Pimentel, Henriëtte Henriquez.

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Pimentel, Henriëtte Henriquez, born 17-04-1879 in  Amsterdam, the tenth child of diamond merchant Nathan Pimentel and his wife Rachel, born Oppenheimer. At the end of the 19th century, Henriette trained as a nursery school keeper and started a Fröbel school in the basement of Andrieszkade 5 in Amsterdam in 1902.

  The school later moved to Sarphatistraat 115 (after renumbering it became 141). Between 1917 and 1922, she worked as a governess in Bussum. During that time, she was committed to women’s interests and founded the Bussum branch of the Algemene Nederlandsche Vrouwen Organisatie (ANVO). In 1926, Henriëtte Pimentel became director of the crèche at Plantage Middenlaan 31 in Amsterdam, which had been founded in 1906 by the Vereeniging Zuigelingen-Inrichting en Kinderhuis (Association of Infants and Children’s Institutions). Both Jewish and non-Jewish children could be brought to the crèche and young women could follow an accredited two-year training course to become childcare workers. Henriëtte Pimentel lived in the building. In 1930, the Royal Family visited the crèche.

Henriette was the director of the crèche on the Plantage Middenlaan. With a small group of supporters, she smuggled about 600 Jewish children from there to a hiding place. Tuesday 19 April is the unveiling of the Henriëtte Pimentel Bridge. The beautiful bridge over the Mauritskade towards the Tropenmuseum will then officially receive her name.

During World War II, Henriëtte Pimentel became one of the key figures in a heroic plan that saved the lives of some 500 to 800 Jewish children. She did this together with Walter Süskind, Johan Wilhelm van Hulst and Raphaël “Felix” Halverstad,   When Walter Süskind was born on 29-10-1906, in Kreis Lüdenscheid, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, his father, Heyman Süskind, was 21 and his mother, Frieda Kessler, was 21. He had at least 1 daughter with Johanna Natt. He died on 28-02-1945, at the age of 38, in concentration camp Auschwitz and was buried in Auschwitz-Birkenau Concentration Camp, Brzezinka, Biała County, Kraków, Poland.

Johan van Hulst for his services as a resistance fighter and child rescuer during the Holocaust, received the Yad Vashem award in 1972. Johan died on 22-03-2018 at the age of 107.

Raphaël (Felix) Halverstad (Amsterdam, 11-08-1904 / 14-08-1978) was a Dutch economist who became best known for his role in helping Jewish children escape from the Hollandsche Schouwburg in 1942 and 1943. Halverstad, was arrested and had to go on the last transport of Amsterdam Jews to Westerbork, but managed to escape and went into hiding. Like his wife and daughter, he survived the war.

Henriëtte Pimentel was the director of a crèche that was located opposite the Hollandsche Schouwburg in Amsterdam. When Jews from Amsterdam and the surrounding area had to report to the theatre for deportation from July 1942, or were forcibly taken there to be deported to Camp Westerbork,   (where Anna Frank was a “prisoner” too), it quickly became far too crowded. In October 1942, the crèche was requisitioned and children up to the age of 13 were accommodated there until the moment of transport. Henriëtte Pimentel, Walter Süskind and Felix Halverstad made a plan at the end of December 1942 to systematically have as many children as possible leave via the crèche. For this purpose, contacts were established with various resistance groups, often students, who took children to hiding places. This was only possible if parents gave permission and the child’s name had been removed from the Jewish Council’s records. Four resistance groups were involved in accommodating the children: the NV group with Johannes Theodorus (Joop) Woortman, the Utrecht Children’s Committee, the Wedding Group and the Amsterdam Student Group with Pieter Adriaan “Piet” Meerburg, who broke off his law studies to help this group.On 23 July 1943, Henriëtte Pimentel was transported to Westerbork with 70 children and 36 childcare workers. On 14 September 1943, she was deported to Auschwitz where she was murdered immediately upon arrival on 17 September 1943. The crèche was closed on 29 September 1943, the building was demolished in 1976.

Joop Woortman was born in Amsterdam, as the son of Johannes Theodorus Woortman and Henriëtte Johanna Frederika Schutte. In 1927 he married Johanna Maria Muller, from whom he divorced in 1935. In 1938 he remarried Lena Maria (Semmy) Glasoog, from whom he divorced in 1942. Woortman was betrayed in 1944 and, via the House of Detention on the Amstelveenseweg and Camp Amersfoort, ended up in Bergen-Belsen, where he died on 13-3-1945, aged 40.

Pieter Adriaan “Piet” Meerburg, (De Bilt, 01-09-1919 – Amsterdam, 11-04-2010, age 90) was a Dutch resistance fighter also involved in saving Jewish children, and a leading theatre entrepreneur in Amsterdam.

TributeIn Amsterdam Nieuw-West, six bridges were named after female resistance fighters in May 2016, including Pimentel. This original Henriëtte Pimentel Bridge is located in Slotermeer. In 2022, the municipality of Amsterdam changed this by renaming bridge 265 near the Hollandsche Schouwburg to Henriëtte Pimentel Bridge.

Death and burial ground of Pimentel, Henriëtte Henriquez.

Henriëtte Pimentel was transferred to camp Westerbork. There she wrote down instructions for setting up a new crèche after the war. After a month and a half she had to be transported to Auschwitz, where she was murdered around 17-09-1943, aged 67. Henriette is buried In a Auschwitz mass grave.

Message(s), tips or interesting graves for the webmaster:    robhopmans@outlook.com

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