Biography

About Elsa Prins

Elsa Prins was the eldest of the two daughters of Lewis Prins and Ernestine Loewenthal. She was born 30 January 1909 in Amsterdam, where in 1914 her sister Greta was born too. Till she was 10 years old, she and her sister lived with her parents at Den Texstraat 19 in Amsterdam.

The marriage of her parents however was going to end in a divorce, which was pronounced in April 1921. Her parents separated already earlier: 5 September 1919 Elsa and her sister Greta were already unsubscribed from their parental address. Elsa was 10 and Greta 5 years at that time. They moved with their mother to Wagenaarstraat 44 3rd stock, where they lived in for a few months with the A.A. Landzaat family. 20 March 1920 however, Elsa, Greta and their mother Ernestine Loewenthal “after control of compulsory education” were officially unsubscribed from Amsterdam to Krummestrasse 47 in Charlottenburg (Germany). Of Greta and her mother is nothing further known.

On 17 September 1919, after his wife and daughters had left him, her father Lewis Prins moved to O.Z. Achterburgwal 85 in Amsterdam and he remarried in July 1921 Esther Spier.

At some point, Elsa Prins arrived in Den Haag where she worked as servant maid. She was unmarried and her address in Den Haag was Crispijnstraat 97. In the first half of 1943 she was deported from her residence in Den Haag to concentration camp Vught and 17 July 1943 transferred to Camp Westerbork where she stayed in barack 57. 20 July 1943 she was put on transport to Sobibor and on arrival there 23 July 1943, she was immediately killed.

Sources: City Archive of Amsterdam, family registration card of Lewis Prins, archive card of Esther Spier, Peoples Registry, copied volumes 1892-1920 and the file cabinet of the Jewish Council, registration card of Elsa Prins.

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