Helena van Stratum was born in Amsterdam on 1 December 1882 as the third of the four children of Lion van Stratum and Anna Pije. She married Hijman Stodel, a diamond worker by trade, on 24 April 1904 in Amsterdam, who was born in Amsterdam on 19 February 1882 as the son of Joseph Stodel and Elizabeth (Betje) Metz. On 10 June 1906, the couple Stodel-van Stratum had one son: Joseph.
Hijman lived with his parents at Weespersraat 31 and Helena then lived with her parents and family at 's-Gravesandestraat 6 ground floor in Amsterdam. After Hijman and Helena were married, they found accommodation at 's-Gravesandestraat 10 1st floor, but on 10 November 1906 they moved into a house at Linneausparkweg 21 in Watergraafsmeer.
However, the marriage of Hijman and Helena did not last; Hijman Stodel left for Amsterdam again already in December 1911, where he could go to the 's-Gravensandestraat 10 and from 2 May 1912 he moved into living space at the Pieter Aertszstraat 121 2nd floor
Later, in March 1912, Helena followed with her son Joseph in Amsterdam too, but they went to Wijttenbachstraat 35 3rd floor in Amsterdam-East, where her parents and other family members also stayed. At that time, the Stodel-van Stratum couple were already living separately from each other and on August 28, 1914, the marriage was dissolved after a verdict of the District Court.
Hijman, now a trader in rubber products, was remarried in Den Haag on 21 February 1919 to the 25-year-old non-Jewish Catharina Christina Boekhout, a daughter of Pieter Boekhout and Dorothea Serrarens. On 1 May 1920, Hijman was registered at Witte de Withstraat 14 in Den Haag, where his second wife had been living since 3 March 1917. Their son Henri was born from this marriage on 2 September 1921. On 1 June 1926 they moved to Rijswijk, where Hijman Stodel died on 19 October 1939.
Helena van Stratum also married for the second time: on 26 May 1922 she married in Amsterdam the traveling salesman Isaäc Cartoef, who was born in Amsterdam on 5 June 1888 as the son of Hijman Cartoef and Branca Dooseman. Until his marriage to Helena, Isaäc lived with his older sister Betsy Cartoef, who was married to Isaäc Leger at Transvaalstraat 51.
After the marriage was concluded, Isaäc Cartoef moved in with his wife, who had been living at Wijttenbachstraat 35 3rd floor since March 1912, but in February 1928 they moved to Cilliersstraat 3 I, where Isaäc's sister Betsy and her husband came to live a year earlier and in May 1936 Isaäc and Helena moved to the Lekstraat 3 1st floor in Amsterdam-South.
At the time of the compulsory registration of all Jews in the Netherlands in 1941, Helena Cartoef-van Stratum was hospitalized in the N.I.Z. the Dutch Israelitic Hospital, which was located at Nieuwe Keizersgracht 104. When Helena was in the N.I.Z., Isaäc Cartoef still had to move from Lekstraat to Laing's Neckstraat 3 in Amsterdam-East, from where he was arrested in the early days of October 1942 and taken to Westerbork. On 23 October 1942 he was deported to Auschwitz, where on arrival there on 26 October 1942 he was immediately murdered in the gas chambers of Auschwitz-Birkenau.
Because Helena could no longer return to the Lekstraat, she lived from 11 November 1942 on the Kloveniersburgwal 17 ground floor. On 4 March 1943 she was arrested and taken to Westerbork where she ended up in barrack 84, the old people's barrack. On 10 March 1943, Helena Cartoef-van Stratum was deported from Westerbork to Sobibor where she was immediately killed in the gas chambers there, upon arrival on 13 March 1943.
Sources include the City Archive of Amsterdam, family registration cards of Lion van Stratum, Isaäc Leger and Isaäc Cartoef; archive cards of Helena van Stratum, Isaäc Cartoef and Isaäc Leger; the Peoples Registry of Amsterdam, closed family registration cards of Hijman Cartoef, Hijman Stodel, Helena van Stratum and Isaäc Cartoef; Amsterdam residence card of Lekstraat 3; the Municipal Archive of Den Haag, family registration card of Hijman Stodel; website hetstenenarchief.nl/grave Hijman Cartoef and the file cabinet of the Jewish Council, registration cards of Helena van Stratum and Isaäc Cartoef.