A Forgotten List from the War Now Accessible at the Felix Archives
Sometimes in genealogy, you come across documents that stop you in your tracks. Not just because of their historical importance, but because those documents suddenly connect to real lives, real families. Recently, such a document was added to the Felix Archives in Antwerp: a list of residents who disappeared from the city during World War II. Most of the names are from Jewish families, but it also includes political prisoners and people who were forced to leave their homes.
Why This Matters for Family History
Anyone who has ever done family research knows the frustration of missing pieces. You search for a last address, a clue in the population registers, a trace of where someone went—and sometimes the trail just ends. That’s where lists like this can be so powerful. Street by street, it shows who was still in Antwerp and who wasn’t. It’s heartbreaking to read, but at the same time, it gives descendants and researchers something solid to hold on to.
The 6th District: A Snapshot of a Community
This particular list comes from Antwerp’s 6th District, an area running from Central Station to the city park and Plantin-Moretuslei. Back then, it was the heart of the city’s Jewish community. Many of the names were people arrested in August and September 1942. For most, their journey ended in Auschwitz-Birkenau. Very few ever returned.
For those tracing their roots, finding a family name here can be painful, but also illuminating. It might reveal an address you didn’t know, a date you hadn’t found elsewhere, or a detail that suddenly ties your family story together.
Preserving the Memory
The original document is now safe at the Felix Archives, where it’s being preserved so future generations can access it. A replica will also be kept at the police heritage centre (erfgoedcentrum van Politie Antwerpen), making sure that this painful chapter of the city’s history remains visible.
How It Can Help Your Research
If you’re working on your family tree or trying to piece together the fate of relatives, a document like this can be a key resource. It might help you:
Find addresses that show exactly where families lived.
Link dates of disappearance with known transport or deportation lists.
Compare with other archives—like Kazerne Dossin, Yad Vashem, the Belgian State Archives (Rijksarchief) or local municipal records, to build a fuller picture.
For me, sources like this remind us that genealogy isn’t only about charts and names. It’s about people, their lives, and their stories—stories that were often cut short but deserve to be remembered and told.
Between 1900 and 1969 millions of people traveled and emigrated with the ships of the Holland-America Line.
The Holland-America Line (HAL), originally a Dutch transatlantic cruise company, offered full trips, but emigrants also made use of the HAL. Many Dutch people do have relatives who have migrated to the United States or Canada. There is a good chance that they have used the HAL services.
Also, many Polish Jews traveled via Rotterdam to New York. Between 1880 and 1920, approximately one million Eastern Europeans traveled to America via Rotterdam. The Holland America Line had offices in Bulgaria, Latvia, and Russia where tickets could be purchased for the train to Rotterdam, the boat to America and again the train to every station in the New World. The list also shows that they booked their trip in their native country.
These passenger lists (“passagiersstaten”) are handwritten lists with information about who made the crossing to the promised land with which ship and when. It was also recorded how much the passengers paid for the trip and in which class they traveled.
The FelixArchief (the City Archives of Antwerp: https://felixarchief.antwerpen.be) announced in their recent newsletter from February, sent out via email, that the subject of the mini-expo which will run from February 12, 2019, until Friday, April 5, 2019, will be about “Vreemdelingen in een vreemde stad” (Foreigners in a foreign city). I think that it is worth sharing, hence this post with a translation of the original announcement
(please note, the translation is my responsibility and was not specifically endorsed by the FelixArchief. I’ve included the full URL with the original announcement below the translated text.)
In 1839, the then Sûreté Publique (State Security Service), was commissioned to check all foreign nationals on Belgian territory. In order to gather the necessary information about each foreign national, the State turned to the cities and towns. They were instructed to keep a close eye on every stranger and to forward documents with information to Brussels, where they were kept in a central file.
The city archives of Antwerp (known as Felixarchief) has updated its website. On their website you can read, among others, the following about the update:
Thanks to the new search function you can find a relevant search result faster and more efficiently. Filters allow you to define a relevant time period or limit a search to a few specific detail entries. […] Thanks to a new algorithm, results are not returned in a randomized order, they appear higher in the result as they become more relevant.
Innovation is (always) fun, but it will certainly require some adjustment from the users because the new website is now, compared to the earlier version, completely overhauled.
By Fulvio Spada from Torino, Italy (Cold case) [CC BY-SA 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons
I am currently in the middle of reading the book on my Kindle “I’ll Be Gone in the Dark” by Michelle McNamara which tells the story about, what is, or better was, considered a cold case. The book tells the gripping story about a mysterious and violent predator, later nicknamed the “Golden State Killer”, who committed fifty sexual assaults in Northern California before moving south, where he perpetrated ten sadistic murders (see https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0792LVP7T).
Thanks to the possibilities which DNA later offered, in combination with similarities of different M.O.’s the investigators learned about, it became possible to link multiple cases to the same perpetrator. In 2018 they nabbed a suspect,
Vincent Vagman has recently published an important  list of Jews who have lived in Charleroi before the outbreak of WWII .
Charleroi, which is in the Southern part of Belgium, is a very industrial city, which I’d not consider a particularly attractive city. Charleroi used to have a very active Jewish community, mainly thanks to the coal-mining industry.
Vincent Vagman specializes in genealogical researches, as well as in the history of Charleroi and its Jews. The list which he has published for free on his website, contains names of 1641 Jews, of whom 507 were deported between 1942 and 1944.
Mr. Vagman explains in the introduction of the book his methodology and the sources he has used in order to compile the list. The list can and should be considered as an invaluable source if you had any relatives living in Charleroi.
As a Jew living in Antwerp, Belgium, and with an interest in Genealogy, I have some specific interests which are reflected somehow in my choice of magazine subscriptions.
In this article I’d like to discuss the magazines I’m subscribed to (or was at some point). Most are related to genealogy, both Jewish and nonJewish, and/or culture and/or Antwerp and/or Belgium, etc. I know that the list is (still) small, but it is a start:
Title
Description
Main Topics
My Comments
Website
Avotaynu
The world’s largest circulation magazine devoted to Jewish genealogy each year publishes more than 300 pages of useful, interesting information that can help you in your research. Now in its thirteeth year, an index to the first 24 volumes is available to all the major articles.Published quarterly, our contributing editors from 15 countries throughout the world regularly gather important information that appears in our issues. Our publishers, Gary Mokotoff and Sallyann Amdur Sack, are on a first name basis with officials at institutions containing genealogical data throughout the world. Some institutions are YIVO Institute, American Jewish Archives, American Jewish Historical Society, U.S. National Archives, U.S. Library of Congress, U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, Leo Baeck Institute, U.S. Holocaust Museum, Yad Vashem and Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People.
International Jewish Genealogy
This is a likable quarterly with articles by and for the subscribers of which most are (amateur and some professional) genealogists. The articles do not just discuss genealogy, but also indirect topics (which are usually related to genealogy in some ways).Apart from Avotaynu, you may which to subscribe to Jewish genealogy related magazines which discuss topics limited to a specific region
Shemot -Â The Journal of the Jewish Genealogical Society of Great Britain
Shemot is the journal of the Jewish Genealogical Society of Great Britain. It is published three times a year and is sent free to members. We publish original articles, submitted by members or commissioned, on a variety of topics likely to be of interest to our readers. We particularly welcome personal experiences that include sources and research methodology, explanations of technological developments and innovations, articles highlighting archival material and the work carried out by volunteers to preserve our heritage, biographical or historical accounts, and practical research tips. We also publish book reviews and letters
British Jewish Genealogy, (some) International Jewish Genealogy
Looks nice. It’s specifically meant for the genealogists with an interest in Jewish British family history. Some articles pertain to the general (mainly Jewish) public.
Das Magazin COMPUTERGENEALOGIE ist ein Projekt des Vereins für Computergenealogie. Die Hefte erscheinen vierteljährlich (Bezug: s.u.).
Genealogy, Germany Genealogy, IT for Genealogy
This is a quarterly by the ‘Verein für Computergenealogie e.V.’. It is written in German by a dedicated team of fellow subscribers and members of this magazine.This magazine has a uniqueness in the way that it does discuss genealogy related articles which have anything to do with Computers and Genealogy, mainly German genealogy. Usually they discuss in each magazine computer software, etc. They also discuss results of conducted surveys as to which software program is the best for working on family histories etc.Their website have many tools, databases, etc which you should really make sure to check out. Its advantages etc is simply too much to discuss in this short article.Every two years they also issue another magazine, “Familienforschung” Ahnenforschung leicht gemacht – Computergenealogie für jedermann” incl. DVD, which in fact is a collection of subjects which were discussed in the quarterly edition of Computergenealogie.I highly recommend this magazine!Subscribe via: https://db.genealogy.net/vereine/antrag.php?verein=CompGen
Vlaamse Stam is voor familiekundigen, genealogen en heraldici een onmisbare bron van informatie. Het bevat onder meer:
Artikels omtrent familiegeschiedenis: het verhaal van een familie of van het onderzoek naar een voorouder.
Artikels in verband met familiekundige bronnen (bronontsluitingen, transcripties van archiefstukken,…): wat kunt u vinden in welke bronnen en waar bevinden deze bronnen zich?
Nieuwsberichten omtrent familiekunde, genealogie, heraldiek, de erfgoedsector, de archiefsector,…
Publicaties van wapenschilden die erkend werden door het Heraldisch College
Het tijdschrift Vlaamse Stam bevat jaarlijks ongeveer 600 bladzijden en kent een oplage van 4500 exemplaren. Leden van Familiekunde Vlaanderen ontvangen Vlaamse Stam automatisch in de brievenbus.
Flemish Genealogy
This is also one of my favorites. Their quarterly magazine has very good, and well-researched articles with many footnotes. Topics are very diverse, there is an online index on their website, see:Â www.familiekunde-vlaanderen.be/tijdschrift
Stadsgidsen gaan steeds op zoek naar andere bronnen, informatie en wetenswaardigheden om hun opdrachten bij de tijd te houden. Daarom werd er drieëndertig jaar geleden binnen de Koninklijke Gidsenvereniging van Antwerpen een tijdschrift opgestart. Driemaandelijks geeft de “Antwerpsche Tydinghen” uitgebreide informatie over allerhande onderwerpen welke met onze stad te maken hebben. Vele collega’s stadsgidsen werken hier aan mee en delen hun kennis, ook specialisten ter zake helpen ons hierbij door artikels of uitgebreide informatie door te spelen. Men vindt hierin ook achtergrondinfo bij komende tentoonstellingen. Een greep uit de laatste jaargangen : Recente archeologische activiteiten; een collage van Paul van Ostaijen ontdekt; Sint-Rochus in Sint-Jacob; Rubens en architectuur, De molens in Antwerpen, De Augustinuscyclus in AMUZ, de Bank, stadsbeeld en monument op de Leien enzovoort.
Culture and History of Antwerp
This publication has articles which discuss the City of Antwerp and its history. It’s mainly meant for active City guides of Antwerp. Also other interested people, who are not city guides, may be interested in subscribing to this magazine.The articles are written by fellow subscribers. If personally think that if you have an interest in the history of Antwerp, good books would be a better source. Sometimes the articles in this magazine are written in a specific way in order to add a funny undertone. I think that that technique works very well, and even is a requirement for any successful city guide, but that technique is, in my opinion, less suited for articles in a magazine. But the journal has another purpose as well, which is to allow the City Guides to keep in touch between themselves and update the whole group with news etc. Another advantage to subscribe to this magazine is that sometimes they offer you a discount to new books they, or others, have written. I bought already a book which was written by a few City Guides about Antwerp. When you’d make use of every discount they offer, you’ll gain often by getting almost the whole subscription fee for the magazine back.
HistoriANT is een jaarboek dat wordt uitgegeven door het Genootschap voor Antwerpse Geschiedenis. De bedoeling van HistoriANT is om wetenschappelijke, maar vlot leesbare artikels over de rijke geschiedenis van de stad Antwerpen en haar omgeving te bundelen. Via het Jaarboek wil het Genootschap de Antwerpse geschiedenis in al haar facetten kenbaar maken aan een zo ruim mogelijk publiek en zowel historici als niet-historici laten kennismaken met de rijke geschiedenis van de Scheldestad. Het Genootschap biedt historici, archeologen, kunst- en literatuurhistorici, musicologen, volkskundigen, enz. in Antwerpen en daarbuiten via HistoriANT een forum aan om hun wetenschappelijke bevindingen betreffende de Antwerpse geschiedenis te publiceren.[…]
History of Antwerp
This is not really a magazine, but rather an edited book with different articles by its contributors. Most articles usually discuss the same subject, which in each yearbook is different. The articles all have footnotes and are well-sourced. If you are looking for a scientific, and easy to read collection of articles about topics related to Antwerp, you may be looking for the right thing.
The Districts of Antwerp: You need to understand that the city of Antwerp is composed of 9 districts. Most of these districts were in the past independent municipalities. These districts, which are now part of the City of Antwerp, do have some limited independent administrative functions.
Here is a map of Antwerp with its 9 districts:
District
Antwerpen (district)
Berchem
Berendrecht-Zandvliet-Lillo
Borgerhout
Deurne
Ekeren
Hoboken
Merksem
Wilrijk
Source: By LennartBolks at nl.wikipedia Later versions were uploaded by Westermarck at nl.wikipedia. [Public domain], from Wikimedia Commons
While clearing out their late mother’s home in Amsterdam, my father-in-law and his sisters stumbled upon an intriguing old document — a certificate, written in Dutch, that appeared to relate to a parcel of land in what was then Palestine.
The front of the certificate contains mostly typed text, while the reverse side features handwritten notes and a small drawing.
Front of the certificate:
And the Back:
Now Follows the Transcription First in the original Dutch, followed by the English translation:
Certificaat
vertegenwoordigende een stuk gronds groot 83000 dunam op de kaart van Palestina, dewelke zich bevindt in het Beth-Am van `Hatsair`.
Datum van aankoop:[hard to read character] 19 April
Staande t.a.v.Sellav. Straten
Ligging van het gekochte gebied:[hard to read, but maybe correctly deciphered as →]  Greta
Verso
The reverse side of the document is entirely handwritten:
1936
Met beste wenschenvan heelen Sjoek שלום [drawing of frontage of a house with a big flag and drawn exclamation]
(written with a pencil) 17
The Translation
Below is the English translation of the text.
Certificate
representing a large piece of land 83,000 dunam on the map of Palestine, which is located in the Beth-Am of `Hatsair`.
Date of acquisition:[hard to read character] 19 April
Standing AttnSellav. Straten
Location of the purchased area:[hard to read, but maybe correctly deciphered as →]  Greta
Verso (completely handwritten):
1936
With best wishes from the whole Sjoek שלום [drawing of frontage of a house with a big flag and drawn exclamation]
(written with a pencil) 17
After Analyzing the Certificate, I Concluded That:
The certificate was issued on 18 April 1936 (this date appears on the document). At the time, Sella was 19 years and 3 days old, having been born on 15 April 1917.
Based on my findings, “Beth-Am van ‘Hatsair’” refers to an organization known as Hatsair, which operated from a communal space called Beth Am (see below for more context).
“Beth Am” was a folk house or community venue that could be used by various groups—typically ones with a Zionist orientation—for meetings and events.
Hatsair was likely one of these Zionist organizations, possibly a youth movement, and they were the ones who issued the certificate to Sella.
“Sjoek” (or Shuk, as it would be spelled in English) is the transliterated Hebrew word for market. Originally Arabic in origin, shuk in this context referred to a fancy fair or bazaar, held in support of the Zionist effort in what was then still Palestine.
If my interpretation so far is correct, and we take another look at the certificate, we can now read it in a new light: It seems that Sella received “land on the map”—a symbolic plot shown on a map hung on the wall of the Hatsair organization inside Beth Am.
If this is indeed the case, then sadly, it means that my father-in-law and his sisters don’t actually own those 83,000 dunams today (for context, 1 dunam equals 1,000 square meters or approximately 10,764 square feet).
Evidence Supporting My Conclusions
Now, let me present the evidence upon which I based my conclusions:
1. The Date
The certificate was issued on 18 April 1936 — this date is clearly stated on the document itself:
Beth Am: A Network of Community Houses
There were several “Beth Am” houses in existence, including ones in Amsterdam, Rotterdam, and other cities. Some existed before the war, others were established afterward.
What remains unclear to me is who exactly oversaw these Beth Am houses. Was it a single overarching organization, similar to what today might fall under the responsibility of the Jewish Agency? Or were these houses independent initiatives run locally?
Historical References to Beth Am Houses
To shed some light on this, here are a few newspaper clippings that relate to the Beth Am houses, showing that several of them indeed existed in the past.
The first example is an announcement published in the Nieuw Israelietisch Weekblad (NIW) on 21 March 1924 (Year 59, No. 44, page 1), in the section covering town news about the Beth Am in Amsterdam. (Source: http://resolver.kb.nl/resolve?urn=ddd:010872473:mpeg21:a0016):
Here is an announcement about an initiative to establish a Beth Am in Rotterdam under the leadership of Zionist and Mizrachi groups. This notice appeared in the Nieuw Israelietisch Weekblad (NIW) on 1 August 1924.
It appears that this initiative indeed came to fruition, as indicated by the following announcement in the Nieuw Israelietisch Weekblad (NIW) dated 21 November 1924, which reports on the festive opening of the Beth Am in Rotterdam.(Source: http://resolver.kb.nl/resolve?urn=ddd:010872515:mpeg21:a0078):
According to the Jewish Canon of Amsterdam (online version) it seems that:
…at number 24 Johannes Vermeerstraat there was a “Beth Am” — a folk house intended to serve as a welcoming home for all Jews in Amsterdam.
This space was open to all associations and organizations to hold their activities. For example:
The Dutch Zionist Student Organization conducted courses in Jewish history and held meetings there.
The socialist Poale Zion movement organized May Day celebrations.
Interestingly, both the Israeli national anthem, Hatikvah, and the Socialist International were sung with equal enthusiasm.
There is one more newspaper clipping I want to share regarding an organization operating within the Beth Am house in Amsterdam. This announcement appeared in the Nieuw Israelietisch Weekblad (NIW) on 19 April 1940. (Source: http://resolver.kb.nl/resolve?urn=ddd:010874620:mpeg21:a0156):
I suspect there is a typo in this announcement, and that “Hatstair” should actually read “Hatsair”. As far as I know, Hatstair has no meaning, whereas Hatzair does—read on to understand why.
Another note: This announcement dates from 1940, only four years after Sella received her certificate. Could her Beth Am have been at the same address, i.e., on the Pieter Aertzstraat?
Initially, I considered that “Hatsair” on the certificate might be a shortened reference to Hashomer Hatzair. Hashomer Hatzair is a socialist Zionist, secular Jewish youth movement founded in 1913 in Galicia (Austria-Hungary)—long before Sella received her certificate.
However, I’m unsure whether the organization that issued Sella’s certificate is the same as Hashomer Hatzair, since the Dutch chapter of Hashomer Hatzair was only established in 1958. Nevertheless, I still consider it possible that they may have had some kind of alliance or connection with Hashomer Hatzair at the time.
Sjoek is the Dutch transliteration of the Hebrew word שוק (market). In our context, a Sjoek was often a market organized to support the Zionist endeavor in Palestine, typically held around Purim time.
The following newspaper clippings provide evidence of this tradition.
For example, here is an announcement published in the Nieuw Israelietisch Weekblad (NIW) on 5 February 1965, advertising a Sjoek organized by the Haboniem youth group on 14 February 1965 in The Hague.(Source:Â http://resolver.kb.nl/resolve?urn=ddd:010872240:mpeg21:a0063):
Another relevant clipping, published in the Nieuw Israelietisch Weekblad (NIW) on 3 March 1961, announces the cancellation of that week’s meeting and includes a call to collect “many presents” for the upcoming Sjoek. (Source: http://resolver.kb.nl/resolve?urn=ddd:010873033:mpeg21:a0111):
The following two newspaper clippings, published in the Nieuw Israelietisch Weekblad (NIW) on 24 March 1933, report on a Shuk held in Amsterdam by an organization called De Vereeniging Practisch Palestinawerk. (Source: http://resolver.kb.nl/resolve?urn=ddd:010874822:mpeg21:a0106):
Conclusion: Now that we have analyzed everything, primarily using the online archive of the Nieuw Israelietisch Weekblad (NIW), we can confidently say that we have a solid understanding of what Beth Am, Hatzair, Shuk, and the like were.
When I consulted Dr. B. W. from VU University Amsterdam, a specialist in the history of Dutch Jewry, he confirmed that my interpretation of the certificate’s value was likely correct. He also explained that there were many youth movements at the time, each with its own name, and Hatzair could very well have been one of these groups.
Our Next Steps
In my opinion, the following actions would help deepen our understanding and uncover more about this fascinating piece of history:
We need to investigate whether an archive still exists for the Beth-Am that Sella attended. Since organizations that used the Beth Am likely kept records, this is a promising lead. The following article, published in the Nieuw Israelietisch Weekblad (NIW) on 12 April 1946, supports this belief: http://resolver.kb.nl/resolve?urn=ddd:010872192:mpeg21:a0029): In that article, the Beth-Am board announced that, thanks to generous donations, a building had been purchased at Johan Vermeerstraat 26. They also listed the members of the management and invited organizations interested in using the new hall to submit their names, addresses, and details about their activities.
We also need to determine whether Hatzair was affiliated with the international Hashomer Hatzair movement, or if the Hatzair that Sella belonged to was a separate organization altogether.
If you happen to have any additional information that could help advance this research—whether about the certificate, the youth group Hatzair, the Shuk, the Beth Am, or related topics—please feel free to share it by commenting below or by contacting me directly via this link. I would be very grateful for any valuable insights or leads.
