Biography

About Andries Ossendrijver, his wife Henriette Franco and their daughter Gretha Lisette.

Andries Ossendrijver, son of Alexander Ossendrijver and Simha Pesaro, was married 20 December 1933 in Amsterdam to Henriette Franco, a daughter of Jacob Franco and Judith Polak. They lived at Nieuwe Achtergracht 103 3rd floor in Amsterdam. On 15 December 1935 their daughter Gretha Lisette was born there.

During the big raids of early October 1942 in Amsterdam , the Andries Ossendrijver family was arrested and carried off to Westerbork, from where they have been deported to Auschwitz already on 5 October 1942. On arrival there on 8 October, Henriette Franco and her daughter Gretha Lisette were immediately killed.

The transport, with which Andries Ossendrijver and his family were deported to Auschwitz contained 2012 deportees, including the first quota of the 10.000 Jews from the Jewish Labor Camps. The train stopped in Kozel, located ±80 km west from Auschwitz, where 550 boys and men between 15 and 50 years were forced to leave the train. They were employed as forced laboreres in the surrounding satellite camps of Auschwitz.

Those, who remained in the train were transported onwards to Auschwitz to be killed on arrival there. Among them Andries’ wife Henriette Franco and his daughter Gretha Lisette who were both on arrival on 8 October 1942 in Auschwitz immediately killed .

Most likely Andries Ossendrijver belonged to the group of 550 men who had to leave the train in Kozel but it is not known in which labor camp he eventually ended up. During the last six months of the war, when the Russian forces came nearer, many Jewish prisoners have been transferred from Auschwitz and Gross Rosen to German camps west from Auschwitz, like Buchenwald. In January 1945 there had been two large transports, on 22 and 26 January. Presumably Andries ended up in Buchenwald like this, where after the war has been established that Andries Ossendrijver lost his life there on 17 March 1945.

Sources among others: City Archive of Amsterdam, family registration cards of Alexander Ossendrijver, Andries Ossendrijver and Henriette Franco; website wiewaswie.nl/wedding Ossendrijver/Pesaro; the file cabinet of the Jewish Council, registration cards of Alexander Ossendrijver, Simha Ossendrijver-Pesaro, Max Ossendrijver, Andries Ossendrijver, Henriette Ossendrijver-Franco en Gretha Lisette Ossendrijver and the website jewishgen.org re Auschwitz-Buchenwald transport 22 and 26 January 1945.

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