Barend Velleman was the first born child from the 2nd wedlock of his father Levie Velleman to Saartje Slagter. He was born on 10 April 1889 in Schagen, and before he was married, he worked as controller in a circus and earned his living as manager.
Barend married on 22 March 1911 in Alkmaar the 21 year old and on 9 August 1889 born Femmetje Spier, a daughter of David Spier and Klaartje Englander. Barend and Femmetje had four children together, namely Levi Barend in 1911, David Henri in 1913, Sara (usually named Selma) in 1922 and Clara in 1928.
Barend Velleman and his family arrived via Diemen in Amsterdam on 11 July 1933, where they lived at Tweede Jan van der Heidstraat 41 3rd floor. On 28 September 1936 they moved to the Jan Lievenstraat 49 1st floor, a side street of the Jozef Israelskade and located in the Diamond district of Amsterdam.
Levi Barend and his brother David Henri Velleman survived the Holocaust. Also their sister Sara or Selma, survived the Shoah. Notes from her registration card of the Jewish Council show that she was sent on 8 September 1944 to concentration camp Ravensbrück named as Margareta Kuijt and a false date of birth of 21 October 1920. On 20 August 1945 she was repatriated from Sweden to Amsterdam where she ended up in the Jan van der Heijdenstraat 44, in de Amsterdam district “De Pijp”.
In 1942, the Velleman family has made efforts to go into hiding, but it was only partially succesfull. Both their sons already lived elsewhere and were able to avoid the mandatory registration of the Jews in the Netherlands; they survived the war. Levi Barend married in 1943 in Hull (GB) and left for Canada in 1957 and his brother David Henri married in 1939 in Weenen, Germany. But Sara/Selma was sent to concentration camp Ravensbrück in September 1944 and Femmetje Spier, together with her daughter Clara, arrived after their arrest, in the penal barrack 67 in Westerbork on 15 June 1943. Both were put on a so-called penal-transport to Sobibor on 29 June and on arrival there they were immediately killed in the gas chambers on 2 July 1943.
Barend Velleman was already arrested and carried off to Westerbork in the period of the large-scale round-ups of early October 1942 and the at the same time liquidation of the Jewish labour camps in the North of the Netherlands. When he came down in Westerbork between 3 and 5 October 1942, and it was a great chaos with the many thousands of men, women and children there. Among others, Barend stayed in barrack 70 but since 13 November also in the hospital barrack 81. On 4 December he was put on transport to Auschwitz and on arrival there on 7 December 1942, he was immediately killed in the gas chambers of Auschwitz-Birkenau.
Source include the City Archive of Amsterdam, archive cards of Barend Velleman, Femmetje Spier, Levi Barend Velleman and David Henri Velleman; the file cabinet of the Jewish Council, registration cards of Barend Velleman, Femmetje Velleman-Spier, Sara Velleman and Clara Velleman and additions of visitors of the website.