Klaartje de Zwarte - Walvisch

Klaartje at a wedding april 1940.

Klaartje was born on 6th February 1911 in Amsterdam as the ninth child of Barend Walvisch and Mietje Breemer. She had 10 brothers and sisters. Four of them died at a young age, only her two oldest sisters survived the war. On the 22nd of March 1943, in the afternoon, she is arrested by 2 Dutch men who worked for the SD at the office of the Zentralstelle für Judische Auswanderung in Amsterdam. Klaartje and her husband Joseph de Zwarte got their first call for deportation on the 25th of July 1942 but they decided not to appear, but they also decided not to go into hiding.
First, they were taken to the Zentralstelle. A lot of Jewish people that were arrested were kept there before transportation to the Hollandsche Schouwburg. Starting in March 1943 the nazi's were giving fee's for every Jew that was arrested. Specialised personel from the SD, like the Colonne Henneike, arrested hundreds of Jews in the months after for fl. 7,50 per captured Jew.

In the night of the 1rst and 2nd of april, Klaartje and her husband, are taken to the concentrationcamp of Vught. From there Klaartje's husband is taken to Moerdijk, near Rotterdam, to work on the defensive constructions that are being build in case of an Allied invasion on the Dutch coast. Klaartje herself is put to work in the Philips factory in camp Vught.

On the 4th of July Klaartje is taken to the Westerbork camp, without her husband. After nine days, on the 13th of July, she is deported from Westerbork to Sobibor. The train arrives there on the 16th and all of the 1990 men, women and children on that train die the same day.

Klaartje has kept a diary from the 22nd of March untill the 4th of July. She gave this diary to her brother-in-law Salomon de Zwarte in Westerbork. He managed to survive the war. In 2009 her diary is published under the title; Alles ging aan flarden (Everything went to pieces).

Sources:

Alles ging aan flarden; Het oorlogsdagboek van Klaartje de Zwarte-Walvisch; Uitgeverij Balans 2009.