Salomon Cohen was the fourth child of the cattle trader and butcher Izaak Cohen and Elizabeth van Lier. He was born in Rotterdam on 9 October 1871 into a family which would grow till twelve children. He married at the age of 38 in Herwijnen on 13 April 1910 the 23-year old Sophia van Straten, a daughter of Manuël van Straten, butcher in Herwijnen and Helena Frank. Sophia was born there on 22 March 1887 and apart from the birth of a stillborn son in 1890, she had five other siblings.
Salomon Cohen was a wholesaler of beef. After his parents and their family moved to Rotterdam in June 1910, Salomon moved into a house in the Jonker Fransstraat 27b in December 1910, together with his wife Sophia van Straten, where at the same time their first born child Elizabeth Helena was born. Via relocations to Heemraadssingel, Bergsingel and West Zeedijk, they ended up at the Ungerplein 2/20 in Rotterdam on 26 June 1934, where they have lived till their deportation.
Meantime two daughters were born in Rotterdam, namely Elizabeth Helena on 18 December 1910 and on 5 May 1918 Helena Sophia. The latter was unmarried, worked as a secretary and managed to survive the Holocaust. After war’s end she has been repatriated to Eindhoven but further nothing is known about her. Elizabeth Helena married Ruben Kleinkramer from Strijen, moved to Eindhoven and had two daughters, Rosy and Salomé. The children survived the Holocaust by hiding. Elizabeth Helena and her husband Ruben Kleinkramer were betrayed and arrested during their hiding, and eventually killed in Auschwitz
Salomon Cohen and his wife Sophia van Straten were taken from their home address on 9 October 1942 and carried off to Westerbork via “Loods 24” - a warehouse in Rotterdam where Jews were assembled for deportation to the East. From there they were put on transport to Auschwitz on 12 October where on arrival on 15 October Salomon Cohen and his wife Sopha van Straten immediately were killed in the gas chambers there.
Souces include the City Archive of Rotterdam, family registration cares of Izaak Cohen, Manuël van Straten and Salomon Cohen; the file cabinet of the Jewish Council, registration cards of Salomon Cohen, Sophia Cohen-van Straten (registrered as Cohen-van Strouten), Helena Sophia Cohen, Ruben Kleinkramer, Rosy and Salomé Kleinkramer and additions of visitors of the website.