Maurits Elekan, a son of Jonas Elekan and Leentje Polak, was born in Amsterdam on 3 February1872. Up from 1898 he was employed in the diamond industry but his membership card of the ANDB, the Diamond Union, revealed that he was a few times unsubscribed and subscribed again and that he was working in Branch 2 as a brilliant polisher helper. In 1922 he had been definitively unsubscribed as a member of the Union and earned his living further as a streetmarket vendor. In the years 1930, Maurits and his spouse sold leather goods at the Sunday market at Uilenburg.
On 30 November 1899, Maurits married Rebecca Lopes Carança, a daughter of Samuel Lopes Carança and Mirjam Casoetto. She was born in Amsterdam on 29 September 1879. After being married, they lived at Nieuwe Kerkstraat 89 in Amsterdam. But also mother-in-law, the widowed Mirjam Casoetto and his sister Jeannette and her husband Jesaia van West lived in at that address. And on 28 September 1901, there was born their son Samuel too.
After a few more relocations, such as to Iepenweg 49, Weesperstraat 61, Waterlooplein 86, the family ended up on 30 June 1914 at Weesperstraat 4 upperhouse, where they have lived till Maurits and his wife Rebecca were arrested there in February 1943. Their son Samuel had left his parental home already for a long time: he married 10 December 1930 in Onstwedde Geertruida Goudsmid, who passed away in 1937 and in 1938 he remarried in Amsterdam Betsy Buitenkant.
On 25 February 1943, Maurits Elekan and his wife Rebecca Lopes Carança were arrested and via the Hollandsche Schouwburg carried off to Westerbork, from where they were put on transport on 2 March 1943 to the extermination camp Sobibor. There, upon arrival on 5 March 1943, they were immediately murdered in the gas chambers.
Sources include the City Archive of Amsterdam, family registration cards of Maurits Elekan, archive cards of Maurits Elekan and Rebecca Lopes Carança, website ANDB/membership card of Maurits Elekan; the file cabinet of the Jewish Council, registration cards of Maurits Elekan and Rebecca Elekan-Lopes Carança and the Wikipedia website jodentransporten vanuit Nederland.nl.