Biography

The fate of Samuel Gompers, his wife Esther Moscoviter and their children Wilhelmina, Jacques, Jansje and Abraham Samuel.

Samuel Gompers was a son of Abraham Samuel Gompers and Wilhelmina Consenheim. He was the fifth of the seven children of the family and wa born 6 June 1896 in Amsterdam. His sisters Theresia and Jansje, as well their father and he himself were killed during the Shoah. His mother died already in 1928; one sister survived the Holocaust, two sister passed already before the war and one sister died in 1893, only one year old.

Samuel Gompers was a commercial traveller with fashion articles; he married in Amsterdam his 25-year old cousin Esther Moscoviter on 22 August 1918 in Amsterdam, a daughter of  Salomon Moscoviter and Sarah Gompers. Together they had four children, namely Wilhelmina in 1919, Jacques in 1921, Jansje in 1923 and Abraham Samuel in 1924. After their wedding in 1918, Samuel and Esther lived at Amstel 151, but one year later, in 1919 they moved to Tilanusstraat 36.

Per 11 May 1923 they left Amsterdam and the family was unsubscribed to Zandvoort, where they came living at Jacob van Heemskerckstraat 7, but on 26 September 1924, they returned to Amsterdam, where they moved in a house at Tweede Jan Steenstraat 106, 2nd  and 5th  floor. After two more removals, to Samaragdstraat and Michel Angelostraat, they moved to Keizer Karelweg 370 in Nieuwer Amstel and their last known addres in town became per 12 June 1940 Courbetstraat 33 3rd floor. On 27 November 1942, the whole family was registered in the Peoples Registry of Amsterdam as V.O.W. (means "Vertrokken, Onbekend Waarheen" or Left, Unkown Whereto), which generally meant that people were gone into hiding.

On 9 October 1943, the whole Gompers family was carried off to Westerbork. Most likely they were betrayed early October, arrested and locked in the penal barrack 67 in Westerbork. Ten days later, on 19 October 1943, they were deported in a so-called penal transport to Auschwitz and on arrival there on 22 October, Esther Gompers-Moscoviter, 50 years and her 24 year old daughter Wilhelmina were immediately killed in the gas chambers there.

Samuel Gompers and his three still surviving children Jacques, Jansje and Abraham Samuel were selected to be deployed as forced labourers. They have lost their lives in Auschwitz on different times. Because exact dates of their death were not known, the Dutch Ministry of Justice ordered the Municipality of Amsterdam after the war, to draw up certificates of death for them, in which it was established that:

Samuel Gompers, 47 year, has died in Auschwitz on 31 March 1944.   

Jacques Gompers, 22 year, has died in Auschwitz on 31 March 1944.  

Jansje Gompers, 20 years, has died in Auschwitz on 28 January 1944 and 

Abraham Samuel Gompers, 19 years, had died in Auschwitz  on 31 March 1944.

 

Sources include City Archive of Amsterdam, family registration card of Samuel Gompers, archive cards of Samuel Gompers, Esther Moscoviter, Wilhelmina, Jacques, Jansje and Abraham Samuel Gompers; residence card Amsterdam, Tweede Jan Steenstraat 106; the file cabinet of the Jewish Council, registration cards of Samuel Gompers, Esther Gompers-Moscoviter, Wilhelmina, Jacques, Jansje and Abraham Samuel Gompers; the wikipedia website jodentransporten vanuit Nederland.nl and the death register Amsterdam 1943, registers A82, folio 81 and  A95, folio 47v and an addition of a visitor of the website.

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