Izak Hartog Cohen was born 26 February 1903 in Leiden. He was the third of the seven children of Hartog Cohen from Leeuwarden and Marianne Sitters From Gorinchem. His father passed away already on 24 May 1930 in Leiden, but his mother was killed during the Holocaust, just as all her other children and their families, namely Margaretha, Elisabeth, Salomon, Berend Gustaaf, Herman Samuel and Ester Cornelia. Only Izak Hartog himself and Ester Cornelia remained unmarried; the latter lived together with her mother in the Dintelstraat 54 in Amsterdam since 9 May 1938.
On 17 January 1928 Izak Hartog Cohen left Leiden and was registered in Laren (province of Noord Holland), at the address Doodweg 4. There the Bergstichting (foundation) was located (According to the State Inspection one of the best children’s homes in the Netherlands), were he was appointed as administrator. On 19 August 1942 the location in Laren had to be closed down by orders of the Germans and on 5 December 1942 the building should be delivered completely empty. Because of that, in 1942 the complete foundation had to move in stages to Rapenburg in Amsterdam, where the children and staff were assigned to three worn out houses.
Izak Hartog Cohen was then registered formally on 30 December 1942 in the function of “adjunct director neglected Jewish children” at the address Rapenburg 92-96 in Amsterdam. Director Reitsma had typed the Bergstichting as a so-called “hybride home”(Mischlingheim), where children lived who were not thoroughbred Jewish. That the residents of that home probably were partly Aryan, was more than delicate for the German Sicherheitsdienst and they took care that no staff and residents were arrested during a raid and a house search. The foundation was left alone for some time. And due to that, people were able to go into hiding.
It is possible that Izak Hartog up from 11 April 1943 was able to live for some time with his brother Herman Samuel Cohen in the Retiefstraat 18 3rd floor in Amsterdam East, where possibly were made plans to go into hiding. It concerned Izak Hartog himself, his brother Herman Samuel and his wife Elsa Kattenburg, his siter Ester Cohen and their mother Marianne Sitters.
On 4 June 1943, Izak Hartog returned again to Rapenburg 92-96, where on 2 August a crucial raid took place, whereby the Germans found a bed which was slept in but from which the person in hiding had fled. The non-Jewish director was arrested but also released again however, the children who were present in the home then were arrested and deported. Most of them were killed in Sobibor.
It was striking that Izak Hartog Cohen was arrested on 14 August 1943, together with his mother Marianne Cohen-Sitters and his sister Ester Cohen and carried off to Westerbork (his brother and sister-in-law Herman Samuel Cohen and Elsa Cohen-Kattenburg already on 8 August), where they all werd locked up in the penal barrack 67. On 3 September 1943 they were all deported as “penal cases” put on “penal transport” to Auschwitz, where on arrival there on 6 September 1943 only Marianne Cohen-Sitters was killed immediately in the gas chambers of Auschwitz-Birkenau.
Of the others, Esther Cohen eventually lost her life on 8 March 1945 in concentration camp Libau (an outer camp of Gross Rosen); Herman Samuel Cohen died on 11 February 1945 in concentration camp Ebensee, his wife Elsa Cohen-Kattenburg was killed on 31 October 1944 in Auschwitz and Izak Hartog Cohen lost his life somewhere in Mid-Europe on 15 March 1945.
Sources include the City Archive of Amsterdam, archive card of Izak Hartog Cohen, Marianne Sitters, Herman Samuel Cohen, Elsa Kattenburg, Ester Cohen; the file cabinet of the Jewish Council, registration cards of Izak Hartog Cohen, Herman Samuel Cohen, Elsa Cohen-Kattenburg, Ester Cohen en Marianne Cohen-Sitters; website Joodsamsterdam.nl/Rapenburg 92-96 and the website Oneindig Noord Holland/Bergstichting.