Figure 1.--
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Figure 1.-- |
Once the death camps in Poland were operational, the NAZIs could begin deporting the Dutch Jews. Ferdinand Aus der Fünten, commander of the German Special Police in Amsterdam on June 26, 1942 summoned ranking members of the Jewish Council to a special meeting. He announced that the Germans had decided to send groups of Dutch Jews, aged 16 to 40, to do "labor service" in Germany. SS coordinator for the Holocaust Adolph Eichmann set up a branch of the Central Office for Jewish Immigration in each occupied country. This Office prepared the list of people to be conscripted. The quota was set at 4,000 Jews. Doing the mathematices, the 160,000 Dutch Jews could be deported in only 40 weeks. The Office had the records from the Jewish census compiled in January 1941 when virtually every Dutch Jew registered. The Central Office for the first group of deportees chose mostly young, single German Jews and had come from Germany. This seemed the most likely to be chosen for actual work. It also had the advantage of dealing with the most likely group to resist while many believed that they were actually being sent to "labor service". While many Jews receiving the notices did report as directed, the Germans realized that they were not going to meet their quota of 4000 Jews to be dispatched July 15. The Germans on July 14 randomly arrested 700 Jews as hostages. Despite the difficulties, more Jews refused to comply when receiving their notices. The first trainload of deportees were dispatched on schedule by the NAZIs on July 15. The Jews involved were fearfull, but hoped they were headed to "work camps" as the Germans had assurred them. They were in fact headed to the death camps that were now in full opperation. As fewer Jews complied with deportment notices. The Germans had by 1942 acquired considerable experience in such matters. Thgey stopped mailing the dportation notices. The NAZIs in August started arrest Jews and neighborhood round-ups forcing whole families at gun point out of their apartments. Gradually more and more Dutch Jews came to realize the terrible reality of what the deportations meant.
Ferdinand Aus der Fünten, commander of the German Special Police in Amsterdam on June 26, 1942 summoned ranking members of the Jewish Council to a special meeting. He announced that the Germans had decided to send groups of Dutch Jews, aged 16 to 40, to do "labor service" in Germany. He wanted the Jewish Council Council to help secure the people for this "labor service." David Cohen, co-chairman of the Council, declared that such work violated international law, which specifically forbade the conscription of civilians in occupied countries. Aus der Fünten ignored the objections and insisted that the Germans would indust Dutch Jews with or without the Council's assistance. Council members have intense soul searching decided to assist the Germans. Some reasoned that if they were involved in the process they might be able to improve conditions. Some were under the illusion that America which had entered the War could easily defeat the Germans and end the War. The Dutch were horrified at the deportation orders. The NAZI respons to the Februay Strike, however, had the intended impact that cowed most of the Dutch. [Anderson]
SS coordinator for the Holocaust Adolph Eichmann set up a branch of the Central Office for Jewish Immigration in each occupied country. This Office prepared the list of people to be conscripted. The quota was set at 4,000 Jews. Doing the mathematices, the 160,000 Dutch Jews could be deported in only 40 weeks. The Office had the records from the Jewish census compiled in January 1941 when virtually every Dutch Jew registered.
The Central Office for the first group of deportees chose mostly young, single German Jews and had come from Germany. This seemed the most likely to be chosen for actual work. It also had the advantage of dealing with the most likely group to resist while many believed that they were actually being sent to "labor service". The first notices were sent n Sunday, July 5, 1942 by special delivery. The inductees were told to report for "labor service" within the week and instructed as to the clothing to bring. The notice was carefully crafted to convince the recipient that the deportations were for actual labor servce. Among those receiving the notice was Matgot Frank. The Frank family immediately went into hiding. Most Dutch Jews had made no such prequations. Most receiving the notices did not know what to do. The Jewish Council advised complying. Many were afraid of what the Germans would do to the family if they did not report. Others like good Dutch citizens believed in complying with the law and official regulations. [Anderson]
While many Jews receiving the notices did report as directed, the Germans realized that they were not going to meet their quota of 4000 Jews to be dispatched July 15. The Germans on July 14 randomly arrested 700 Jews as hostages. The Germans made the Jewish Council publish a special edition of their weekly newspaper with a front page article warning that the 700 hostages would be sent to a concentration camp if all 4,000 labor service inductees did not report. More did, but not all. [Anderson]
The Dutch were horrified at the deportation orders. The NAZI respons to the Februay Strike, however, had the intended impact that cowed most of the Dutch. Protestant and Catholic clergymen on July 11, 1942 sent a telegram to Seyss-Inquart protesting the deportaions. They told Seyss-Inquart that the deportation "ran counter
to divine commandments of justice and charity." They threatened to condemn the NAZI action from their pulpits. Seyss-Inquart responded with a threat to target baptized Jews. The Protestant pastors relented, but Catholic priests did speak out from heir pulpits. Seyss-Inquart with the information afforded by the Jewish censs ordered the arrest of all Dutch Jews who had converted to Catholocism. This was why Sister Teresea Benedicta of the Cross (Edith Stein) was arrested in her convent and shipped to Auschwitz. Radio broadcasts from the London Dutch government-in-exile condemned the deportations, but ws powerless to do more. [Anderson]
The first trainload of deportees were dispatched on schedule by the NAZIs on July 15. The Jews involved were fearfull, but hoped they were headed to "work camps" as the Germans had assurred them. They were in fact headed to the death camps that were now in full opperation. The NAZIs were intent on maintaining a schedule of 4,000 Jews weekly.
The NAZIs continued to assure the Jewish Council that the labor service in Germany was ordinary work. At the time, this did not sound unresonable. The character of the War had changed. The Russians had stopped the Germans before Moscow in December 1941 and the Germans for the first time had experinced serious casulties for the first time. America also entered the War. The Germans were in the process of expanding War production and because of the need for military man-power there was a serious labor shortage. Htler and the NAZIs did not like the idea of mobilizing German women as the British had done and the Americans were in the process of doing. Thus a need for Dutch workers to work in war industries seemed reasonable. In fact, Seyss-Inquart administered a much larger program of sending Dutch workers to Germany for actual labor service. The NAZIs also began to allow those Jews inducted to bring their families to the work camps. German officials explained that for humanitarian reasons that they did mnot want to separate children from their parents. The Germans explained that they did not wish to see children separated from their parents. Of course they were not sending families with the much larger program for non-Jewish workers in Germny. The Immigration Office continued to mail out "labor service" notices in July. [Anderson]
Many Jews continued to comply with the NAZI labor service notices. NAZI policy was to make life for Dutch Jews increasingly difficult to help promote compliance. Most Dutch Jews by this time had lost or shops and businesses as a result of th NAZI anti-Jewish measures. Families were finding it difficult to obtain food. There was the threat of Mauthausen for those who did not comply which they knee meant death. No one yet knew of Auschwitz, although mny terrible rumors were circulated. Many had no where to hide or the financial resources to maintain themselves. The NAZIs had everyone's address and thus friends were needed to provide hiding places. Most Jews did not have friends that were willing to put their lives in jepordy. Many Jews saw no option but to report as ordered.
Despite the difficulties, more Jews refused to comply when receiving their notices. Some had planned how to hide themselves and their family. Some had friends that were willing to rik their lives and assist them. Many took this decission without any real knowledge of the death camps. What they knew now was the character of the NAZIs and more Dutch Jews inuitively realized that no mater what the conditions, they were better ff in the Netherlands than in the hands of the NAZIs in Germany.
As fewer Jews complied with deportment notices. The Germans had by 1942 acquired considerable experience in such matters. Thgey stopped mailing the dportation notices. The NAZIs in August started arrest Jews. Most Dutch Jews were in Amsterdm, perhaps 90 percent of the total. And in Amsterdam most Jews were concentrated in a few neighborhoods. The Germans assisted by the Dutch NAZIs and police began their infamous roundups (razzias). The NAZIs began arresting anyone on the street wearing the mandaory yellow Star. They also began carefully coordinated nightly raids planned with he assistance of the data from the Jewish census. The Germans would block off the streets in whole neighborhoods. Armed with the addresses, whole families were arrested. [De Jong] This process continued relentlessly as the Dutch Jews were steadily deported. The NAZIs also arressted children in orphanages, patients in hospitals, and the elderly in old peoples homes--obviously people who could not be used for labor service.
A new word entered the Dutch language--Pulsen. The word has come to mean loot. Pulsen was the name of a moving company. The company obtasined a contract from the NAZI security forces and Dutch police. After a Jewish family had been deported, their household effects became the property of the Reich. A Pulsen van would pull up their home or apartment and their effects loaded on go a Pulsen van and trucked away for processing. I am not sure yet who did the processing and how the property was disposed.
Henriette von Schirach was the wife of Bauder von Schirach, the head of the Hitler Youth and later the Gocernor of Austria. As the wife of a high-ranking NAZI, she was able to travel around Europe. One trip to Portugal she returned to Germany through the Netherlands. While in Portugal she had seen a copy of Life magazine with a description of German attrocities in the East. While in Amsterdam she happened on a procession of Jewish children and women that had been rounded up by the SS. She was later taken to a school room with benches full of looted Jewish wedding rings and other jewlry. An SS officer asked if she wanted any, "Do you want any diamonds. They go at rediculous prices." Soon after, she and her husband were guests of Hitler at Obersalzberg. Henritte tried to show him the Life magazine and explain what she had seen in the Netherlands. Hitler was furious, screaming "You people must learn to hate, all of you! You are much too sentimental!" [Conot, p.423.] She was never invited back.
The Jews arrested in their apparments usually had about 10 minutes to gather clothing and a few personal affects, often in chaos as armed men shouted orders and the children crying. Then they had to turn over the apartment keys. The police than locked and sealed the apartment. All the contents became the property of the Third Reich. Most Dutch Jews lived in Amsterdam and were taken Joodse Schouwburg, the Jewish Theater. It had been an important theater and the Jews had ben allowed to use it until the deportations began. The NAZIs when they began the deportaions stated using it as an assembly place for the arrested Jews. They might remain their for a few days filling out forms. They were then taken in special streetcars to the city's Centraal Station where they boarded sealed trains which took them to Westerbork. [Anderson]
This was a detention camp opened by the Dutch Government in 1939 before the War to intern illegal aliens, mostly German Jews fleeing the NAZIs. The Germn Jewish detainees in Westerbork, with the approval of the Dutch commandant Schol, established a type of self-government. Westerbork remain under Dutch even after the NAZIS invaded and and occupied the Netherlands. Seyss-Inquart allowed that to continue until July 1, 1942 when the Polish death camps were operational and deportation scould begin. The NAZIs when they took control of Westerbork used the existing facilities to funnel Dutch Jews to the death camps. Westerbork had a German speaking Jewish core group. The NAZIs permitted the existing situation to continue. The German Jews to run the internal affairs of the camp which was substantially expanded to accommodate the influx of Dutch Jews in transit.
The NAZIs changed the camp from one for refugee to a Polizeiliches Judendurchgangslager - Police Enforced Transit Camp for Jews. [Vanderwerff] Dutch Jews might spend about 2 weeks at Westerbork. There would formalities such as registering for jobs in Germany--all a cruel facade. Authorities in Berlin would telex instructions as to how many Jews should be dispatched for "labor service". The requested number would be selected and an announcement usually made Monday evening. We note a photograph of a family that we believe was taken at Westerbork as they were preparing to board the transports.
Gradually more and more Dutch Jews came to realize the terrible reality of what the deportations meant. The ferocity of the round-ups and the arrest of children and elderly made it clear that labor service was not what the NAZIs were involved with. Also terrifying was the fact that relatives were not receiving any letters back from the deportees. Some continued to hope that the Germans were interested in their labor, but more and more realized that this was not the case. Unfortunately there were few options for most of these unfortunate people.
The NAZIs between July 1942 and November 1944 dispatched over 104,000 Jews and 250 Roma (Gypsies) from Westerbock and Vught. The deportees were shipped in cattle cars lacking the most basic ammenities. The destination was not labor camps in Germany, but death camps in Poland. There were 65 trains with 58,380 people entrained to Auschwitz II (Birkenau). The NAZIs dispated 19 train loads with 34,000 people to Sorbior. The sorbibor camp was especially deadly. Only 13 Dutch Jews survived. After the Red Army overran Poland in 1944, the NAZIs could no longer had the death camps. Even so, deportations of Duth Jews continued. The NAZIs dispattched nine trains 4,894 Jews to Theresienstadt, an Internment camp and Transit camp north of Prague . Of these about 2,000 survived. The remaining 4,413 Jews were shipped to Bergen-Belsen near Hannover in Germany.
Anderson, Anthony E. "Anne Frank was not alone: Holland and the Holocaust" [Online], October 24, 1995.
Conot, Robert E. Justice at Nuremberg (Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc.: New York, 1984), p. 593.
De Jong, Louis. The Netherlands and Nazi Germany (Harvard University Press, 1990).
anderwerff, Hans. ""The why and how, a valid question", accesed October 19, 2002.
Vanderwerff, Hans. "Journey's End", accessed October 20, 2002.
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