Bloeme van West was born in Amsterdam on 23 March 1877 as a daughter of Joseph Mozes van West and Vrouwtje Wijnman. As a 15-year old girl she married on 8 March 1893 the 21-year old diamond polisher Hartog van West, a son of Manuel van West and Klara Wurms. Hartog was born on 27 August 1871 in Amsterdam.
The Van West-Van West couple had nine children, of whom the first one, named Joseph, was born on 28 May 1893, two months after the wedding ceremony. However, as a baby, he died already on 21 June 1894. Of the remaining eight children, Emanuel (1894), Clara (1898) and Sientje (1910) survived the Holocaust but the 2nd Joseph (1896-1943), Sara (1903-1944), Marianne (1906-1943) and Lena (1916-1944), whether or not with their families, were murderd in the Shoah,
After their marriage was concluded, Hartog and Bloeme lived at various addresses in Amsteram, such as the Valkenburgerstraat 184, the Blasiusstraat 121 3rd floor and the 2nd Boerhaavestraat 12 3rd floor. In the latter, they came living there per 20 June 1931. There, Bloeme van West became widowed on 8 July 1937, when her husband Hartog van West passed away. He was 65 years old and interred in the Jewish Cemetery in Diemen.
After the passing of her husband, Bloeme van West remained living in the 2nd Boerhaavestraat 13rd , togehter with her unmarried daughter Sara and granddaughter Schoontje. She was the daughter of Bloeme’s son Emanuel and his already on 10 August 1930 deceased wife Heintje Prins. After the passing of Heintje, Emanuel temporarily lived in with his mother, till he permanently left the Netherlands for South-Africa at the end of September 1931.
Boerhaavestraat 13 was the last known addres in Amsterdam of Bloeme van West, her daughter Sara and granddaughter Schoontje. From there, Bloeme van West-van West was carried off to Westerbork on 13 April 1943, where she had to wait for her deportation in barrack 57, which followed on 20 April to Sobibor. Upon arrival there on 23 April 1943, she was immediately murdered in the gas chambers there.
After being caught early May 1943, the still at home living seamstress Sara van West was carried off to concentration camp Vught during the night of 6 to 7 May 1943. There she was put to work as a confection stitcher. On 15 November she was deported from there direct to Auschwitz, where she was put to work again. In the end, Dutch Authorities after the war have established that she died in Auschwitz on 31 January 1944.
Schoontje van West has been accomodated in 1930 with her grandparents Van West after the passing of her mother and emigration of her father to South-Africa. She passed her 3-year MULO diploma and worked as a cashier with a textile whole saler. In July 1942 she was exempted from deportation by the Jewish Council until further notice (gesperrt bis auf weiteres), and became a typist at the address Waterlooplein 109, the Foreign Department of the Council. But during the large scale raid of 20 June 1943 she was arrested and carried off to Westerbork. On 20 July she was deported to Sobibor and upon arrival there on 23 July 1943, immediately murdered in the gas chambers.
Sources include the City Archive of Amsterdam, archive card of Bloeme van West, family registration cards of Hartog van West and Emanuel van West, archive cards of Joseph, Clara, Sara, Marianne, Sientje and Lena van West; the file cabinet of the Jewish Counicil, registration cards of Bloeme van West-van West, Sara van West and Schoontje van West; Archives of ITS Arolson/camp card Vught of Sara van West; Website oorlogsbronnen/razzia 20 June 1943 (only Dutch language), website Joods Amsterdam/Waterlooplein 109 (only Dutch language); and the Wikipedia website Jodentransporten vanuit Nederland.nl.