Esther Zwaaf was a daughter of Isaäc Zwaaf and Bloeme Swaluw and born in Rotterdam on 3 July 1915. She had three sibs, namely Christina, who was born 15 September 1910, Hijman, on 19 February 1919 and Jacob on 5 January 1923. Only Jacob Zwaaf survived the Holocaust, the others were killed during the Shoah, whether or not with their families.
Esther’s mother passed away on 5 July 1935 and was interred in the Jewish Cemetery Toepan in Rotterdam. Then her father, aged 51 years, married again the 45-year old Roosje Reens in Amsterdam, who was born there on 12 March 1890 as a daughter of Mozes Reens and Lena van Dam.
Esther Zwaaf married in Rotterdam on 27 January 1937 the tailor Joseph Davids; he was born as one of the twin brothers Isaac and Joseph Davids, children of Louis Davids and Jetje Moscoviter. Joseph and Isaac Davids were born in Rotterdam on 2 October 1915. Esther and Joseph together had three children: Bloeme in 1937, Louis in 1940 and Isaac in 1942.
After that 27th of January 1937, Esther and Joseph moved into a house in the Ammanstraat 5b in the centre of Rotterdam, moved on 13 April 1937 to Helmersstraat 37b in the district “Kop van Zuid-Entrepot” and on 29 September 1938 to Kruisstraat 34b in Rotterdam-Citycentre. Most likely, as a result of the bombardment on Rotterdam of 14 May 1940, the family had to move elsewhere; in April 1942 they lived in Den Haag in the Nieuwe Molstraat 49a.
At the time of the large scale round-ups in among others Amsterdam, Den Haag and Rotterdam of early October 1942, the entire Joseph Davids family was taken from their home address Nieuwe Molstraat 49 in Den Haag to Westerbork, where they arrived between 3 and 5 October and had to stay in barrack 40. At some point, their children Louis and Bloeme were hospitalized and they were still there on 7 November 1942. Isaac, as a newborn baby in August, stayed with his mother in barrack 40.
Also Joseph Davids stayed in barrack 40 and was still in Westerbork that 7th November too. But three days later, on 10 November 1942, he was deported to Germany, alone, without his wife and children. That transport contained 758 deportees, of whom during a stop at Kozel, a place located about 80 km west from Auschwitz, 180 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 satellite camps of Auschwitz. Those, who remained in the train were transported onwards to Auschwitz to be killed there on arrival.
No doubt that Joseph Davids belonged to that group of 180 men, who were sent from Kozel to the labour camps in the Auschwitz region, but it is not known where Joseph has ended up in the end. At the other hand, he was one of the lucky few who managed to survive the hardship, diseases and beatings; he could return to the Netherlands and according to the Population Registry of Den Haag, Joseph Davids lived per 11 December 1947 at the address Poeldijksestraat 69 in the Schilderswijk district of Den Haag.
However, Esther Davids-Zwaaf still stayed in Westerbork with her three young children; two of her children had since been released from hospital and the youngest was now 6 months old when they were deemed “fit” to be transported to Auschwitz on 16 February 1943. On arrival there on 19 February 1943 Esther and her children Bloeme, Louis and Isaac were immediately killed in the gas chambers of Auschwitz-Birkenau.
Sources including the City Archive of Rotterdam, family registration cards of Louis Davids, Isaäc Zwaaf and Joseph Davids; wedding certificate of Rotterdam for Isaäc Davids/Bloeme Swaluw; the City Archive of Amsterdam, archive card of Roosje Reens; website het stenen archief.nl/grave Bloeme Davids-Swaluw ; the file cabinet of the file cabinet of the Jewish Council, registration cards of Joseph Davids, Esther Davids-Zwaaf and the children Bloeme, Louis and Isaac Davids and the wikipedia website Jodentransporten vanuit Nederland.nl