the Netherlands
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Like in Germany proper and other Nazi-occupied countries, the Holocaust wasn’t a sudden process but a gradual one. On September 1, 1941, the Nazis introduced several measures against the Dutch Jews. On that day, the Nazis announced that from that moment on, Jewish students and teachers were no longer welcome at ordinary schools. They had…
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Sweet angel Rudolf, you would have had 85 candles on your birthday cake today. How I wish I could have helped you blow them out. That would have been 85 candles—one for each year of your life. You weren’t given the opportunity to see five candles on your cake all those years ago. Rudolf de…
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The photograph above is of Gezina de Leeuwe-de Jong with her four children. I presume the photo was taken by her husband and the father of the children, Louis de Leeuw. I reckon that’s why he is not in the picture. He was a son of Barend de Leeuwe and Sientje van Minden. He married…
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The photographs in this post are categorized as artefacts. I don‘t really like that description because the definition of an artefact is—an object made by a human being, typically one of cultural or historical interest. These objects may have been made by a human being, but more than that—they were personal belongings. The narrative of…
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After setting up this blog a few years ago, I am amazed that I still come across stories of heroes I had never heard of before. Ernst Sillim was born in 1923, the first of five children. Shortly before that, his father, Albert, a stockbroker, and his mother, Annie, moved from Amsterdam to a house…
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The Dutch railways were essential to the Nazis, not only as the transport of Jews and others eastwards to the camps but also as a propaganda tool. During the pre-war crisis years, the Netherlands welcomed many malnourished Austrian children. Reichskommissar Seyss-Inquart, himself an Austrian, thought he should show gratitude for this. The Nazis, therefore, organized…
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In the late 1930s, many German Jews tried to flee persecution in Nazi Germany. The Netherlands allowed a few to enter their borders. Jews in the Netherlands were committed to helping these refugees cross the border and arranged shelter. One of them was the Karel Nihom from Winterswijk. Not only did Karel help Jewish refugees,…
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There are no photographs of the two babies—just death certificates. Elisabeth Jeanne Petzal was born with her twin brother Robert Harry on 10 August 1943 at Camp Westerbork. They were children of Werner Petzal and Fanny Betsy Oppenheim. Both were murdered at Auschwitz on 18 October 1944. They were just a year old when they…
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The title is The 4 from Breda, but there are only 3 men pictured. There is a reason for that which I shall explain a bit later. After the Second World War, 241 Germans were tried in the Netherlands for war crimes. Among them, the quartet Willi Lages, Ferdinand aus der Fünten, Franz Fischer and Joseph Kotälla,…
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The Holocaust wasn’t something that happened overnight, it was a gradual process. In Germany, it started in 1933, and in the Netherlands, it started shortly after the German occupation n May 1940. Below is a brief timeline of what eventually led to the murder of 75% of all Dutch Jews. 1940 July 1stJews are forbidden…
History of Sorts 