More than a thousand Jewish children were taken from Camp Vught to the Sobibor extermination camp on June 6 and 7, 1943 during the infamous Kindertransporten and were immediately gassed upon arrival. Adolf and Otto Schaap were also on those trains and were one of the few to escape this terrible fate. The now 94-year-old Adolf survived several concentration camps and will speak about what happened to him during the commemoration this weekend. “My most terrible time was in Vught.”
Adolf Otto (Dolf) Schaap was born in Amsterdam on January 14, 1932, his brother Otto followed a few years later. Adolf is a real family name and it is no surprise that he gets it, he says during a interview at the Jewish Cultural Quarter. “I think that if I had been born six months later, they would not have given me the name Adolf. The name Adolf bothered me quite a bit after the war. Because if I had to say my name, they would say: Ah Adolf, then you are an NSB child.”
Both Jewish brothers experience the beginning of the war as an exciting boys’ book. “On May 10, 1940, Mother said with a grave face, the war has started. But yes, war is exciting for little boys. So we stood cheering in bed, dancing in bed. Without, of course, any idea of what would follow.”
Horrible food
The Schaap family was betrayed and deported to Camp Vught in 1943. His time there is etched in his memory. “The food in Vught was more than horrible. Cabbage soup every day. A kind of stew made from cabbages that had been stewed with potatoes. It was very disgusting mess. Every now and then a scrap of meat in between.”
Every now and then they receive a bag of bread from an acquaintance who leaves it for them in the bushes near the barracks. “Otto and I were very lucky with that.”
Otto and Dolf are separated from their parents in the children’s barracks. They have to appear there for roll call every day. They are inspected by the gray mice: Dutch and German women in a gray/green uniform who conduct a true reign of terror. The children must line up in rows of three according to length.
Dolf: “I never understood how women could be so mean to children. They were such bastards. That was really terrible. The smallest children in particular had it the worst, because they were at the front. If a child could not stand for too long, he would get a blow on the head. They threaten to stick pencils in the eyes. To this day, I cannot understand that there are such women who treat children like that.”
What has stayed with him forever is the flat cart that stands next to the entrance to the barracks. Almost every day there are bodies of babies and small children who died that night. “I remember Vught well, because it was one of the worst periods that Otto and I experienced.”
In June, all the children are suddenly allowed to visit their mothers in the women’s camp and suddenly receive a plate of good food. “Those women said, oh Jesus, something terrible is going to happen. That’s abnormal.”
Their premonition is correct, shortly afterwards the Kindertransports follow towards Westerbork. Dolf and Otto are on the second train with their mother, which leaves on June 7. His father had previously been transported to Westerbork and worked there as a doctor. He must check the occupants of the trains for infectious diseases. He manages to get mother and both sons off the train.
That turns out to be their salvation, because both trains then continue to Sobibor where all the children are gassed immediately upon arrival.
Commemoration
On June 7, the children’s transports of June 6 and 7, 1943 are commemorated, during which almost 1,300 Jewish children were taken from Vught to the Sobibor extermination camp and gassed there almost immediately. The program starts at 1.40 pm and Dolf Schaap is one of the speakers.
The entire family then ends up in various concentration camps, but manages to survive time and time again. Their salvation is a prisoner exchange made in 1945 between the Germans and Allies. Together with four hundred other Dutch people from Theresienstadt concentration camp, they go by train to Switzerland and are one of the few to survive the Holocaust as a complete family.
Bygone Past
Vervlogen Verleden is a weekly column about fun, remarkable or funny facts from Brabant’s rich past. If you have a tip, please email: [email protected]
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