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Organisations for helping people in hiding

In 1942, the LO - the National Organisation for Helping People in Hiding - was established (Dutch: Landelijke Organisatie voor Hulp aan Onderduikers). This became the largest organisation for helping people in hiding with networks throughout the Netherlands, a unit for forging documents, and assault teams that raided distribution offices to obtain food ration coupons.
In 1942, resistance groups were also set up in Amsterdam and Utrecht for rescuing Jewish children. In Amsterdam, Jews who were rounded up were brought to the former Hollandsche Schouwburg for deportation to Westerbork and later transported further. Assistants from the Jewish Council in the Hollandsche Schouwburg knew how to remove people's names from the personal registration and then smuggle them out of the building. The children of the Jews in the building were brought to the childcare centre on the other side of the street. Resistance groups with the help of the Jewish leaders took children out of the centre and brought them to foster families. Six hundred children were rescued.

Personal story: Süskind en Cohen
Personal story: Slomp en Kuipers-Rietberg

1. Two Jewish children with two sons of Johannes Boogaard
   In the summer of 1943, the farmstead of Johannes Boogaard and his family in Haarlemmermeerpolder was the hiding place of 70 people in hiding, mostly Jews.
   Unknown photographer, NIOD Collection, Amsterdam
2. Jews in hiding at Johannes Boogaard's farm in Haarlemmermeerpolder
   Unknown photographer, NIOD Collection, Amsterdam
3. On 6 October 1944, Johannes Boogaard's farm was raided. Thirty four people were caught and had to lie on the ground awaiting transport. All were murdered in the extermination camps.
   Unknown photographer, NIOD Collection, Amsterdam
4. In a forest in the Nunspeet municipality, a cleverly concealed hiding place was set up where around 80 to 100 people could hide. On 29 October 1944, the Germans discovered the place. Most of the people hiding were able to get away on time. The few that stayed behind were shot dead on the spot.
   Unknown photographer, NIOD Collection, Amsterdam
5. In a forest in the Nunspeet municipality, a cleverly concealed hiding place was set up where around 80 to 100 people could hide. On 29 October 1944, the Germans discovered the place. Most of the people hiding were able to get away on time. The few that stayed behind were shot dead on the spot.
   Unknown photographer, NIOD Collection, Amsterdam
6. A hiding place in Amsterdam in the cellar of a tobacco firm
   The caretaker of the building and his wife, seen in the photo, hid many people during the war.
   Photo Cas Oorthuys, May 1945, NFM Collection, Rotterdam
7. Hiding place under the floor, The Hague, 21 November 1944.
   Photo Ed van Wijk, NFM Collectie, Rotterdam
8. A 'drill in disappearing' in the home of the Ten Boom family in Haarlem, July 1943.
   During his hiding period in the home of the Ten Boom family (May 1943 to February 1944), the student Hans Poley used a box camera and paper negatives to make 24 photos of the daily life of people in hiding. The Ten Boom family were devout Christians who opened their doors to persecuted people out of their religious convictions. This included Jews, students who refused to sign a loyalty declaration, and people in the resistance. Poley was arrested on the street in February 1944 and imprisoned in camp Amersfoort. During a raid of the Sicherheitsdienst at the end of February 1944, everyone in the Ten Boom's home were arrested. Six people were so well hidden that they were not discovered. Corrie ten Boom survived imprisonment in Ravensbrück concentration camp. The rest of the family perished.
   Photo Hans Poley, NFM collection, Rotterdam
9. Inner courtyard of the Hollandsche Schouwburg in Amsterdam. Jews who were arrested were brought to the Hollandsche Schouwburg awaiting transport to the Westerborg transit camp. Between 1942 and 1943, 15,000 to 18,000 Jews came through the Hollandsche Schouwburg.
   Photo Lydia Riezouw, VMA Collection, Amsterdam and NIOD, Amsterdam