German Resistance Memorial Center
- Biographies

"I won't write [...] hymns to Hitler," Jens Mungard told a friend. The poet, linguistics scholar, and farmer lived in abject poverty on the island of Sylt. He wrote poems and plays in the local Friesian language. Mungard was convinced that Friesian culture should remain independent of German influences. He maintained contact with writers in the Netherlands in the hope of preserving a community for all Friesians. Mungard was placed in "protective custody" for the first time in 1935, on the grounds of "severely damaging the reputation of the German Reich abroad." He was banned from writing in 1938 because he was considered "nationally unreliable." Jens Mungard was not deterred. He was therefore arrested again in March of 1939 and imprisoned in Sachsenhausen concentration camp, where he perished on February 13, 1940.