I mentioned in a previous blog that Cor's family found seven other families out of the 81 Cor contacted who agreed to hide Jews. Sometimes Cor would be contacted that someone needed to be moved because some problem arose. When that happened, Cor would go the the address with 35 picture ID's of non-Jews he got from a friend who worked at city hall. They were from people of all ages, male & female, who had died. Cor would lay all the ID's out, & they would choose the one that most closely fit the person. Sometimes they had to add spectacles or change a hairstyle to fit the photo, but it was mandatory that they have an ID card to travel anywhere.
Two or three times when he was on his way to get a Jew to move them to a new location, he was stopped while going through a check-point, but nothing had happened. This time when he went through, he was stopped by two officers. When he went to get back on his bike, they saw somethiing in his sock, & found the 35 ID's. The officers told him to take off his clothes which he did staniding naked in the freezing Dec. cold. They asked what he was doing with them, & he told them he found them in the trasg by cityt hall & was going to sell them on the black market to make money. He was taken to the military command of the city where he was hit in the chest with a gun. He later found out that the hit broke his diaphram; one can survive with a broken diaphram, but the lung will not function. He was only 20 years old, & for 70 years he has lived with his left lung not working so has been short of breath & living on one lung.
He was taken to a prison camp outside Amsterdam--Amersfoort. This was a male "police camp" for prisoners who were in groups forbidden or blacklisted by the Nazis including gypsies, Jehovah Witnesses, black market traffickers, & some clergy. Obviously Cor was in the group for black market trafifckers, & his uniform indicated this by a specific colored triangle.
Cor was first in line in a group of prisoners who had to walk through a line of SS guards & German Sheperds on both sides & he was very frightened. Then he told us about Eric, a student in his high school who had entered only three years before graduation. Cor had been number one in the class up until then, but Eric took that spot. Now to Cor's dismay, Eric would be the one called to the front of the class by teachers to explain a complicated issue to the rest of the class. Eric became the object of ridicule by the class for reasons not explained by Cor. Cor felt badly that he had not told the kids to stop teasing Eric. One day Eric could not find his bike as it had been hidden by a student. Eric asked Cor if he could use his bike for 30 minutes, but Cor refused to let him. Eric left school a year before graduation, & Cor thought it was strange because with a graduation certificate, a person could be admitted to any university.
When Cor walked through the line of SS guards, he finally dared to look up, & he saw Eric who had joined the German Army. The Netherlands had been invaded & occupied by the Germans, & it was considered an act of treason for a Dutch man to join the German Army. The prisoners were forbidden to speak to the guards, but Cor said to him, "Hello Eric, how are you doing?'
Eric replied, "Don't count on me!" During the five months Cor was in the concentration camp until the war ended, he lived in fear that Eric would come & torture or kill him, but he never saw him again.
At a class reunion, an older man walked up to Cor & asked to speak to him. The man said, "You probably do not want to speak to me. I am the father of Eric. Cor asked him how Eric was, & his father told him he had died in Russia during war & that the entire family was ashamed that he had joined the German Army. They thought that Eric's joining the enemy had something to do with a girl.
Cor said, "Did Eric tell you what happene to him at school?" His father did not know so Cor told him about the horrid teasing Eric experienced at the hands of his school mates. Eric had never told his family about the teasing, & his father asked Cor to please come to their home to tell Eric's mother so she could understand what happened to their boy & how he had been tortured at school. Cor went & told Eric's mother & sisters, but he never got over his own guilt of not stopping his classmates from bullying Eric & not lending him his bike. Perhaps if he had been his friend, he would have changed Eric's life. Cor said, "Teasing classmates can have serious consequences. Guilt is guilt."
Cor did not speak much about his five months in the concentration camp. It was rumored that it is because he is ashamed of his behvior in the camp; he stole bread from fellow prisoners. He shared that he always wonders why all Holocaust movies show camp inmates screaming & crying. It was total silence he said. The one thing that made him want to keep going & survive was a letter he received just before his arrest from a girl who liked him. He thought of the letter all the time in camp & knew he wanted to read it when he got home.
When he finally did get home, he was so weak he could barely walk & could not ride a bike. He went to his room & found all his things were gone. When he asked his father where his things were, his father told him he had destroyed everything just in case the police came & went through them. There might have been a phone number or name of a contact they might want to interrogate Cor about for information.
Cor's family told him they found out about his arrest from someone who witnessed it. That afternoon German soldiers came to the house & broke down the door. Much to their surprise, the Nazi general who lived with them was inside & was furious when they knocked the door down as if to say somethiing illegal was going on inside that house under his nose. He told them what a good family ithe Sujiks were & made them fix the door! Cor also spoke of not having a girlfriend until he was 24 & it was at her insistence they dated. He said, "Being in camps convinces you that you are undesirable; you feel unwanted."
Last night we returned to Amsterdam after a long day on the road. We had our farewell dinner in a beautiful restaurant in yet another lovely hotel. Dinner took three hours & 15 mintues (Mother would have had a fit) & Cor at age 90 who had left his car in the hotel parking lot, left us after 90 minutes to drive the 2 & 1/ hours to his home somewhere in Germany. How on earth he can drive a car is beyond me as he can hardly walk, but we all surrounded him on his scooter as he was leaving the hotel to bid farewell. The tears flowed readily from all 12 of us on the tour. In 11 days we had all come to respect & love him, & it was hard to say goodbye knowing we will not see him again.
Barbed wire did more than keep prisoners inside the camp. It remains with the survivors & those who did what they could to help. For some, they are invisible barbs. Barbs that pierce the memory of those who were witnesses & victims. Barbs that torture the spirit. For others they are invisible barbs. Barbs that remain as proof that people can become monsters when they lose their moral compass. Barbs that will forever scar humanity.
Eleven days, six countries & 3,000 miles later, we returned to Amsterdam. I am not the same person who arrived in Amsterdam on June 14th. I traveled, laughed, learned, & cried, not to mention enjoying several glasses of wine, with my mentors Dana & Lolle. I made new friends from across the US; people who are kind, compassionate & caring. I have touched history, but more importantly, it has left a mark on me. I am so blessed to have had this experience.
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