Saartje Speelman was the youngest of the four children of Koopman Speelman and Judith Kan. She was born in Amsterdam on 2 November 1899 and worked as a lingerie seamsress. Saartje had two brothers, Jacob Abraham and Isaac and an elder siser, Elisabeth. The family however moved already several times to other addresses in Amsterdam and the Koopman Speelman family moved in March 1911 to the Govert Flinckstraat, where Saartje’s mother, Judith Kan, passed away on 3 November 1912. She was interred in the Jewish Cemetery of Zeeburg.
Saartje’s father, Koopman Speelman left 14 April 1913 for New York, reason why Saartje together with her elder sister Elisabeth went living in with their brother Jacob Abraham Speelman. When their father at the end of July 1914 again returned, both sisters went living again with their father. On 12 July 1916 Saartje’s father remarried in Zaandam Rebecca Lopes Quiros, who was born in Amsterdam on 14 September 1875.
As the last one of the four children, Saartje married on 22 March 1922 in Amsterdam Simon Salomon van Kollem, who was born in Arnhem on 6 March 1891 as a son of Salomon van Kollem and Maria van Praag. Since July 1891, he lived already in Amsterdam with his parents, brothers and sisters. There were 12 children born in the Salomon van Kollem family.
After the wedding was concluded, Simon Salomon and Saartje went living in at Blasiusstraat 38 with Benavente, but moved already in July 1922 to Swammerdamstraat3 in Amsterdam. After having resided at Oude Schans and Kloveniersburgwasl, the family moved on 11 March 1933 to Den Haag, where they came to live at Oranjeplein 48. Their last known address in Den Haag was however Kraaijenhofstraat 2.
In the meantime, Simon Salomon van Kollem and Saartje Speelman had already four children, all born in Amsterdam, viz. Judith on 31 July 1922, Maria on 10 March 1924, Elisabeth on 21 May 1926 and Rachel on 25 December 1925. And when they lived in Den Haag, on 15 May 1940 another son was born, Salomon Simon van Kollem, and with him as 5th child, the family was complete.
Their eldest daughter Judith had married in Den Haag on 18 August 1942 to Jonas Fresco, buth both had been deported already on 21 August from Westerbork to Auschwitz. After the war, the Dutch Authorities have established that Judith van Kollem and her husband Jonas Fresco had died in Auschwitz on 30 September 1942.
The second dauhter of Simon Salomon and Saartje was Maria van Kollem. She was a seamstress by profession but died in Den Haag at the age of 17 on 19 June 1941. She was interred on Sunday 22 June 1941 in the Israëlitic Cemetery in Wassenaar.
The other family members, Saarthe van Kollem-Speelman and her daughters Elisabeth, Rachel and the 2-year old Salomon Simon van Kollem were arrested during the large scaled raids, the Germans organized early October 1942, and were carried off to Westerbork, where they arrived somewhere between 3 and 5 October 1942. At the same time, the Jewish Labor camps in the Northern Netherlands were liquidated, causing great chaos in Westerbork.
Whether Simon Salomon van Kollem has been put to work in such a Jewish labour camp and therefore also arrived in Westerbork between 3 and 5 October 1942, is unknown. Fact is however that he was deported from Westerbork to Auschwitz already four days earlier than his wife and children, viz. 2 November 1942. Upon arrival there on 5 November 1942 he was immediately murdered in the gas chambers of Auschwitz-Birkenau.
Saartje van Kollem-Speelman and her dauhthers Elisabeth, Rachel and the 2-year old Salomon Simon van Kollem were deporte on 6 November 1942 to Auschwitz and upon arrival there on 9 November 1942 also immediately murdered in the gas chambers of Auschwitz-Birkenau.
Sources include the City archive of Amsterdam, family registration cards of Salomon van Kollem (1861), Koopman Speelman (1868), Jacob Abraham Speelman and Simon Salomon van Kollem; archive cards of Elisabeth Speelman and Lodewijk Sarlouis; closed family registration cards (Overgenomen delen) volume 218 page 160/Elisabeth Speelman and Saartje Speelman; the file cabinet of the Jewish Council, registration cards Simon Salomon van Kollem, Saartje van Kollem-Speelman and of Judith, Elisabeth Rachel and Salomon Simon van Kollem; the Municipal Archive of Den Haag, wedding Judith van Kollem x Jonas Fresco on 18 Aug 1942-cert. E722, certificate of death nr. 1575 dated 20 Jun 1941 for Maria van Kollem and the death certificates C3666 for Simon Salomon van Kollem dated. 27 Oct 1951 and C1412, C1407, C1422 and C1406 dated 26 Apr 1951 for resp. Saartje van Kollem-Speelman, Elizabeth van Kollem, Rachel van Kollem and Salomon Simon van Kollem.