Sajet Dorothea (Venema)

Garrelfs-Kluver, Maria Helena Holman-Kluver, Hendrika Johanna Sajet-Venema, Dorothea Johanna Dr. Ben Sajet, a well-known physician and member of the Amsterdam municipal council, was fired from his medical practice for being Jewish at the end of September 1940. In June 1941, when the anti-Jewish measures became more and more crippling, he wanted to flee to England, together with his sons Jacob and Herman. His youngest son had already reached England earlier to fight, but soon afterwards crashed with his fighter plane. The three Sajets reached England, where Jacob was tragically in a car accident and did not survive. A few months later, in November 1941, a son was born to Jacob and Jetty his wife, assisted by Ben Sajet’s second wife, Dr. Dorothea (née Venema), who was also a midwife. They called him Daniel (Daan). By mid-1943, Dorothea, (called, Thea), Jetty and baby Daniel were ordered to leave their home that was close to German headquarters, and moved within Amsterdam. Dorothea, a non-Jewish woman, took in other Jews, among whom Max Rood, a distant relative of Ben’s first wife. In August 1943, Max was caught in the street, which subsequently led to Dorothea’s arrest. Luckily Jetty and the baby were not there at the time. Dorothea was taken to Vught (KZ Herzogenbusch) in the south of the Netherlands. Jetty thereupon fled with the baby to her sisters who were hiding with the Kluver sisters, also in Amsterdam - Maria Helena (Rietje), 21 years old, and Hendrika Johanna (Riek), 27. Their parents had passed away at a young age, and they were taking care of their seven-year-old brother. Their apartment was now very crowded with three - Jetty and her two sisters plus child - so they found an alternative address for Jetty and Daan. They were subsequently betrayed at that address - Jetty was taken to the Hollandsche Schouwburg holding site and Daan to the Crèche opposite. When the Kluver sisters heard about this that very night, Rietje went to the Crèche with oneof Jetty’s sisters and managed to free Daan, taking him home with her. Yet again, they could not take care of him in their home, so a few days later he was brought to a children’s home. In December 1943, Thea Sajet, herself a mother of two very young children, and not Jewish, was released from the camp as a ‘gesture for Christmas’. She immediately picked up her own daughters, as well as Daan, who stayed with her until the liberation of the city in May 1945. Thea even succeeded in having Daan inscribed in her family book as the twin brother of her own youngest daughter who was born a month after him. This spared him from deportation, as he was now ”officially half-Jewish”. Jetty, however, was deported and murdered in Auschwitz in September 1943. Daan continued to live with Dorothea after the war. When, much later, Daan realized what role the Kluver sisters had played in his survival, he asked them why they did all of this, they simply answered: “Well, that is what one does!” On January 31, 2011, Yad Vashem recognized Maria Helena Garrelfs-Kluver, her sister Hendrika Johanna Holman-Kluver as well as Dorothea Johanna Sajet-Venema as Righteous Among the Nations.