Catharina and her son, Clarence,
Westerbork Camp , June 1943 |
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Catharina performing before the war |
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Cartoon by Leo Kok in Camp
Westerbork, the Netherlands: a scene from a play titled “Humor and
Melody” that was performed in the camp.
Left balloon: “I know how you don’t get [a baby].”
The character who “knows how not to get a baby [how not to get
pregnant]” is Catharina. |
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Catharina as a Flamenco Dancer,
Terezin Ghetto, 1944
Charlotte Buresova |
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Portrait of Clarence as a Child,
Terezin Ghetto, 1944
Charlotte Buresova |
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Catharina Frank
The dance that Catharina performed in Westerbork saved her life and that of her
son.
Catharina was born in 1917 in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, to an affluent family
in the textile business. She worked as a nurse for the Jewish hospital. In 1941,
she married Jacques Frank. The couple went into hiding in Amsterdam but was
discovered and transported to Camp Westerbork. Catharina, six months pregnant
when she reached the camp, gave birth to their son, Clarence, in May 1943.
Jacques managed to see his son once before being sent to Sobibór, where he was
murdered.
Catharina, who had studied dance as a teenager, joined the camp’s entertainment
team. Adolf Eichmann attended one of the performances. In a selection held in
his presence, he promised her that she and her son would be sent to Terezin and
allowed to stay there until the end of the war. Catharina and Clarence reached
Terezin in spring 1944
An infant in the ghetto was unusual and people thronged to see the cute little
baby. In preparations for the Red Cross’ visit, the artist Charlotte Buresova
asked Catharina to model for a painting that would be displayed in one of the
Ghetto’s administration offices. During one of his visits to Terezin, Eichmann
saw the painting and identified Catharina in it. Eichmann had her and her son
transferred to a private room, where they also received extra food from
deportees from Denmark.
Catharina remarried after the war and died in 2003.
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