Alfred de Jong, born in Den Haag on 1 April 1926, was a son of Leo de Jong and Ida Wertheimer. Alfred was the eldest of four children in the family, which also consisted of his sisters Marianna, Nanny and brother Emanuel Ernst. The entire De Jong family was killed during the Holocaust.
The family was carried off from Den Haag to Westerbork, where they arrived on 3 Octber 1942. Two days later, on 5 October, all were put on transport to Auschwitz. Alfred’s mother Ida, together with his siblings Marianna, Nanny and Emanuel Ernst, were immediately killed upon arrival in Auschwitz on 8 October 1942. His father Leo however, ended up in the Extern Command Siemianowitz in Silesia, which was also known as “Polenlager 11” (Polish Camps), a forced labour camp, located in the area of Katowice. He lost his life there on 1 November 1942.
The transport of 5 October 1942 was a so-called Kozel transport and contained more than 2000 deportees. A part of it came from the 10000 Jewish forced labourers, who were forced to perfom forced labor in the Jewish labour camps in the Netherlands, but who were all taken to Westerbork on 2 October 1942, when those labour camps were emptied by the Germans. The transport stopped at Kozel, a place located ±80 km west from Auschwitz, where 550 boys and men between 15 and 50 years of age were forced to leave the train. They were deployed as forced labourers in the surrounding labour camps of Auschwitz.
Alfred de Jong belonged to that group of 550 boys and men who had to leave the train and ended up eventually in the forced labour camp “Reichsautobahnlager Annaberg” in Upper Silesia in Poland. After the war, it was known that Alfred de Jong had not survived the Holocaust, but it was not known where and when and under what circumstances. Therefore on order of the Ministry of Justice after the war, a certificate of death was drawn up in the municipality of Den Haag for Alfred de Jong, in which his place and date of death were established as in Mid Europe on 31 August 1943.
However, in 2015, research was carried out in Poland to victims of among others the labour camp “Reichsautobahnlager Annaberg” in Upper Silesia (Poland) where several certificates of death were found, including those of Alfred de Jong. This document shows that Jonas Fresco died already 4 December 1942 in camp Annaberg, due to exhaustion, diseases and/or hardship. On the death certificate is mentioned as cause of death “heart failure” (Herzschwäche).
By establishing the date of death of Alfred de Jong, the official Dutch date of death of 31 August 1943 is maintained, a juridical date established after the war by the Dutch Department of Justice.
Sources include the Municipal Archive of Den Haag, family registration card of Leo de Jong; certificate of death on order of the Ministry of Justice nr. C3 dated 5 January 1952 for Alfred de Jong; the file cabinet of the Jewish Council, registration cards of Leo de Jong, Ida de Jong-Wertheimer, Marianne de Jong, Nanny de Jong, Emanuel Ernst de Jong and Alfred de Jong; website Joodse Erfgoed Den Haag (Jewish Heritage Den Haag).raids and deportations; website Jodentransporten from the Netherlands and Edward Haduch, Kedzierzyn-Kozle (Poland), the death certificate of Alfred de Jong from the Peoples Registry (Standesamt) Annaberg