Isaäc Zwaaf was a son of Jacob Zwaaf and Christina Vleesdraager. He was born in Amsterdam on 24 Juli 1884 and earned his living as a cigar maker, as chocolate worker and as a shopkeeper of chocolate articles. On 4 May 1910 he married Bloeme Swaluw in Rotterdam, who was born on 11 April 1889 in Amsterdam as a daughter of Hijman Swaluw and Esther Springer.
The Zwaaf-Swaluw couple had four children, namely Christina in 1910, Esther in 1915, Hijman in 1919 and Jacob in 1923. Only Jacob survived the Holocaust; he married in August 1942 Martha Sluijs and had with her two children, who were born after the war. The other children of Isaäc and Bloeme have been killed during the Shoah, whether or not with their families.
After Isaäc and Bloeme were married, they moved into a house in the Helmersstraat 13b in Rotterdam. Isaäc lived there already previously, but at other house numbers. In 1918 they moved to a lodging in the Aert van Nesstraat 30b, but on 11 December 1924 they returned to the Helmersstraat, however now to no. 23a.
Isaäc’s wife Bloeme Swaluw however passed away on 5 July 1935 and was interred in the Jewish Cemetery Toepad in Rotterdam. Then, the 51-year old Isaäc remarried on 11 March 1936 in Amsterdam the 45-year old Roosje Reens, who was born there on 12 March 1890 as a daughter of Mozes Reens and Lena van Dam.
After the passing of their mother, Christina Zwaaf married in 1936 Isaac de Jong and her sister Esther in 1937 Joseph Davids. They left their parental home to move to own living space elsewhere in the city. Hijman, who was unmarried, left for an own house in the Aleidisstraat 73b in Rottterdam on 3 July 1939. Only the youngest son Jacob still lived at home with his father Isaäc and his stepmother Roosje Reens.
After the bombardment on Rotterdam of 14 May 1940, they left for Amsterdam on 18 May where they found shelter with Roosje’s brother Marcus Reens and his family in the Jodenbreestraat 64 parterre and on 16 November 1940 they were officially registered there. Shortly afterwards they moved to Beukenplein 3 parterre in Amsterdam-East, where Isaäc Zwaaf ran a grocery store together with his son Jacob. His business was designated as a so-called “Joods Lokaal” (a Jewish Local), reason why he and his wife received a special exemption from the Jewish Council so they were exempted from deportation for the time being.
But on 20 June 1943, Isaäc Zwaaf and his wife Roosje Reens were arrested during the large-scale and secretly prepared round-up in Amsterdam and, together with over 5500 other arrested Jews, were carried off to Westerbork. From there, they were deported to Sobibor on 29 June and on arrival there on 2 July 1943 they were immediately killed in the gas chambers there.
Sources including the City Archive of Rotterdam, family registration card of Isaäc Zwaaf; website wiewaswie.nl/wedding Bloeme Swaluw; website hetstenenarchief.nl/ grave Bloeme Swaluw; the City Archive of Amsterdam, archive card of Roosje Reens, residence cards Amsterdam of Jodenbreestraat 64 and Beukenplein 3; the file cabinet of the Jewish Council, registration cards of Isaäc Zwaaf, Roosje Zwaaf-Reens, Jacob Zwaaf and Martha Zwaaf-Sluijs.