David Frank, born 30 December 1903 in Rotterdam, was a son of Izaak Frank and Rebekka van der Stam. He married 5 August 1925 in Rotterdam the non-Jewish Hendrika Albertha Sophia van Oers, a daughter of Franciscus Cornelis van Oers and Sophia Pieternella Schoonenberg. From this marriage, their son Harry Izaak was born on 19 January 1926. David’s spouse as well his son survived the war.
David Frank was the 2nd child of Izaak and Rebekka Frank. His siblings were Wilhelm, Mozes, Marianna, Meijer, Jacob, Henriette en Joseph. Two sibs died already before the war in childhood but the others have survived the war.
Before the war, David Frank has been enrolled twice on a ship of the Holland-Amerika Line where he worked as steward. In New York he tried to be naturalized as an American citizen but he did not succeed. Back in Rotterdam, he worked as a waiter in various grand hotels in the city and later, he earned his living as a merchant in textiles.
On 15 June 1926, six months after the birth of his son, the family left Rotterdam for Utrechtsestraat 29 2nd floor in Amsterdam. From there they moved four weeks later to Ferdinand Bolstraat 107 3rd floor. However. On 29 November that same year the family returned to Rotterdam. His last known addrerss was Maasstraat 14 in Schiedam.
On 3 August 1943 David Frank was arrested and taken to Westerbork, where he was locked in penal barrack 67, probably because of his mixed marriage. In the month of August David has done a lot of work to gather evidence and documents showing that he was mixed married and that his son is not Jewish. All to prevent that he too would not be deported, in which he succeeded. However, in 1944 his son still was arrested during a raid and has been sent to Germany to perform hard labour there.
However, despite that David Frank stayed a long time in Westerbork, in the end he was still deported as a penal case with another 731 deportees to Auschwitz. The transport arrived there 5 or 6 March, he got prison number 174733 and was employed as forced laborer in Monowitz.
Between 18 and 21 January 1945 prisoners were evacuated from Auschwitz to other concentration camps. According to two surviving witnesses, Mr. de Wolf and Mr. Kattenburg from Den Haag, who have made a written statement on official sealed paper, David Frank has died in their presence on 21 January 1945 in a train-wagon during a transport from Monowitz to Buchenwald.
However, the Dutch Red Cross stated in a letter from 1969 to his son H.J. Frank, that his father David Frank was not alive anymore on 9 May 1945 at the most. Also based on this statement his place and date of death has been established as on 9 May 1945 in Mid-Europe.
Sources among others: City Archive of Rotterdam, family registration cards of David Frank and Izaak Frank; City Archive of Amsterdam, residence cards of Utrechtsestraat 29 and Ferdinand Bolstraat 107; De Groene Amsterdammer newspaper; statements of J. de Wolf and J. Kattenburg from 1946; Letter from 1969 by the Dutch Red Cross to H.J. Frank re David Frank; website wiewaswie.nl/marriage David Frank/Hendrika van Oers; the file cabinet of the Jewish Council, registration cards of David Frank; additions of a visitor of the website and informations from grandson David Frank.