K.J. Dijkstra Profile picture
Apr 21, 2021 8 tweets 6 min read Read on X
@AuschwitzMuseum (1/8) I knew the story of poor Little Edith as she lived here in Gouda.
Edith was the youngest child of Arnold and Clara Betsy nee de Jong. Her brother was Johan Rene Simon, born in 1930. The family lived in Gouda where Arnold, a doctor, had a medical practice📷.
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@AuschwitzMuseum (2/8) Edit went to the primary school in Gouda, but in 1941 she has to leave the school as Jewish children were no longer allowed to go to public schools. For a while she gets private lessons from one of her former teachers, a non-Jewish woman.
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@AuschwitzMuseum (3/8) In September 1942 the family decided to go into hiding. As finding locations was difficult they had to split up.
In a police report she and her family were ‘wanted’ for illegally changing place of residence without permission, an euphemism for going into hiding.🥺
@AuschwitzMuseum (4/8) She was in hiding in the rectory of Remonstrant church in Zwammerdam where Reverend Gunther kept her hidden. She lived there for about a year. Her stay there was a public secret.
But, she gets betrayed!😠
The day after her 9th birthday she and the reverend are ‘arrested’
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@AuschwitzMuseum (5/8) She is first interrogated for 5 days to find out where her family members are. But both children were instilled in hiding what to say to strangers or in case they are arrested:
"Father works in the mines and mother left me to look for my father in Germany".
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@AuschwitzMuseum (6/8) She was first send to an orphanage in The Hague and on 29-06-1943 she arrives in #Westerbork. There she was in barrack 35, the orphanage. She became ill (scarlet fever) but was even so deported on 16-11-1943 to Auschwitz
She arrived 3 days later and was killed on arrival😢 ImageImage
@AuschwitzMuseum (7/8) She had a favorite doll which she had taken with her while in hiding. But after her 'arrest' the doll stayed behind (📷).
Her parents and brother survived the war in hiding.
Her father, like Otto Frank, started a search for his daughter, which was in vain of course
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@AuschwitzMuseum (8/8) Poor little Edith, I can't imagine how frightened you must have been. From the day of your arrest, the months in Westerbork and finally the train ride to Auschwitz.
All without your mum and dad.😢

A cousin of Edith wrote a book about her.

We will remember you!😢💔🕯️✡️ Image

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More from @shannara77

Apr 21, 2023
(1/n) 127 years ago Truus Meijer was born on 21-04-1896. This time not a victim of the Nazi's but a brave woman who stood up against them.

And by doing that she saved more than 10.000 Jewish children.

And the sad thing is that so many people, even Dutch, never heard of her.
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(2/n) Truus, who was born as Geertruida, was married to Franciscus Wijsmuller and so became known as Truus Wijsmuller.

It starts in 1933, when Hitler came to power. She travels to Germany to pick up relatives of Jewish acquaintances.
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(3/n) A few days after kristallnacht she travels to the Dutch-German border to see what is happening there. She takes a Yiddish-speaking Polish boy, under her skirts, to Amsterdam.
November 1938, the British government decides they will take Jewish children for temporary stay
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Read 13 tweets
Dec 16, 2022
@AuschwitzMuseum (1/n) This little 4 year 'old' boy was the brother of Eline Regina, born 04-09-1934 (8yr) and Frits Herman, born 18-11-1935 (7yr). They were the children of Salomon born 21-03-1910 and Mirjam Sara nee Micheels, born 02-11-1908.
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@AuschwitzMuseum (2/n) The family used to live in the Hague.
Parents, Max and Eline were in Westerbork from 25-09-1942 and were 3 days later deported to Auschwitz. They were most likely all gassed on arrival.😢

Frits Herman was not deported on that day.
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@AuschwitzMuseum (3/n) It turned out he was in 'het Apeldoornsche Bos'. This was a Jewish psychiatric institution in the forest near Apeldoorn. For a long time it was thought that the Nazis would leave the patients in Apeldoorn undisturbed and therefore would not deport them to Westerbork.
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Read 9 tweets
Dec 16, 2022
(1/n) In 1998 this picture was found when a picture frame was changed. It had been hidden there 60 years ago.
It shows 22 children, in the age of 4-17 year. It was made behind the synagogue in Deventer. Some children are wearing the dreadful star.
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(2/n) The photo came into the hands of Mr Meier de Leeuw. He is Jewish and was a child before the war and knew some of these children. He himself was already in hiding, otherwise he would have been on the photo
Meier started an investigation to find out more about the children
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(3/n) Finally it turned out that the photo must have been taken around the Jewish New Year (Rosh
Hashanah) that fell on September 12/13 in 1942. The children celebrated this day in the synagogue and youth shul.
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Read 16 tweets
May 7, 2022
@AuschwitzMuseum (1/n) It was 07-05-1934 when Leon (called Lonnie) Zwaap was born. He was the son of Salomon, born 03-01-1906 and Esther Jeannette Zwaap nee Philipse, born 15-02-1913. On 08-05-1936 Lonnie's brother Edward David (called Eddy) was born.
Both children were born in Hilversum.
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@AuschwitzMuseum (2/n) Salomon was a doctor while Esther was a childcare worker and a singer. They still lived in Hilversum.
In 1942 Salomon was a representative of the Jewish Council. This is probably why he was the first to be arrested.
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@AuschwitzMuseum (3/n) The first document shows that he was in Vught from 17-02-1943. The Jewish Council card shows the date 12-02-1943 with the handwritten text 'uit gevangenis' or 'out of prison'.
But he probably was in Westerbork somewhere in February.
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Read 7 tweets
Feb 14, 2022
@AuschwitzMuseum (1/n) Lia (📷1&2) was the daughter of Julius, who was a baker, born 15-01-1895 and Alice, born 14-05-1895. She had an older sister Rita, born 05-12-1924.
Julius was already deported to Nisko in Poland before the girls and there mother were deported to Theresienstadt.
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@AuschwitzMuseum (2/n) Lia, and her mother and sister were in Theresienstadt from 30-06-1943. And on 19-10-1944 they were all 3 deported to Auschwitz.

Rita was best friends with another Jewish girl, Vera Rosenzweig. Vera was in Theresienstadt from 30-09-1942, so before the Feiners.
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@AuschwitzMuseum (3/n) And while she was there Rita wrote her a card.
It says:
Hope to see you all, with all friends. I miss you all, and would rather be with you. Luckily I have a lot of work in the hospital. Stay healthy and greetings to all.

9 months later Rita was also in Theresienstadt.
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Read 7 tweets
Oct 24, 2021
(1/n) Andrée Geulen was a teacher in a school in Brussels. One day, summer of 1942 some of her students arrived at school with the compulsory yellow star on their clothes. Until that time Geulen hadn't paid attention to the anti-Jewish measures and the persecution of the Jews.
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(2/n) Having her students marked and humiliated in this way enraged Geulen, and she instructed the entire class – Jews and non-Jews alike - to wear aprons to school, so as to cover the yellow stars.
This first close encounter with the persecution of the Jews convinced...
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(3/n) ..Andrée that she had to act. While continuing to teach, she became an activist in the Comité de Défence des Juifs (Jewish Defense Committee), where Jews (like Ida Sterno) and non-Jews joined forces to hide and save Jewish children.
📷Andree with Ida Sterno
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Read 11 tweets

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