If you look in each of Diana Gabaldon’s novels, there are people from real history included. While A Fugitive Green didn’t have any real historical figures, there was a connection to real history. It’s all about the couple who married Minnie and Hal at the very end.
The couple had the surname ten Boom, and for many people, this may not have stood out. However, it did for me due to the history of World War II. And while the characters in the story were just fictitious, I like to think that it was a familial trait to help people in need.
Who were the ten Booms in A Fugitive Green?
In the novella, Hal makes his way to Amsterdam to find Minnie. It seems he always had the intention of marrying her, and when he sees that she is pregnant, he knows that he needs to do it fast. And so, they find an innkeeper, whose husband is a minister. The two are the ten Booms.
They marry Minnie and Hal quickly. They know that not everything is quite above board. After all, Hal didn’t even know Minnie’s real name until their wedding — that sounds like someone else in the Outlander universe! — but the ten Booms didn’t make that an issue. They helped people in need.
Who were the ten Booms in real history?
When it comes to the family name in real history, we need to jump ahead a couple of centuries to World War II. Corrie ten Boom became known for her work with the Dutch Resistance. She owned a watch shop in Haarlem, which she would use to hide Jewish people and other refugees from the Nazis.
She was not alone in this. Other family members were also involved, notably her father and sister. The four of them were arrested in February 1944 after an informant betrayed them. They were initially imprisoned, where Corrie’s father, Casper, died, and then she and her sister Betsie were sent to Ravensbrück Concentration Camp, where Betsie died. The only reason Corrie survived was due to being released after an administrative error.
You can learn more about Corrie’s work during World War II in The Hiding Place, an autobiography where she recounts her experiences. It’s somewhat heartening to think that actions like this are a familial trait, and that there may have been ancestors in the 17th century who helped people marry and get away.
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