Simon Gomperts was the eldest of the eight children from the musical family of Aäron Gompertz and Hester van Leeuwen. He was born in the Lepelstraat in Amsterdam on 13 May 1891, after his parents were married in Den Haag on 20 August 1890 as both his parents were born in Den Haag. Simon’s musicality was expressed in his choice of profession: he played the double bass and from 1927 to 1941 he was a member of the Amsterdam Concertgebouw Orchestra.
Simon married in Amsterdam Thérèse Biederman on 28 August 1918, who in 1917 after five years of marriage has been divorced from Guy Jean Paul Dose from Triëst. Térèse was born on 18 March 1888 in Amsterdam as a daughter of Maijer Markus Biederman and Justina Kann. The couple had no children.
After having resided in Amsterdam at various addresses, among ohters in the Govert Flinckstraat 299, the couple Gomperts-Biederman moved into a house at the Maasstraat 114 1st floor on 18 October 1935. Till their deportation they have lived there.
On Friday, 16 October 2020, a memorial was unveiled in the Concertgebouw with which the Concertgebouw and Concertgebouw Orchestra jointly commemorate seventeen Jewish orchestra members. They were fired in World War II, three of them did not survive the Holocaust.
The NPOradio4 broadcasting company published on its website among others the following about it: When the Concertgebouw was ordered in April 1941 by the German occupiers to fire all Jewish members of the orchestra, it then concerned sixteen members: twelve strings, three blowers and one harpist. They played for the last time during a concert on 8 Jude 1941 the Eight and Ninth symphony by Beethoven under the direction of conductor Eduard van Beinum. When it later turned out that the Hungarian concertmaster Zoltan Szekely was Jewish too, he too has been fired.
Through intercession of board members of the Concertgebouw,the Jewish members of the orchestra ended up in the relative safe camp Barneveld. Still a great number of them were later deported to among others Theresienstadt, Auschwitz and Sobibor. Three orchestra members did not return after the war: double bass player Samuel Gompertz and viola player Jacques Muller were killed in Auschwitz in 1942; in May 1943 violinist Simon Fürth died in Sobibor. After the was was ended, most of the fourteen Jewish members of the orchestra resumed their work at the Concertgebouw Orchestra.
The above article seems to refer to the doublebass player Simon Gomperts instead Samuel Gompertz, as mentioned in the article. However on the plaquette in the Concertgebouw he is listed as Simon Gomperts who was killed in the Shoah.
Simon Gomperts was registered in Westerbork on 15 September 1942 and deported to Auschwitz on 18 September. His official Dutch date of death is 21 September 1942; he would have been killed immediately in Auschwitz-Birkenau upon arrival there. However, the “Sterbebücher” (death records) of Auschwitz show another date of death, namely “fate 9 October 1942”. But for the time being, the Dutch legal date of death is used on the Joods Monument website.
Sources include the City Archive of Amsterdam, certificate of birth of Simon Gomperts, dated 14 May 1891, book 6-folio 49-deed nr. 5380 and the certificate of death of Simon Gomperts from the A-register 53-folio 11, deed nr. 55 dated 29 September 1950; the file cabinet of the Jewish Council, registration card of Simon Gomperts; the website NPOradio4; the website NPOradio4; the website http://auschwitz.org/en/museum/auschwitz-prisoners/Simon_Gompertz and additions of visitors of the website.