Biography

The fate of Abraham Elzas, his wife Rebecca de Swarte and their six children.

Abraham Elzas was a son of Mozes Elzas and Naatje Peperwortel. He was born on 13 July 1908 in Amsterdam and married there as a 21-year old the 20-year old Rebecca de Swarte, who was born on 8 April 1909 in Amsterdam as the first born of the first marriage of Hijman de Swarte and Louise van Dal. Before Rebecca got married, she stayed also for some time in Antwerp with her parents and her brother Isaac. Abraham Elzas and Rebecca de Swarte had six children, viz. Ruben in 1930, Maurice in 1932, Louise in 1935, Hijman in 1937, Levie in 1938 and as the last one, in 1942 their daughter Elly was born.

Abraham Elzas started his working life as a skins salter. Subsequently he became a warehouseman and later he was a laborer and then he became a metalworker for a shipping company. Since their marriage in 1929, Abraham and Rebecca lived at many addresses in Amsterdam. They certainly stayed at 20 different addresses in the city, before they had their living space at Tweede Oosterparkstraat 9 2nd floor in Amsterdam-East on 20 June 1940. However they moved again on 25 September 1941 to the Kleine Wittenbugerstraat 37 2nd floor, located in the eastern part of the centre of Amsterdam.

On 20 March 1942, Abraham Elzas was called up fort he so-called work extension in one of the Jewish labor camps in the Northern Netherlands and he ended up in camp Vledder. However, in the night of 2 to 3 October 1942, the camp was liquidated by the Germans and all Jewish forced laborers were carried off to Westerbork.

On 5 October 1942, Abraham Elzas was registered in Westerbork and in the context of the so-called family reunification, also his family was summoned to report in Westerbork. Rebecca Elzas-de Swarte and her six children were registered in Westerbork on 13 October and on 16 October 1942 the entire Elzas family was put on transport to Auschwitz.

After a stop in Cosel, located ±80 km west from Auschwitz, where 570 boys and men between 15 and 50 years of age were forced to leave the train as they were considered suitable for work (“arbeitsfähig”), the remaining people (elderly, sickly, weak, women and children) were transported on to Auschwitz, where they were, with a few exceptions, all murdered in the gas chambers of Auschwitz-Birkenau immediately upon arrival on 19 October 1942. This was also the fate of Rebecca Elzas-de Swarte and her six children Ruben, Maurice, Louise, Hijman, Levie and Elly Elzas.  

Abraham Elzas however belonged tot he group of 570 men, who had to leave the train in Cosel, to be deployed as forced laborers in the surrounding labor camps in Upper Silesia. It is not known where Abraham exactly ended up, nor where he eventually lost his life. It is clear however, which route the men took who “got off” in Cosel and who were fit for work, namely to the forced labor camps St. Annaberg or Sakrau, Bobrek or Malapane, Blechhammer and some more to Bismarckhütte/Monowitz. A seperate group went to the Gross Rosen resort.

After the war, the Dutch Authorities have established, partly based on research by the Red Cross and testimonies from survivors, that Abraham Elzas must have died áfter 19 October 1942 but not later than 31 March 1944. Since it is uncertain too where Abraham exactly has died, his place of death has been established as “Central Europe”. The Municpality of Amsterdam then was commissoned to draw up a certificate of death for Abraham Elzas which stated that he has died in Central Europe on 31 March 1944.

Sources include the City Archive of Amsterdam, family registration cards of Mozes Elzas (1881) and Abraham Elzas; archive cards of Abraham Elzas and Rebecca de Swarte;; the file cabinet of the Jewish Council, registration cards of Abraham Elzas, Rebecca de Swarte and the children Ruben, Maurice, Louise, Hijman, Levie and Elly Elzas;  the Red Cross publication “Auschwitz part III, deportation transports during the Cosel period, edited in October 1952; the Wikipedia website Jodentransporten vanuit Nederland.nl and the certificate of death for Abraham Elzas from the A-register 118 – folio 2.

All rights reserved