Benvenida Rodrigues Parreira was the youngest of the six children of Abraham Rodrigues Parreira and Jetje Brandon. She was born in Amsterdam on 10 July 1914 and she was a seamstress by profession. She married Benjamin de la Penha in Amsterdam on 15 December 1937, a son of Hartog de la Penha and Lea Pais; and he was born on 1 February 1911 in Amsterdam.
Benjamin was employed as warehouse clerk, tailor, presser and had been also a shopkeeper in chocolates. After 1941 he came to work through the Jewish Council and the Jewish Society for Nursing and Care, the JVvVV for the cleaning service of the Joodsche Invalide on the Weesperplein in Amsterdam , just as his brother-in-law and neighbor Aäron Rodrigues Parreira, who lived at the Graaf Florisstraat 19 1st floor at the time. The De la Penha couple had no children.
Ever since August 1932, Benjamin de la Penha did not live at home anymore with his own parents and siblings, but lived in with the Abraham Rodrigues Parreira family at Weesperstraat 73. He stayed with the family, despite all removals they undertook, from Weesperstraat 73 to Vrolikstraat 77 in August 1933, to Roetersstraat 3a in November 1934 and to Lepelstraat 62 in October 1935, until he and his wife Benvenida, a daughter of the house, with whom he had married on 15 December, moved into their own house at Krugerplein 5 groundfloor in Amsterdam-East on 17 December 1937. On 20 April 1938 Benjamin and Benvenida moved again, yet to the Graaf Florisstraat 21 2nd floor, located between the Wibautstraat and Weesperzijde.
The Jewish Council registration cards of Benvenida and Benjamin show, that already on 17 July 1942, they were provisionally exempted from deportation, most likely because they belonged to the P.I.G., the Portuguese Israelitic Congregation. During the Second World War, Portuguese Jews tried to gain a place on Portuguese and emigration lists by emphasizing their Portuguese descent in order to escape deportation. Through extensive genealogical and scientific research, the Portuguese Jews tried to prove that they belonged to the Mediterranean and not to the Jewish race. Their Jewish identity would be based solely on religion. (sources Lydia Hagoort in the Historisch Nieuwsblad 10/2005.
Moreover, Benjamin de la Penha was added to the JVvVV, the Jewish Society for Nursing and Care by the Jewish Council, reason why he was able to join the cleaning service of the Joodsche Invalide as a cleaner. Because of that, he was officially “gesperrte bis auf weiteres” – exempted from deportation until further notice – for which the Jewish Council issued the ID Z-1507 for him. Also his wife Benvenida Rodrigues Parreira was exempted from deportation for the time being. They received the Sperre numbers 92089 and 92090 in the series 8-100.000, the actual Jewish Council stamps, which also would be stamped in their personal ID’s.
Despite their exemptions, Benjamin and Benvenida were arrested on 6 May 1943 and carried off to Westerbork where both were housed in barrack 55, waiting for their deportation, which followd on 11 May 1943. They were included in the 11th transport to Sobibor with in total 1446 deportees. Upon arrival there Benjamin de la Penha and Benvenida Rodrigues Parreira were murdered immediately in the gas chambers.
Sources include the City Archive of Amsterdam, family registration cards of Abraham Rodrigues Parreira, Hartog de la Penha and Benjamin de la Penha; archive cards of Benvenida Rodrigues Parreira and Benjamin de la Penha; Amsterdam residence card/Weesperstraat 73; the file cabinet of the Jewish Council, registration cards of Benvenida de la Penha-Rodrigues Parreira and Benjamin de la Penha and the wikipedia website jodentransporten vanuit Nederland.nl.