Veronica and Roza Lionni were the unmarried daughters of Levie Lionni and Eva van Praag. Father Levie was born on 30 September 1839 in Amsterdam and passed away there on 9 December 1912. His wife Eva van Praag was born on 8 November 1845 and deceased on 15 February 1925. Both have been interred in the Jewish Cemetery at Muiderberg. Levie Lionni and Eva van Praag were married in Amsterdam on 24 May 1866.
The Lionni family consisted of father, mother and eight children, all of whom were born between 1867 and 1899. Veronica was the 5th, born on 26 August 1882 and Roza the 7th, born on 30 March 1888. The other children were Leonard, Sophia, Marianne, Machiel and Geertruida, of whom Leonard and Marianne have been deceased already before the war. Sophia, Machiel and Geertruida and their families have lost their lives during the Holocaust. The youngest was Alfred, born on 5 August 1899 but he already has died on 3 September of that same year, not even one month old.
Veroncia Lionni was a dressmaker by trade and her sister Roza a milliner, but later she became a sales lady in a fashionstore. They often lived together in a house or appartment and so they were registered on 30 October 1939 at the address Parklaan 89 in Haarlem. Previously, in 1938, they lived together in the Carillonstraat 14 1st floor in Amsterdam, a side street of the Van Woustraat.In 1942 they had to relocate once more and ended up then at Kromme Mijdrechtstraat 6 2nd floor in Amsterdam-South, were they were registered on 18 July 1942.
On 3 September 1942, Veronica and Roza were registered in Westerbork. Both had received a call and were carried off that date from Amsterdam to Westerbork. Alreadyd the next day, on 4 September, Veronica and Roza were put on transport to Auschwitz with another 712 deportees.
After 200 boys and men between the ages of 15 and 50 were forced to leave the train in Cosel and were put to work as forced laborers in the surrounding labor camps in Upper Silesia, the remaining deported elderly, sick, infirm, women and children stayed behind on the train and were transported further to Auschwitz. Upon arrival there on 7 September 1942, all were immediately murdered in the gas chambers of Auschwitz-Birkenau. That was also the fate of 60-year old Veronica Lionni and 54-year old Roza Lionni.
Sources include the City Archive of Amsterdam, family registration cards of Levie Lionni (1839); archive cards of Veronica and Roza Lionni; the file cabinet of the Jewish Council, registration cards of Veronica and Roza Lionni; the archives of the Red Cross/transport list of 4 September 1942 Amsterdam->Westerbork, page 5-lines 229 and 230/call numbers 33992/2263/3 and 33991/2263/4; The Red Cross publication “Auschwitz III” edited October 1952 re transport of 4 Sept 1942, pages 29 and 30 and the Wikipedia website Jodentransporten vanuit Nederland.nl