Weezer Str. 29
(having previously resided at Herzogenstrasse 8 and Klever Strasse 27)
Jakob Cohen was a butcher. He and his wife Elise Cohen (daughter of Emil Kern) lived in Feldstrasse 7 on the first floor of a butcher´s shop of Gerhard Vondermans. Their children Margot and Herbert often played with the children of the family Vondermans (1). Due to the economic crisis and the resultant high level of unemployment at the start of the ‘thirties many tradesmen suffered great hardship, as did the Cohen family. Despite working very hard, they hardly earned enough to cover basic essentials. After 1935 Jewish butchers and cattle dealers were no longer allowed to engage in business, so Jakob Cohen had to take up any work he could get. In 1938 he worked as a caretaker of the shul (synagogue) and the school. It is known that prior to deportation in 1941, Mrs. Cohen had worked at home for the Goch margarine factory of Jeurgens & Prinzen. For his part Jakob Cohen had been reduced to working as a handyman for the Alex Eicken firm in Krefeld.
Within Goch the Cohen family had often changed their domicile. Known addresses are Feldstrasse 7, Klever Strasse 27, Herzogenstrasse 8 (Synagogue), and Weezer Strasse 29. In 1938 Jakob Cohen had taken over the responsibilities of the caretaker for the shul and adjacent Jewish school. The family were most probably living in the caretaker’s flat of the school when on the 9th of November 1938 (Reichsprogromnacht/Kristallnacht-"Night of the broken glas") the shul and school were set on fire by SA men. After this they had to move to accomodation at Weezer Strasse 29. By this time Jewish people were no longer to freely rent accomodation and had to live in shared “communal appartments” – these usually being forced-requisitioned private residences of Jews which now had to accommodate three or more families in cramped conditions. There were three such “communal appartments” in Goch.
Most probably at the end of 1938 the parents of Elise Cohen, Emil and Caroline Kern, from the southern German town of Edenkoben, temporarily lived with the family in the caretaker´s flat at Herzogenstrasse 8. They moved back to Edenkoben at the start of 1939. In October 1940 Emil and Caroline Kern were deported to the Vichy French internment camp at Gurs in S.W. France. Elise´s mother Caroline (A”H) died there after a short period of time, later her father Emil (A”H) was deported from there to Auschwitz, where he was most likely murdered during 1944.
A close family friend of the Cohens was a local gentile butcher cattle dealer named Gerhard Vondermans. A few days after the "Reichsprogromnacht" he secretly smuggled the children Margot and Herbert over the border into the Netherlands. He and his eldest daughter took them by train to Nimwegen (Netherlands). Beeing a Dutchman he could travel over the border without to many problems. From Nimwegen they were apparently taken to Amsterdam by car (1). Herbert was seven and Margot six years old. Their parents had already applied for the immigration to Great Britain (Brixham) and their (vain) hope was to later meet with their children in safety, in England.
After 1938 both children spent most of their time in Amsterdam. In 1944 Herbert Cohen (A”H) was caught and was taken first to Theresienstadt and later to Auschwitz, where he was murdered. Initially Margot was sent to an orphanage in Amsterdam and later she was fostered by a Dutch family, which already had one daughter. Though she was but a child, Margot helped with many household chores – in those hard times when German occupation of the Netherlands made life increasingly difficult for the Dutch. She attended the local school until that too was forbidden for Jewish children. Life became increasingly difficult for Margot and her foster-family. Regular searches of houses were made by the Germans and so Margot had to be hidden on several occasions. These experiences were very traumatic and Margot forgot neither them nor the fear which they caused in her and her foster-family. Eventually she was caught and, a mere child, sent to a transportation point in or near Amsterdam. However, assisted by an unknown person she was able to escape and was returned to her foster-family. They hid her until the end of the war, and thus saved her from an otherwise inevitable death at either Auschwitz or Sobibor. After the war her foster-family traced relatives of Margot, she then travelled to Haiti and later on to United States. Margot Cohen-Keinon (A”H) would eventually spend her adult life in Denver, Colorado, USA where, having founded a family, she passed away in 1985.
On the 26th October 1941, Jakob (A”H) and Elise Cohen (A”H) were deported to the Ghetto of Litzmannstadt (Poland) where they later died. Before leaving Goch they were forced to make a detailed inventory of their possessions. They were only allowed to take 100 Reichsmarks, one suitcase and enough provisions for eight days on their final journey (see Order of "Evacuation").
in 2000 Herbert Keinon (son of Margot Cohen/Keinon), a senior-correspondent of the Jerusalem Post newspaper, had received an invitation from the Foreign Ministry to visit the Federal Republic of Germany. When Herbert Keinon visited Goch he went to the municipal archive to seek information concerning his mother. Later he would comment how important it had been to make this visit, though when he was asked wether he would return sometime in the future, he also stated clearly that he had no wish to revisit the town of Goch on a private visit.
Sources:
- (1) Letter of Laura Aldenhoven nee Vondermans to Herb Keinon in: - http://www.peacemaker-gemeinschaft.de/Texte/Buchprojekt/Kapitel%201.htm
- Emails von Herb Keinon und Cindy Wolfe
- Judy Hoffman, Joseph and me, In the Days of the Holochaust , KTAV Publishing Company Inc., 1979, ISBN 0-87068-655-0
- Stadtarchiv Goch, D 629, Auszug auf den Standesregistern des Standesamts Goch, betr. jüdische Einwohner von 1795-1945 und von 1799 in Goch geborene Kinder jüdischer Eltern. Geburten bis 1939 – Eheschließungen – Sterbefälle - Beerdigungsregister
- Stadtarchiv Goch, Mitgliedslisten der israelitischen Gemeinde, des Männer-, Frauen-, und Sportvereins vom 1. April 1938. Wiener Library, StA Goch, Karton J4 - Gestapo Akten
- Handschriftliches "Verzeichnis der Anfang 1933 noch in Goch wohnenden Juden" wohl nach 1945 von der Stadtverwaltung im Rhamen der Restitutionsverfahren aufgestellt, StA Goch, D630.
- Ruth Benger, SHOAH (hebr. Vernichtung), Alphabetische Liste der jüdischen Gocher, in: Kalender für das Klever Land, 1989, S. 43-50
- Geburtsurkunden von Elise und Emil Cohen - dankenswerterweise zur Verfügung gestellt durch die Stadt Edenkoben.
- Drießen, Gocher Juden im Dritten Reich, Powerpoint-Präsentation des Stadtarchivs Goch
- Picture published with the permission of the Jewish Historical Museum in Amsterdam JHM 00004527_q - http://www.jhm.nl/collectie/fotos/40009827
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