The story of "The Hiding Place" is based on the true experiences of Corrie ten Boom and her family during World War II, specifically in their home in Haarlem, Netherlands. They hid Jews in their home and were eventually caught by the Nazis.
Harry de Vries was a key character in the book, but he was a friend of the ten Boom family who worked in the watchmaking business. He was not a shop owner, and the ten Boom family's home was not a shop but a private residence.