A woman in resistance; my mother

At the beginning of the war, on June 26, 1940, my mother Hetty (Henriëtte) Hertzberger was head over heels married in Amsterdam to the Winschoter Bert (Olbert) de Beer.

Because traveling became increasingly difficult for them, both Jewish, the newly married couple decided to move in with Bert’s parents, who owned a drapery shop at 51-53 Langestraat in Winschoten.

In the night of October 2 to 3, 1942, a large raid was held there in East Groningen, which really started the Second World War for Hetty and Bert.

On 3 October 1942, the arrested young couple arrived in camp Westerbork. Hetty was now pregnant but almost immediately lost her unborn child in the camp. Whether it was the stress or the forced eating of camphor, I don’t know; she did say that during her imprisonment she never had her period again.

She never told us, her children, much about her life in the camp. It was mostly talked about. Little by little, some fixed anecdotes were in her ‘repeat’ mode. They were mainly about something that had almost cost her her life.

For example, she had committed sabotage in labor camp Märzdorf by making holes in the parachute fabric in the weaving mill – German paratroopers would then fall to their deaths. After discovery, a gallows was prepared for her in the courtyard. Fortunately, due to a Russian bombardment, the execution was barely canceled.

My mother was a nurse in Westerbork, so she had some privileges and sometimes got some extra food. She kept the eggs she got hold of until she had four to share with her husband and in-laws.

As an escort of sick babies and children who were transported by ambulance to the Academic Hospital in Groningen, Hetty was occasionally able to leave Camp Westerbork. On a form that has been preserved in the archives of the Marechaussee in Westerbork, signed by the Dutch, strongly anti-German commander Jacques Schol, she received official permission for this on 3 December 1942, together with maternity nurse Reina Oudplezier.

It was also during that period that an underground organized child smuggling operation took place. After the war, resistance member Ies Spetter stated that as an employee of the Jewish Council in Westerbork, he smuggled some children out of the camp by ambulance. Etty Hillesum, who became famous after the war through her letters from Westerbork, also played a role in this, he says.

In her youth, Etty was the girlfriend of Bert’s niece, Liesje de Beer from the Langestraat in Winschoten.

In Westerbork, Bert and Hetty may have met her again.

It is not inconceivable that my mother participated in this child smuggling. After all, as a nurse she had access to the sick barracks and the ambulance. At least she was brave enough to risk her life for something like that.

The war had marked my mother forever, becoming a hard woman who, in her own words, “should have had no more children.” Because she could no longer give love, after her great love Bert de Beer had been taken from her. On arrival in Auschwitz, he was immediately gassed.

She herself managed to survive, under the most appalling conditions. Until her self-chosen death in 1985, my mother remained brave and combative: a woman in resistance.

In memory of her who survived Camp Westerbork, Camp Vught, Theresienstadt, Auschwitz Birkenau and Gross Rosen (Spinnerei Märzdorf).