Breling; 1896–1995) offered their children considerable personal freedom while growing up. From 1929, Cato stayed abroad to attend the German school in Amsterdam, and in 1937, she spent time in Winchcombe, Gloucestershire, as an au pair.

Unlike many others, Cato did not join the League of German Girls (Bund Deutscher Mädel, BDM) youth organisation.

Resistance activities

Van Beek's active work against the Nazis began in the Red Orchestra resistance organization after she had gotten to know Libertas Schulze-Boysen in autumn 1941.

Arrest In the course of the suppression of the resistance group, van Beek was arrested by Gestapo agents on 20 September 1942 in her father's pottery shop in Berlin. On 18 January 1943, she was found guilty at the Reichskriegsgericht military court of "abetting a conspiracy to commit high treason" and sentenced to death. A clemency appeal of the 22-year-old was personally denied by Adolf Hitler, though the court itself had suggested a reprieve. She was guillotined on 5 August 1943 at Plötzensee Prison in Berlin, Her final resting place is unknown.

Cato's younger sister, Mietje, managed to escape Nazi persecution and lived in Fischerhude until her death in 2012. Cato's mother's efforts to have her daughter's death sentence declared invalid remained unsuccessful for decades. The conviction was only reversed in 1999, four years after Cato's mother's death.

Honours Stolperstein memorial in front of last address Kaiserdamm No. 22, Berlin-Westend A gymnasium secondary school in Achim, a town near Bremen, has since 1991 borne the name Cato Bontjes van Beek-Gymnasium. A street in nearby Fischerhude also bears her name, and an explanatory notice. Both these places are in the Verden district. Further streets and public squares are named after her in Bremen, Leipzig, and Meldorf.