Helga Deen (6 April 1925 – 16 July 1943) was a Jewish diarist whose diary was discovered in 2004, which describes her stay in a Dutch prison camp, ''
Kamp Vught'', where she was brought during World War II at the age of 18.
Biography
Deen was half-Dutch. Initially her father lived with his German
GP wife in Germany, but moved back to the Netherlands as persecution increased. Her mother worked for a time as a doctor at a
concentration camp at Vught. She was given leave to remain but chose to accompany her family to
Sobibor
Sobibor (, Polish: ) was an extermination camp built and operated by Nazi Germany as part of Operation Reinhard. It was located in the forest near the village of Żłobek Duży in the General Government region of German-occupied Poland.
As an ...
, where she became one of the millions who was murdered in the Nazis'
gas chambers
A gas chamber is an apparatus for killing humans or other animals with gas, consisting of a sealed chamber into which a poisonous or asphyxiant gas is introduced. Poisonous agents used include hydrogen cyanide and carbon monoxide.
History
...
.
After her last diary entry, in early July 1943, Helga Deen was deported to
Sobibór extermination camp
Sobibor (, Polish: ) was an extermination camp built and operated by Nazi Germany as part of Operation Reinhard. It was located in the forest near the village of Żłobek Duży in the General Government region of German-occupied Poland.
As a ...
and murdered in the
gas chambers
A gas chamber is an apparatus for killing humans or other animals with gas, consisting of a sealed chamber into which a poisonous or asphyxiant gas is introduced. Poisonous agents used include hydrogen cyanide and carbon monoxide.
History
...
shortly after she arrived in the camp. She was 18 years old.
Diary
Upon her arrival at
Camp Vught in April 1943, she started writing in her diary, a school notebook. Deen wrote the diary for her boyfriend, Kees van den Berg, who kept it hidden after the war. After his death, his son presented the diary to archivists in
Tilburg
Tilburg () is a city and municipality in the Netherlands, in the southern province of North Brabant. With a population of 222,601 (1 July 2021), it is the second-largest city or municipality in North Brabant after Eindhoven and the seventh-larg ...
.
Memorials
A memorial stone to Helga and her family has been placed by a member of the Dutch Sobibor Foundation on the pathway which used to lead to the gas chambers (called the "Road to Heaven").
See also
*
List of posthumous publications of Holocaust victims
This is a list of Holocaust victims whose writings were published posthumously.
Published in English or translated into English
*Hinde Bergner (1870–1942): ''On Long Winter Nights: Memoirs of a Jewish Family in a Galician Township, 1870–19 ...
*
List of Holocaust diarists
Diarists who wrote diaries concerning the Holocaust (1941-1945).
* Mary Berg
* Hélène Berr - a French diarist
* Willy Cohn
* Adam Czerniaków
* Arnold Daghani
* Petr Ginz
* Zalman Gradowski
* Etty Hillesum - Dutch Jewish diarist and Holocaust ...
*
Anne Frank
Annelies Marie "Anne" Frank (, ; 12 June 1929 – )Research by The Anne Frank House in 2015 revealed that Frank may have died in February 1945 rather than in March, as Dutch authorities had long assumed"New research sheds new light on Anne Fra ...
*
Etty Hillesum
Esther (Etty) Hillesum (15 January 1914 – 30 November 1943) was the Dutch author of confessional letters and diaries which describe both her religious awakening and the persecutions of Jewish people in Amsterdam during the German occupation. I ...
*
David Koker
*
Selma Wijnberg-Engel
Selma Engel-Wijnberg (born Saartje "Selme" Wijnberg; 15 May 1922 – 4 December 2018) was one of only two Dutch Jewish Holocaust survivors of the Sobibor extermination camp. She escaped during the 1943 uprising, hid in Poland, and survived the w ...
References
External links
Helga Deen at Virtual Jewish Community of Netherlands recordHelga Deen, the Last Night, a 32-page graphic novel created by Dario Picciau and Roberto MaliniStichting sobibor.nl
click on 'gedenklaan' and 'links' to view the images
{{DEFAULTSORT:Deen, Helga
1925 births
1943 deaths
Writers from Szczecin
German Jews who died in the Holocaust
Dutch Jews who died in the Holocaust
Dutch civilians killed in World War II
Dutch diarists
German diarists
People from the Province of Pomerania
Dutch people who died in Sobibor extermination camp
German people who died in Sobibor extermination camp
Women diarists
20th-century German women writers
Jewish women writers
Holocaust diarists
Dutch people executed in Nazi concentration camps
People killed by gas chamber by Nazi Germany
German emigrants to the Netherlands