Daalen van Gerard & Philippina (Schaap); Daughter: Ittmann Anna (Daalen van)

Daalen van, Gerard Daalen van, Philippina (Schaap) Ittmann, Anna Hendrika (van Daalen) Hennie Themans (later Rutin) was born in 1917 in Oldenzaal, the Netherlands. She had a brother and a sister; her parents had died before the war. Hennie studied at a seminary for teachers in Hengelo, in the eastern part of the Netherlands. She had a very good friend, Anna Hendrika van Daalen (b. 1917), who was studying at the same seminar. During their studies Anna married and thus became Anna Ittmann. When Hennie and Anna finished their studies, Henny found a job in Utrecht and went to live there. Anna and her husband lived in Amersfoort. When the Germans invaded the Netherlands in 1940 and started persecuting the Jewish population, Anna told Hennie that she should turn to her for help if she were ever in danger. Indeed, at the end of 1942, when the expulsion of the Jews from the Netherlands had begun, Hennie needed that help. She contacted her friend Anna, who brought Henny to her own parents, who lived in the industrial city of Enschede. Anna’s parents, Gerard (b. 1878) and Philippina (née Schaap, b. 1889) van Daalen, were elderly, and like their daughter, they were warm hearted. They did not hesitate to take Hennie into their home and hide her in the attic of their house. Gerard van Daalen was already retired, and they were living on a small pension. Anna’s brother Nico had been arrested by the Germans, owing to his resistance activities, and had been sent to a concentration camp in Germany. Mr. van Daalen made an excellent hiding place for Hennie in the attic of the house, behind a double wall. When strangers were in the house, or the house was searched by Germans, she would hide behind that wall; fortunately, she was never discovered. To pass the time, she sewed and knitted with Philippina van Daalen and helped in with household chores. The clothes they made were exchanged for food. In the winter it was very cold, and Hennie suffered from cold and lack of light. Sometimes, on very dark and silent nights, Hennie would go outside for a short walk in the street. Finally, in the spring of 1945, the dark, cold winter and the war came to an end. After having been hidden for two-and-a-half years, Hennie could go outside and was free. She decided to go back to Oldenzaal, the place where she had been born, but there was nothing left of her family or their property. Hennie’s brother and his family had been killed, as well as her other family members. Her sister had immigrated to Israel before the war, and Hennie decided to follow her to Israel, where she was a teacher for twenty years. Hennie remained in contact with the van Daalen family. There were mutual visits and correspondence. The van Daalens never spoke about their brave deeds after the war, assuming that saving Hennie’s life had been the completely obvious thing to do. But Hennie’s son Dr. Joshua Rutin knew that saving Jews had not been at all the obvious thing to do, and when he understood that his mother’s rescuers had never been honored, he applied for their recognition by Yad Vashem. He wrote: “I grew up with the knowledge that without the rescue of my mother I would not have been born.” On May 27, 2013, Yad Vashem recognized Gerard and Philippina (Schaap) van Daalen and Anna Hendrika (van Daalen) Ittmann as Righteous Among the Nations.