Isidore Eduard Kaas, born 30 May 1900 in Amsterdam, was a son of Joël Kaas and Schoontje Wolf Beffie. On 26 July 1920 he arrived in Den Haag, still unmarried and worked there as foreman in a tobacco factory. He lived at Van Speijkstraat 120 but left for Amsterdam again on 17 May 1921, where he came living at Muidergracht 79.
In 1935 he returned to Den Haag and in the meantime had a job there as office clerk. He lived at three different addresses in the city, till he married 15 December 1937 Irma Friederike van Gelder from Steele in Germany, which was the Eastern city part of the city of Essen. She was born 23 March 1901 as daughter of Leizer van Gelder from Winterswijk and Johanna van Gelder from the German Steele.
When Irma van Gelder came from Essen to Den Haag on 4 October 1933, she lived at the Van Beverningkstraat 102 there and when she got married to Isidore Eduard Kaas in December 1937 hee moved in with his bride. On 1 June 1941 their daughter Johanna Jeannette was born there.
The Kaas family was arrested and taken to Westerbork during the large-scale round-ups of 4 October 1942. In the prevailing chaos there at the time, Irma apparently lost her daughter so she submits a request for information about her, to which an answer was given on 12 Octgober 1942: “impossible”.
On 16 October, Isidore, his wife Irma and little daughter Johanna were put on transport to Auschwitz. This transport contained 1710 deportees in total and made a stop at Kozel, a place located about 80 km west from Auschwitz. There, 570 boys and men between 15 and 50 years were forced to leave the train, to be deployed as forced laborers in the surrounding labor camps. Also Isidore Kaas belonged to that group who had to leave the train.
Those who remained in the train were transported onwards to Auschwitz, to be killed there on arrival. Also Irma Friederika Kaas-van Gelder and her little daughter Johanna Jeannette: both were murdered there on 19 October 1942 in Auschwitz.
About the fate of Isidore Kaas was nothing known. It was therefore that the Dutch Ministery of Justice ordered the city of Den Haag after the war to draw up a certificate of death for him, in which was established that Isidore Eduard Kaas died 31 March 1944 in Mid Europe.
However, in 2016 it was found that Isidore Kaas has ended up in the Reichsaubahnlager Annaberg and that he has died there on 30 November 1942 due to the terrible circumstances, diseases and hardship.
Sources among others: Municipal Archive of Den Haag, family registration cards of Isidore Eduard Kaas; the file cabinet of the Jewish Council, registration cards of Isidore Kaas, Irma Kaaas-van Gelder en Johanna Kaas; wikipedia website Jodentransporten vanuit Nederaldn and the certificates of death C96 for Isidore Eduard Kaas dated 12 January 1952, C1198 for Irma Friederike Kaas-van Gelder of 12 April 1951 and C3245 for Johanna Jeannette Kaas of 8 September 1951.