Eduard and Alexander Hornemann—Used as Experiments and Murdered

Eduard and Alexander Hornemann are two of the 20 Bullenhuser Damm children who were murdered on 20 April 1945. I have written about the Bullenhuser Damm children before, but I just want to focus on the two brothers now. The reason being, at another time it could have been my boys whose names would have been on that list.

Like Eduard and Alexander’s father, I too worked for Philips at one stage in my life.

Eduard, the elder of the two Hornemann brothers, was born on 1 January 1933. He was known as Edo in the family. Alexander was born on 31 May 1936 and was nicknamed Lexje. The family were from Eindhoven in the Netherlands.

The father, Philip (aka Flip)Carel Hornemann, worked for Philips. After the occupation of the Netherlands by German forces, he and another 100 Jewish colleagues were deployed to a special department of the company. His wife Elisabeth hid on a farm with their son Alexander, whilst Eduard was taken in on another farm. When the Jewish employees of Philips were taken to the 18 Vught Concentration camp, Elisabeth Hornemann followed her husband with her two sons.

On August 18 1943, German troops surrounded the Philips plant in Eindhoven and arrested all the Jews. Philip Carel Hornemann and the rest of the Jewish employees were sent to Vught, a Dutch concentration camp, where they were put to work in a Philips operation that employed more than 3,000 prisoners.

The Philips workers received extra rations and were given the special privilege of living together with their wives and children. When a Philips Corporation representative told Alexander’s mother that the company could guarantee her family’s safety only if she joined her husband in the camp, she felt that she had no choice but to go.

But prior to that their lives had already been interrupted. In 1942 the family lived in the Staringstraat in Eindhoven. The Nazis them to move to Gagelstraat because they have to make way for a Nazi-minded family.

On 3 June 1944, the Hornemanns were deported to the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp in Poland. The two boys remained with their mother and were sent to the women’s barracks. Conditions in the camp were horrendous. There was little food and disease was rampant. Alexander’s mother contracted typhoid fever three months after their arrival and died soon after. Philip died from exhaustion on transport to another camp.

Kurt Heissmeyer was a SS physician and the nephew of the senior SS officer August Heissmeyer. He was working to obtain his Professorship, which required original research.

Although previous research was dismissed, Heissmeyer’s hypothesis was by injecting live tuberculosis bacilli into subjects, the bacilli would function as a vaccine. Another aspect of his experiment was based on the Nazi racial theory that race played a factor in developing tuberculosis. By proving his theory he injected live tuberculosis bacilli into the lungs and bloodstream of 20 Jewish children at the Neuengamme Concentration Camp. These were the 20 children selected by Joseph Mengele, amongst them were the two Hornemann boys. Eduard and Alexander Hornemann were brought to Neuengamme Concentration Camp on 28 November 1944.

On 20 April 1945, the children were taken to the abandoned Bullenhuser Schule. They were cheerful and happy to get out of the camp. The children were given a morphine injection that evening. Just before the injection, they were told that they would be “put to bed quickly.” That night, all twenty children were killed by hanging in the basement of the Bullenhuser Schule. On that same day, the British were less than three miles from the camp.

“I don’t think that the camp inmates are worth the same as other people,” said 61-year-old Kurt Heissmeyer on 21 June 1966. When asked, “Why didn’t you use laboratory animals?” he replied, “because there is no difference between laboratory animals and humans,” and then corrected himself, “between laboratory animals and Jews.”

Heissmeyer died on 29 August 1967.

sources

http://www.philips-kommando.nl/blauw_persoon15.html

https://www.oorlogsbronnen.nl/artikel/de-broertjes-hornemann-medische-experimenten-nazi-kampen

http://www.kinder-vom-bullenhuser-damm.de/_english/eduard_und_alexander_hornemann.php

https://www.museumoftolerance.com/education/teacher-resources/holocaust-resources/children-of-the-holocaust/alexander-hornemann.html

The murder of Philibert Steinbach- a boy from Geleen

Geleen is a small former mining town in the province of Limburg, in the south east of the Netherlands. It is not a particular famous place, although it is the place where the first professional football was played in the Netherlands, and it used to host one of the world’s biggest rock festivals’PinkPop’

It is also the place where I was born and a boy called Philibert Steinbach. Most of us will have seen the picture of his sister ,Settela Steinbach.

Philibert Steinbach was born in Geleen on September 4, 1932. On May 16, 1944, Philibert Steinbach was arrested in Eindhoven. From May 16, 1944 to May 19, 1944 Philibert Steinbach was imprisoned in Camp Westerbork. From May 22, 1944 to August 3, 1944 Philibert Steinbach was in the Gypsy Camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau.

Sinti and Roma had to live in assembly camps outside cities from 22 June 1943, such as near The Hague or Eindhoven. At the behest of the Nazi occupier, the caravans were pulled together here and the Sinti and Roma concentrated. From that moment on, the Sinti and Roma were forced to live in the assembly camps or in a house. This made it easier for the occupier to arrest the Sinti and Roma a year later during the gypsy roundup.

Not the actual camp where the Steinbach family stayed.

The travel ban for Sinti and Roma , also known as the towing ban, was introduced on 1 July 1943. The wheels of the caravans were confiscated or had to be removed. Horses were also seized.

From May 22, 1944 to August 3, 1944 Philibert Steinbach was imprisoned in the Gypsy Camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau. On August 3, 1944 Philibert Steinbach was murdered in Auschwitz, he was aged 11.

The Sinti and Roma were seen by the Nazis as an inferior race and were persecuted for that reason. About 500 Sinti and Roma were deported from the Netherlands, almost the entire community. Across Europe, it is estimated that some 500,000 Sinti and Roma were murdered in concentration camps.

The picture at the top of the blog is an old picture of the start of the street in Geleen where I I grew up. When I was 11 I felt very safe and secure, due to a large part of my family living in the street. Nearly every second house would be occupied by an uncle, aunt or older cousin. Despite the fact that Philibert had a large family, he never enjoyed that safety. Most of his family were murdered just like him.

Only recently I discovered that I am related to the Steinbach family via some in laws. 77 years after the war I am still discovering new aspects of the horrors of the Holocaust.

This is the only official document I could find of Philibert, it was issued by the war graves foundation on February 26,1958.

sources

https://www.oorlogsbronnen.nl/tijdlijn/Philibert-Steinbach/01/102563

https://www.stolpersteinesittardgeleen.nl/Slachtoffers/familie-Steinbach

https://www.joodsmonument.nl/nl/page/658691/philibert-steinbach

Cycling in WWII-The story of 2 cyclists, one hero, one traitor.

German troops invaded the Netherland in May 1940. The Nazi regime stayed in power in the the Netherlands until May 1945. Although the southern provinces had already been liberated in the autumn of 1944.

Despite the occupation, for many life went ahead as usual, at least to an extend. Sporting events were still allowed by the Nazi occupiers. I have often wondered why that was, but of course sports were ideal for propaganda purposes. It created an illusion to show the citizens that the Nazis weren’t all that bad. Also sports functioned as a distraction.

Cycling has always been popular in the Netherlands. Many Dutch still use the bicycle as their preferred means of transport. But also in a sporting sense it has always been popular and there have been many successful Dutch cyclists throughout the decades.

It is no wonder therefor that the Dutch continued to organizes cycling events like the Cauberg Criterium, which was an annual race in the most south Eastern part of the Netherlands , the province of Limburg, in the town of Valkenburg.

Two cyclists who would have competed in these races were Jan van Hout and Cor Wals.

Jan van Hout was a professional cyclist between 1933 and 1940. He was born in Valkenburg on October 17,1908.

He made quite a good living as a cyclist. With the money he earned as a cyclist he was able to buy a pub in Eindhoven. When the Nazis occupied the Netherlands he closed his pub, he did not want to serve any drinks to the Nazis. He was a fervent anti Nazi. After he closed the pub Jan and his wife Anneke decided to join the Dutch resistance. They were involved in providing aid to refugees and people in hiding.

A few months before liberation Jan was arrested during a raid. He was sent to Neuengamme concentration camp where he died on February 22nd 1945.

Cor Wals was a Dutch cyclist, born February 26, 1911 in The Hague.

As early as 1931 Cor got contracts for the six-day races in Chicago and New York and made a name for himself as a six-day driver in the following years. Because of his unparalleled sense of balance, which stopped him from falling of the bike , he was nicknamed “Slingerplant” (Dutch: creeper). He took part in 39 races, of which he won seven, five of them with Jan Pijnenburg . In addition, he was three times Dutch master of the stayers(aka The pacemaker race, an endurance discipline of track cycling)

He was a fan favourite. However on July 21, 1941 during one of those stayers races, he took off his jacket and to the shock of the spectators ,they saw he was wearing a shirt with the SS symbol. He also gave the Hitler salute.

After winning the championship, he was whistled and booed during his lap of honor and cushions were thrown at him. He decided after that not to race again and to focus on a military career with the SS.

Initially he fought at the eastern front but he ended up working as a guard in several concentration camps. There was a rumour that he worked in Neuengamme when Jan van Hout was there, but this has never been verified.

After the war he was sentenced to 15 years in prison, but he was released in 1952.

He opened up a clothes shop in Eindhoven . One day Anneke van Hout-Louwers walked into the shop to buy some clothes for her son, Cor chatted with Anneke and cupid struck. The couple got married. Anneke van Hout-Louwers was the widow of Jan van Hout, there was a public outrage about the newly married couple. People were disgusted that Anneke married a traitor. The couple moved to Belgium soon after, they returned to the Netherlands in 1981.

sources

https://www.nu.nl/sport/2415527/sser-won-nk.html

https://amp.de.googl-info.com/5381126/1/jan-van-hout.html

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Killed to obtain a professorship

Alexander Hornemann, 8, the Netherlands
Eduard Hornemann, 12, the Netherlands
Marek Steinbaum, 10, Poland
Marek James, 6, Poland
W. Junglieb, 12, Yugoslavia
Roman Witonski, 7, Poland
Roman Zeller, 12, Poland
Sergio de Simone, 7, Italy
Georges Andre Kohn, 12, France
Eduard Reichenbaum, 10, Poland
Jacqueline Morgenstern, 12, France
Surcis Goldinger, 11, Poland
Lelka Birnbaum, 12, Poland
Eleonora Witonska, 5, Poland
Ruchla Zylberberg, 10, Poland
H.Wasserman, 8, Poland
Lea Klygerman, 8, Poland
Rywka Herszberg, 7, Poland
Blumel Mekler, 11, Poland
Mania Altman, 5, Poland

Above is the list of 20 children, 10 boys and 10 girls ,aged between 5 and 12 ,who were killed on the night of 20/21 April 1945.They were the children of the Bullenhuser Damm School . They were killed along their minders French doctors, Gabriel Florence and René Quenouille, and two Dutchmen Dirk Deutekom and Anton Hölzel.

The children had been killed for Kurt Heissmeyer to obtain a professorship In order to do this , he had to carry out medical experiments.He injected the children with living tuberculosis bacteria in their veins and directly into their lungs to determine if they had any natural immunity to tuberculosis.

His experiment was carried out on the children  at Neuengamme concentration camp. Because of the approaching allied troops the children and their minders were transported to Bullenhuser Damm School, where they were killed. I have written about these children before but looking back at it today I realized how close to it was to me in a personal way.

The picture at the top of the blog is of the 2 brothers Eduard and Alexander Hornemann.  Their parents both  worked at the Philips factory in Eindhoven,the Netherlands. Their Father ,Philip, died on February 21, 1945 at Sachsenhausen, where he arrived after a stop at Dachau after the ‘death march’. Their mother Elisabeth died of typhus in Auschwitz in October 1944.

I worked for Philips between 1987 and 1997, not in Endhoven but I often had to go there for several training programs as it was the HQ of Philips in the Netherlands. A few decades earlier they would have been my colleagues.

Donation

I am passionate about my site and I know you all like reading my blogs. I have been doing this at no cost and will continue to do so. All I ask is for a voluntary donation of $2, however if you are not in a position to do so I can fully understand, maybe next time then. Thank you. To donate click on the credit/debit card icon of the card you will use. If you want to donate more then $2 just add a higher number in the box left from the PayPal link. Many thanks.

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Sources

http://www.kinder-vom-bullenhuser-damm.de/_english/the_story.php

About

Operation Oyster—The Bombing of Philips Eindhoven

Operation OYSTER, the daylight attack on the Philips radio and valve works at Emmasingel, Eindhoven, Holland, by No. 2 Group. Low-level oblique photograph showing incendiary bombs dropped by Lockheed Venturas bursting on the roof of the Emmasingel lamp and valve factory. C 3268 Part of AIR MINISTRY SECOND WORLD WAR OFFICIAL COLLECTION No. 21 Squadron RAF

For 10 years I worked for Philips and was not aware of this bit of the company’s history, although I worked in a different plant in another city, the links to Eindhoven were substantial because HQ was located there.

On this day 80 years ago the Philips Radio Works in Eindhoven, in the Netherlands was bombed by the RAF. It was a daring low-level attack which turned out to be a notable success for the allies as it cost the Germans an estimated six months’ loss of production.

On 6th December 1942, the RAF mounted Operation Oyster, a daylight low-level bombing raid on the Philips electronic company in Eindhoven, Holland. It was hoped that this approach would minimise casualties amongst Dutch civilians. It also provided the opportunity to build a well-photographed publicity exercise around the whole raid. The Mosquito was developing quite a reputation for this low-level work, although only a small proportion of the aircraft on the raid was of this type.

Squadron Leader Charles Patterson was one of the more experienced pilots taking part, his observer’s seat was occupied by Flying Officer Jimmy Hill from RAF Film Unit – the footage from this raid can be seen in the video below:

93 aircraft took part in the raid;
47 (PV-1) Venturas Mk. Is of RAF No. 21, RAAF No. 464 and RNZAF No. 487 Squadrons.

36 (A-20) Boston IIIs of Nos. 88, 107, and 226 Squadrons

10 Mosquito Mk. IVs of No.105 and No.139 Squadrons;
83 aircraft dropped bombs and one Mosquito was a photographic aircraft.
Eindhoven is beyond the range of fighter escorts so the raid was flown at a low level and in clear weather conditions.

Operation OYSTER, the daylight attack on the Philips radio and valve works at Eindhoven, Holland, by No. 2 Group. Ground crews prepare De Havilland Mosquito B Mark IV, DK336, of No. 105 Squadron RAF for the raid at Marham, Norfolk. C 3298 Part of AIR MINISTRY SECOND WORLD WAR OFFICIAL COLLECTION RAFFPU

Operation OYSTER, the daylight attack on the Philips radio and valve works at Eindhoven, Holland, by No. 2 Group. Wing Commander H I Edwards VC (left), leader of the De Havilland Mosquito B Mark IVs of Nos. 105 and 139 Squadrons RAF on the raid, and his navigator approach their aircraft before taking off from Marham, Norfolk. C 3304 Part of AIR MINISTRY SECOND WORLD WAR OFFICIAL COLLECTION RAFFPU

Mosquito B Mark IV Series 2, DK338, in flight after completion. DK338 served with No. 105 Squadron RAF as ‘GB-O’, and took part in the successful low-level raid on the Phillips radio factory at Eindhoven, Holland, (Operation OYSTER) on 6 December 1942, led by the Squadron Commander, Wing Commander H.I.Edwards VC. CH 7781 Part of AIR MINISTRY SECOND WORLD WAR OFFICIAL COLLECTION De Havilland photographer for Ministry of Aircraft Production

The bombing had to be very accurate to only cause damage to factories in the complex as the Factories were in the middle of the town. Normally they were also full of Dutch workers under Nazi guard so the raid was carried out on a Sunday to try and reduce civilian casualties. Unfortunately, some bombs fell in nearby streets killing 148 Dutch people and seven German soldiers.

Full production at the factory was not reached again until six months after the raid.

Operation OYSTER, the daylight attack on the Philips radio and valve works at Eindhoven, Holland, by No. 2 Group. Douglas Bostons fly over the burning Emmasingel lamp and valve factory at the height of the raid. The works were so severely hit that full production was not resumed for six months. C 5755 Part of AIR MINISTRY SECOND WORLD WAR OFFICIAL COLLECTION No. 2 Group RAF

Operation OYSTER, the daylight attack on the Philips radio and valve works at Eindhoven, Holland, by No. 2 Group. Low-level photographic-reconnaissance aerial taken over the Stryp Group main plant 30 minutes after the attack, showing extensive damage to the radio assembly shop and fires still burning at several points. Full production of electrical material at the factory was not reached again until 6 months after the raid. The bombers suffered a loss rate of 15 per cent for the whole force. C 3281 Part of AIR MINISTRY SECOND WORLD WAR OFFICIAL COLLECTION No. 139 Squadron RAF

Forgotten History-Frits Philips

sources

https://www.annefrank.org/nl/timeline/151/bombardement-op-philipsfabrieken-in-eindhoven/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Oyster

https://isgeschiedenis.nl/nieuws/sinterklaasbombardement-in-eindhoven

originally posted December 6, 2016

Forgotten History-Frits Philips

 

We all know the name and brand. The company which was started as a family business in 1891  by Gerard and his Father Frederik Philips, who owned a cigar shop and was a first cousin of Karl Marx.

 

Gerard and his younger brother Anton Philips changed the business to a corporation by founding in 1912 the NV Philips’ Gloeilampenfabrieken. As the first CEO of the Philips corporation, Gerard laid with Anton the base for the later Philips multinational.

Hang on I hear you say this is not forgotten history, these are well known and documented facts(except for the Karl Marx link). And you would be right but the title is ‘Forgotten History-Frits Philips’

 

Ir. F. Philips voor het Evoluon te Eindhoven

Frederik Jacques “Frits” Philips (16 April 1905 – 5 December 2005) was the fourth chairman of the board of directors of the Dutch electronics company Philips, which his uncle and father founded. For his actions in saving 382 Jews during the Nazi Occupation of the Netherlands in World War II, he was recognized in 1996 by Yad Vashem as a Righteous Among the Nations.

 

Frits Philips was born in the city of Eindhoven in the south of the Netherlands. The second child, he was the only son of Anton Philips and his wife Anne Henriëtte Elisabeth Maria de Jongh.

Born and raised long before many of the products that would make his company a household name had even been developed, Mr. Philips, who was known as Frits, was a successful businessman who was more interested in the common good than the corporate coffers. Mr. Philips, along with his predecessors at the company, helped build houses for company employees along with sports clubs and cultural institutions.

On 18 October 1935 Frits Philips was appointed vice-director and a member of the board of Philips. Learning of the expected occupation of the Netherlands by Nazi Germany in World War II in 1940, his father Anton Philips, young nephew Frans Otten, and other Philips family members escaped from the Netherlands and fled to the United States, taking company capital with them. Frits Philips stayed in the Netherlands. Together they managed to keep the company alive during the war.

From 30 May until 20 September 1943, Philips was held in the concentration camp Vught because of a strike at the Philips factory.

 

During the Occupation, Philips saved the lives of 382 Jews by convincing the Nazis that they were indispensable for the production process at Philips.

Mr. Philips reportedly tried to hire as many Jews as possible and then told the Nazi occupiers that they were irreplaceable, a strategy that prevented many of them from being sent to Auschwitz.

Of the 469 Jews employed at the factory, 382 survived the war, according to a company history.

Some historians are critical about Mr Frits Philips ,they say he played a double role in the war because its factory production contributed to the German war industry as well.But the fact is that anyone who defied the Nazi regime put their life at risk.

Between 1961 and 1971 Frits Philips served as President of the company, he was to be the last of the Philips family to be a President of Philips.

It’s funny I worked for Philips for a decade and I never knew about Frits’s involvement in saving the lives of 382 Jewish Philips employees.Nor did I know that there was a Family link with Karl Marx.

• 1965, he was included in the Dutch royal ranks of Orange Nassau (rank of commander).
• 1970, he was knighted as Knight in the Order of the Netherlands Lion. 
  

  

  In his hometown of Eindoven he was simply known as Mr Frits a statue was erected in his honor and a concert hall was named after him.

   

  

  

  Yet more proof that one man can make a difference.

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I am passionate about my site and I know you all like reading my blogs. I have been doing this at no cost and will continue to do so. All I ask is for a voluntary donation of $2, however if you are not in a position to do so I can fully understand, maybe next time then. Thank you. To donate click on the credit/debit card icon of the card you will use. If you want to donate more then $2 just add a higher number in the box left from the PayPal link. Many thanks.

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