Maren Margrethe Thomsen, known as Maren Margrethe “Grethe” Bartram and “Thora” was born on February 23, 1924, in Aarhus, Denmark, and died on January 31, 2017, Vessigebro, Sweden.
She was a Danish woman who informed on at least 53 people from the Danish resistance movement during the Second World War, resulting in the early communist resistance groups being dismantled and many of their members being sent to Nazi concentration camps.
She informed on her brother, husband, and close acquaintances.
She was given the death penalty after the war.
1947, her sentence was commuted to life in prison.
Maren was released in 1956 and moved to Halland in Sweden where she lived under her married name
She grew up in a poor household, the second of eight children, and both her parents were members of the Communist Party of Denmark (DKP), as were the social circles of the family.
Grethe Bartram’s father, Niels Peter Christopher Bartram (born 1896), was from southern Jutland and participated in World War I on the German side.
Her father suffered from shellshock from the war and found it difficult to work but managed to operate a small bicycle repair shop in Midtbyen, Aarhus.
Maren left school at only 13 years old and started working until she became pregnant at 16 and was married on July 12, 1941 to a young machinist, Frode Thomsen (born 28 March 1920) from her workplace.
Her marriage never lasted long, ending in the Summer of 1943, and their son was put into foster care with her mother-in-law.
Grethe Bartram passed away at 92 years old.