Hijman Hakker, window dresser by profession, a son of Nathan Hakker and Esther Schelvis, was born on 1 May 1909 in Amsterdam. He married there on 27 November 1929 Dina Walvis, a daughter of Michel Walvis and Duifje Kat. Dina was born on 11 March 1910 in Amsterdam and was the eldest of the four children of Michel and Duifje.
After Hijman was married to Dina Walvis, he moved in with his mother-in-law and widow Duifje Kat, who then resided at Ben Viljoenstraat 3 in Amsteram-East. In January 1930 Hijman and Dina moved to Modermolensteeg 7 and moved in there with father c.q. father-in-law Nathan Hakker and his family. There on 21 April 1930 their first daughter Esther was born. On 20 June 1930 Hijman and Dina moved into a house at Ben Viljoenstraat 10, where their only son Michel was born on 3 November 1933.
The Hakker family stayed at Ben Viljoenstraat 10 until April 1936, but then moved to Reitzstraat 8 on 8 April of that year, where on 17 December 1938 Dora Sientje and on 21 July 1940 Eva Hakker were born.
On 24 April 1942, Hijman Hakker was sent to the Jewish labour camp Conrad after being called for the so-called work-expansion. This camp was located in the province of Overijssel near the village of Staphorst. On 2 October of that year, about 10 SS-men arrived in the camp and the next morning, Saturday 3 October at 7 o’clock, the Jewish population of the camp was sent via Meppel to Westerbork. In the context of the so-called family reunification, Dina and her four children were also transferred to Westerbork so that they could be deported together as a family to Auschwitz.
Deportation already followed on 5 September 14942, when Hijman Hakker, his wife Dina Hakker-Walvis and their children Esther, Michel, Dora Sientje and Eva were put on transport to the East. This transport, containing more than 2010 deportees, was the first forwarding of 10.000 Jewish persons of the liquidated Jewish labor camps. But the deportation train still made a stop in Cosel, a place located 80 km west from Auschwitz.
During that stop, 550 boys and men between 15 and 50 year of age werd forced to leave the train - they were forcibly separated from thei families and put to work as forced labourers in the surrounding labor camps of Upper Silesia. Most likely, also Hijman Hakker belonged to that group.
Those, who remained in the train were transported onwards to Auschwitz to be murdered there upon arrival.This also included Dina Hakker-Walvis with her four children; they were immediately murdered there on 8 October 1942 in the gas chambers of Auschwitz-Birkenau.
Hijman Hakker was most likely put to work as a forced laborer in one of the labor camps in Upper Silesia. From the Arolson archives it could be deduced that he then ended up in the Labor Command (Arbeits Kommando) Blechhammer. Blechhammer, the largest sub-camp of the Auschwitz complex, was part of the concentration camp Auschwitz III (Monowitz), where the Oberschlesische Hydrierwerke produced gasoline from coal.
Hijman Hakker is said to have been employed in command 21, Kraftwerk, where he was caught at some point in possession of 20 cigarettes and an iron ring in which he would engrave a monogram. Both were “offenses”; Hijman was reported and the Lagerkommandant was asked for "appropriate punishment".
Another document from the Arolson archives shows that Hijman Hakker was registered in the KL Auschwitz on 1 April 1944. Subsequently, it is fairly certain that Hijman Hakker was one of the many who were "evacuated" from the Auschwitz complex and/or the surrounding camps during the so-called "final period" with the so-called "evacuation transports" to other camps.
For example, on 21 January 1945, an “evacuation transport” departed on foot from Blechhammer with final destination Gross Rosen. The route went via Neustadt, Frankenstein, Stansee, Schweidnitz and Reichenau, with Gross Rosen as final destination, but where only a part of the transport arrived on 2 February 1945.
Many succumbed during those so-called “death marches” and Hijman Hakker did not make it either. It is unknown where and how Hijman died, but after the war the Dutch authorities determined, partly on the basis of research and testimonials from survivors, that Hijman Hakker died on 27 January 1945 in Mid-Europe.
Sources include the City Archive of Amsterdam, family registrtion cards of Nathan Hakker (1887) and Hijman Hakker (1909), archive cards of Hijman Hakker and Dina Walvis; website Jewish Labour camps /Conrad; the file cabinet of the Jewish Council, registration cards of Hijman Hakker, Dina Hakker-Walvis and their children Esther, Michel, Dora Sientje and Eva Hakker; website ITS Arolson; Death certificate of Hijman Hakker nr. 415, made out in Amsterdam on 27 June 1952 from the A-register 96-folio 71v; website Museum & Memorial Auschwitz-Birkenau/Auschwitz prisoners/Hijman Hakker; Dutch Red Crsss publication 1952/Auschwitz volume VI/ evacuation transport from the Auschwitz Complex/ page15, 16 and further and appendix V and the Wikipedia website Jodentransporten vanuit Nederland.nl