Biography

The fate of Louis Boas and his wife Roza Pimontel.

Louis Boas was a son of Alexander Boas and Rachel Koen. He married 10 April 1924 Roza Pimontel, daughter of Salomon Pimontel and Sara Swart. The couple had no children.

From the first marriage of his father to Catharina Walvisch, solomnizes in Amsterdam on 7 May 1873, Louis had three brothers: Barend (who passed away in 1936 and who was married Klaartje Roet, Salomon and Jochem , who were unmarried.

From the second marriag of his father to Rachel Koen, Louis had two more sisters: Roosje and Anna, who both have survived the Holocaust and two more brothers: Herman and Isaac.

Louis Boas was a cabinet maker by profession. After his wedding to Roza Pimontel in 1924, the couple at first lived for a few months at Helmersstreet 249, moved already 7 Octobe 1924 to Nieuwe Kerkstraat 125, and afterwards they moved via the addresses Rijnstraat 79, Amstelkade 20 into a house at Van Woustraat 208 3rd floor in Amsterdam South, which would become also their last known address in the city.

Louis Boas and his wife Roza Pimontel were registered in Westerbork on 9 September 1942 and already put on transport to Auschwitz on 11 September. The transport of 11 September 1942 with 874 deportees was a so-called “Kozel-transport”; the train stopped at the station of a place called Kozel, located ± 80 km west from Auschwitz, where 140 boys and men between 15 and 50 years of age were forced to leave the train, to be deployed as forced labourers in the surrounding labor camps of Auschwitz. Those, who remained in the train, were transported onwards to Auschwitz, to be killed there. Also Roza Boas-Pimentel met that fate: on arrival there on 14 September 1942 she was immediately killed in the gas chambers of Auschwitz-Birkenau.

Louis Boas also belonged to the group of 140 men who were forcedly taken from the train. It appeared only in 2015 that he eventually has ended up as Jewish forced labourer in the "Reichs Autobahnlager St. Annaberg” in Upper Silesia in Poland. After the war, it was clear that Louis Boas had not survived the Shoah, but not where, when and under what circumstances he had lost his life. Therefore, on order of the Ministry of Justice after the war, the Municipality of Amsterdam had drawn up a certificate of death for Louis Boas, in which was established that he has died on 31 March 1943 in Seibersdorf.

However, during a research in 2015 in Poland to victims of among others the labour camp “Reichs Autobahnlager St.Annaberg” in Upper Silesia, several certificates of death were found, including those of Louis Boas. This document showed that he has died 30 December 1942 in labour camp St. Annaberg. On the death certificate is mentioned as an official cause of death as “gangrene and hart weakness” (Gangraen und Herzschwäche).

By establishing the date of death of Louis Boas however, the official Dutch date of death and place of 31 March 1943 in Seibersdorf is maintained, a juridical date and place established after the war by the Dutch Department of Justice.

Sources include the City Archive of Amsterdam, family registration cards of Louis Boas, archive card of Roza Pimontel, the file cabinet of the Jewish Council, registration cards of Louis Boas and Roza Boas-Pimentel; Wikipedia website jodentransporten vanuit Nederland.nl and Edward Haduch, Kedzierzyn-Kozle (Poland), the death certificate of Louis Boas from the Peoples Registry (Standesamt) Annaberg.

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