The sad review…

Under the portent of the Second World War the Netherlands government erected the “Central Refugee Camp Westerbork”. Aim of this facility within the region Drenthe was it to assemble in particular jewish refugees from Germany and Austria off the towns and the rural communes. This way an integration into the Dutch Community should be prevented. Further by this procedure the government emphasized it´s relation to National Socialist Germany.

In the course of the war and with the beginning of the deportations into the extermination camps the “Central Refugee Camp Westerbork” became the “Police Transitcamp for Jews Kamp Westerbork”. Under German occupation here took place the transportation of the prisoners from the Netherlands into the extermination camps.

Until 1944 from Westerbork in all more than 107.000 people were transported with 100 trains into the extermination camps Auschwitz, Sobibor, Bergen-Belsen and Theresienstadt. Merely about 5000 of the deported persons survived and could return from captivity of the National Socialists.