Anna Agsteribbe and Emanuel Agsteribbe were brother and sister. They were born in Amsterdam, respectively on 5 April 1914 and 11 March 1918 as children of Willem Agsteribbe and Bertina van West. Anna was the second and Benjamin the fourth of the five children in this family.
Anna had become a seamstress and Benjamin a tailor. From 1935 they lived at Nieuwe Herengracht 159, where their parents ran a boarding house. Anna was born at Houtkopersburgwal 8, the first address of her newly married parents, and Benjamin was born at Waterlooplein 35, the address where the Agsteribbe family moved to in 1916. The family lived there until 1931, after which they moved to Zwanenburgwal and in 1935 to Nieuwe Herengracht.
Partly in connection with the possible employment in Germany (additional work in Germany under police surveilance) – the “Arbeitseinsatz” – Anna and her brother Emanuel (like so many others) then decided to go to Germany as married couples. So they decided to get married on the same day, which happened on 9 April 1942 in Amsterdam:
The then 28-year-old Anna Agsteribbe married the 33-year-old Levie de Beer, who was born on 7 August 1908 as the son of Abraham de Beer and Roosje Rijxman. Levie de Beer started working as a hairdresser but later tried to earn a living as a casual worker. And the then 24-year-old tailor Emanuel Agsteribbe married the 23-year-old machine stitcher Hendrika Bouwman, who was born on 18 December 1918 as the daughter of Israel Bouwman and Debora Nikkelsberg.
On 10 July 1942, Anna and Levie de Beer already received the call-up for the “Arbeitseinsatz” in Germany, but Anna and Levie had a “Sperrestempel”, an exemption from deportation; Anna worked at Jurgens Pettenfabriek (cap factory) and both Anna and Levie were therefore provisionally deferred - “zurückgestellt” - from deportation. But at the time of the large-scale raids at the beginning of October 1942, they were arrested anyway and ended up in Westerbork. However, their “Sperre stamp” saved them from direct deportation: they were discharged from Westerbork on 2 December 1942.
Emanuel Agsteribbe's registration cards show that he was brought into Westerbork from one of the three (and possibly four) Staphorster labor camps between 3 and 5 October 1942. But on the basis of his wife Hendrika Bouwman's Sperre on her identity card, he was able to prove, with great difficulty, that he had been “wrongly” sent to Westerbork. Emanuel was therefore not deported but released from the camp on 27 November 1942.
However, other arrests followed on 25 March 1943: Anna Agteribbe and her husband Levie de Beer as well as Emanuel Agsteribbe and his wife Hendrika Bouwman were then arrested and transferred to Vught concentration camp on 26 March 1943. Based on their professions - tailor, seamstress, presser, it is likely that they were employed by the textile companies in the camp.
Emanuel was sent on 21 May 1943 to the Moerdijk Command, an outer camp of Vught, where about 500 Jews lived in old ship barracks. They were used to dig tank traps in South Holland and North Brabant. (source: Oorlogsbrons.nl/Moerdijk). Emanuel probably had to work there until the late autumn of 1943.
His wife Hendrika Bouwman had been in Vught all this time, but on 3 September 1943 she was sent to another outer commando of Vught, the Outercamp Venlo, where a military airfield was located. At some point she was sent back to Vught, just like her husband, who was sent back to Vught from Moerdijk. Brother and sister - Emanuel and Anna Agsteribbe - together with their partners - Hendrika Bouwman and Levie de Beer - were deported on 15 November 1942 in a direct transport from Vught to Auschwitz.
On 18 November, the transport arrived in Auschwitz, where all 1149 deportees were then quarantined; no selection took place. Yet in those first weeks, many women in particular died as a result of all kinds of diseases. Selections followed again in January 1944, after which the remaining men were sent to the various coal mines or to work commands in Auschwitz-Birkenau.
In the end, 32 men and 5 women survived this transport, but based on statements by witnesses it has been concluded that “all those who belonged to this transport – unless otherwise known individually – are presumed to have died in Auschwitz-Birkenau no earlier than 1 January 1944 and no later than 31 January 1944”.
After the war, the Dutch authorities decided on the basis of the foregoing and decided to have the Municipality of Amsterdam draw up death certificates for Anna de Beer-Agsteribbe, Levie de Beer, Emanuel Agsteribbe and Hendrika Bouwman, which has been drawn up on 17 August 1951, in which it is recorded that they died on 31 January 1944 in (the vicinity) of Auschwitz-Birkenau.
Sources include Amsterdam City Archives, Closed family registration cards/Benjamin Agsteribbe (1850) and Benjamin van West (1860); archive cards of Anna Agsteribbe, Emanuel Agsteribbe, Levie de Beer and Hendrika Bouwman; Publication "Presumably on transport”/June 2011 by Raymund Schütz; the file cabinet of the Jewish Council, registration cards of Anna Agsteribbe, Emanuel Agsteribbe, Levie de Beer and Hendrika Bouwman; website ITS Arolson, camp cards Vught of Anna de Beer-Agsteribbe, Levie de Beer and Emanuel Agsteribbe; website joodsrotterdam.nl/Moerdijk (Dutch language only); website Jewish labor camps in Staphorst - Beugelen, Conrad and Het Wijde Gat (Dutch only) and the death certificates for Anna de Beer-Agsteribbe (deed 482 from register A83-fol.82), Levie de Beer (deed 494 from register A83-fol.84), Emanuel Agsteribbe (deed 483 from register A 83-fol.82) and Hendrika Bouwman (deed 524 from register A83-fol. 89) drawn up on 17 August 1951, drawn up in Amsterdam.