Voice/Vision Holocaust Survivor Oral History Archive

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Miriam Troostwyk - May 28, 1998 and June 3, 1999

Uh-huh.

And he knew all the people in Velp. And he looked for a--the whole family--mishpocheh from them...

Uh-huh.

for a hiding place, for Edith, her mother, Edith--her mother's sister Laynee and Rosa who was married with uh, with that man, the dancing teacher. Um...

The dancing teacher was Jewish?

Yes.

He was.

He was only son and uh, from the only Jewish family living in Velp.

Hm.

And they were born there and the parents were born there, so they knew all the farmers there and they knew all the people there. So they found for the family, a hiding place.

For the whole family?

For the whole family. And that was a family from ten people in Holland.

Uh-huh.

And we knew that--nearly that whole family because they lived in the Hague and they were evacuated to um, Amersfoort.

Uh-huh.

Because the Hague was near the North Sea, it was near Scheveningen. And you couldn't live in that neighborhood because they were afraid that you go with the boat over to England or--and for spies and everything.

I see.

So everybody who was living in a certain uh, ??? a certain part of uh, the Hague, what was near Scheveningen and they got evacuated, the, the Jewish people. And they brought them to Amersfoort and uh, Edith's mother's brother was--they were all from Poland, the, the parents--not the, not the parents but the grandparents.

Edith, your friend.

Edith, her grandparents were from Poland.

And this is your friend, Edith?

Yes.

Yeah.

And when Edith came to um, Amersfoort, she came to the Jewish school too and so I met her. And we met the family because it was a family what--fixed with our family, it clicked because they had the same background. Her uh, Edith, her mother's brother was a furrier in uh, the Hague. He had a retail shop too.

Oh.

So the--my brother-in-law and he were--could easily be buddies. Then their parents all came from Poland. So they had the same background, it clicked. So um, in the war we visited them in Amersfoort and they visited us. And my girlfriend Toos uh, wasn't living anymore next to me and I didn't see her. So--but Edith came in her place, because I played always with Edith. And we had big pack--backpacks, everybody had it, in the corner from the ???.