A transport company that transported tens of thousands of Jews to concentration camps tried to claim back money owed for hundreds of rides.
The municipal public transport operator in Amsterdam, GVB deported 63,000 Jews during the Second World War, including Anne Frank.
However, not all of the company’s monthly invoices were paid by the time the Netherlands was liberated in May 1945.
The Gestapo paid it 10 guilders for every tram and 12.50 for a journey at night.
One of the trains took Anne Frank to the concentration camps in Poland
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An archive was discovered by filmmaker Willy Lindwer and writer Guus Luijters that showed GVB was still sending out invoices in 1947 – two years after the war had finished, reports The Telegraph.
A GVB bill for the last 900 tram rides from August 8, 1944, showed that Anne Frank and her family were transported from Amsterdam’s Central Station. The youngster and her family were sent to Auschwitz before Anne was sent to Bergen-Belsen in November 1944.
Anne died of typhus at Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in February 1945, days after the death of her sister, Margot. Their mother Edith had died that January, separated from her daughters in Auschwitz.
Their father, Otto, was the only one to survive.
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A memorial stone for Margot Frank and Anne Frank on the grounds of Bergen-Belsen
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In 1947, Otto published his daughter’s diary about their life in hiding. It became an international bestseller, with more than 30 million people having read The Diary Of A Young Girl in 70 languages.
After hearing the BBC announce the D-Day landings on their wireless set, Frank wrote: “Will this year, 1944, bring us victory? We don’t know yet. But where there’s hope, there’s life. It fills us with fresh courage and makes us strong again.”
In 2005, Dutch Railways apologised for their role in it and pledged to pay compensation in 2018.
GVB is now likely to face calls to pay into a fund against anti-Semitism or create a statue to compensate for their part in the deportation of Jews.
GVB still operates the transport system in Amsterdam
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Last week, Prince William met young ambassadors from the Holocaust Educational Trust who are seeking to tackle hatred amid soaring abuse and attacks on Britain’s Jewish community.
During his visit to the Western Marble Arch Synagogue, he said: “Both Catherine and I are extremely concerned about the rise in antisemitism that you guys have talked about this morning and I’m just so sorry if any of you have had to experience that.
“That’s why I’m here today to reassure you all that people do care and people do listen.”
Source Agencies
