Daniël de Vries, the youngest of the six children of Meijer de Vries and Mietje van Coeverden, was born on 10 June 1905 in Amsterdam. Daniël was a musician by profession and he married on 1 August 1928 in Rotterdam his first cousin, Sara Coster, who was born there on 17 January 1906 – also a musician – a daughter of Barend Coster and Betje van Coevorden. Daniel and Sarah had two children, viz. Meijer in 1929 and Bernard in 1939.
Daniël de Vries left Amsterdam on 14 June 1928 for Rotterdam, where he went to live with his parents-in-law at Noordmolenstraat 8b. When his in-laws Barend Coster and his wife Betje van Coevorden moved to Vlaggemanstraat 26b on 7 February 1936, Daniël and Sara and their firstborn son Meijer moved with them. Their second son Bernard was born when they lived with the Coster family in the Vlaggemanstraat.
The registration cards of the Jewish Council show that Daniël de Vries with his wife Sara Coster and their children Meijer and Bernard were brought into Westerbork between 3 and 5 October 1942. The 12-year old Meijer first stayed in barrack 59 and from mid-November 1942 in barrack 58. Daniël, Sara and Bernard were first housed in barrack 63 and in November also in barrack 58. Daniël’s in-laws were also arrested at the same time and taken to Westerbork.
It was not until 16 February 1943 that the Daniël de Vries family was deported. That transport contained 1108 deportees destined for Auschwitz and arrived there ± 3 days later. Sara de Vries-Coster and her two children Meijer and Bernard de Vries were immediately murdered in the gas chambers of Auschwitz-Birkenau after their arrival on 19 February 1943.
Daniël de Vries, on the other hand, was selected on arrival and put to work as a forced labourer, although it is not known where he ended up, nor when exactly he died in Auschwitz. The Dutch authorities therefore determined after the war, partly on the basis of survivors' testimonies and research, that Daniël de Vries could no longer be alive after 30 April 1943. The municipality of Rotterdam was then commissioned to draw up a death certificate for him, in which it was established that Daniël de Vries died in the vicinity of Auschwitz on 30 April 1943.
Sources include the Rotterdam City Archives, family registration cards of Daniël de Vries and Barend Coster; website openarchieven.nl/marriage Barend Coster x Betje van Coevorden and Daniël de Vries x Sara Coster; the file cabinet of the Jewish Council, registration cards of Daniël de Vries, Sara de Vries-Coster and of Meijer and Bernard de Vries, death certificate drawn up in Rotterdam on 4 Aug 1951 for Daniël de Vries, no. v3/1951-1417 and the wikipedia list of Jewish transports from nederland.nl (jodentransporten vanuit nederland.nl).