Immediately after Norway was occupied in April 1940, the young theology student Hans Mamen joined the Norwegian resistance (Milorg). Beginning in November 1942, he took about 25 Jewish refugees from Oslo to the Swedish border. He accompanied them on the last stage, sometimes along with Iver Skogstad. It took several days to organize an escape to Sweden. Some of the escapees found refuge on Mamen’s parents’ farm before embarking on the journey.
Taking strangers to the border required special skills, especially when children were among them. On one occasion, Mamen was carrying a four-year-old boy on his shoulders when the child began to sing, frightening other refugees. Mamen asked him not to disturb the sleeping birds, and the boy was quiet again.
Hans Mamen eventually came under suspicion and had to flee to Sweden himself on December 9, 1942. His sister Judith Mamen Olsen was subsequently arrested and his parents’ farm was seized.
In 1979 Pastor Hans Mamen was the second Norwegian to be honored by the Israeli Holocaust memorial center Yad Vashem as Righteous Among the Nations.