Rosa de Haaff, born 7 June 1874 in Rotterdam, was a daughter of Salomon de Haaff and Catharina Schnitzler. On 8 January 1895 she married in Antwerp the diamond worker Barend Wessel, a son of Barend Wessel and Klaartje Gompers. The couple had four children, namely Samuel, Clara, Bernard and Herman. Only the latter has survived the Holocaust; his siblings and their families were murdered in the Shoah.
Rosa was born into a family with 7 children, of whom her sister Sophia was married to Isaac Wessel and her brother Lehman to Mietje Wessel. Her own husband, Barend Wessel passed away at the age of 52 on 23 July 1922 in Amsterdam already and was interred in the Jewisch Cemetery at Muiderberg.
After her marriage, Rosa lived with her husband at Weesperstraat. They moved to Lepelstraat 6 and to Nieuwe Heerengracht 177 and on 5 February Rosa moved to Topaasstraat 16 parterre in Amsterdam-South. Her children did not live at home anymore, except her unmarried son Bernard, who however later moved to Retiefstraat 76. He was a navvy by profession.
Rosa's son Samuel Wessel was married in 1920 to Anna Presburg, had two children and lived at Vechstraat 13 2nd floor in Amsterdam, but had to move later to President Brandtstraat 76 in Amsterdam-East; daughter Clara Wessel was married in 1922 to Abraham Lever from Utrecht, had two children and lived with her family at Kievitdwarsstraat 49 in Utrecht and son Herman Wessel, a chemist, left for Antwerp on 27 February 1929 where he married a non-Jewish woman in September 1929.
Except Herman, Rosa’s married children and their families were murdered during the Shoah; Samuel Wessel, his wife Anna Presburg and their daughter Rosa on 16 July 1943 in Sobibor; their son Bernard was killed there already two weeks earlier, on 2 July 1943. And Clara Lever-Wessel, her husband Abraham Lever and son Bernard Abraham were murdered in Auschwitz on 7 September 1942; Clara’s daughter Judith lost he life there on 30 September 1942.
Rosa’s son Bernard was taken 9 April 1943 to Westerbork were he ended up in barrack 69. On 20 April he was deported to Sobibor and on arrival there on 23 April 1943 immediately murdered.
And Rosa Wessel-de Haaff herself was taken 15 April 1943 from her home to Westerbork via the Hollandsche Schouwburg. She ended up in Westerbork in barrack 60 from where she was put on transport to Sobibor on 4 May 1943. On arrival there on 7 May 1943, Rosa Wessel-de Haaf has been immediately murdered.
Sources among others: City Archive of Amsterdam, family registration card of Barend Wessel, archive cards of Rosa de Haaff, Bernard Wessel and Samuel Wessel; the file cabinet of the Jewish Council, registration cards of Rosa Wessel-de Haaff, Bernard Wessel, Samuel Wessel and Clara Levier-Wessel.