Jacques Schop. Collection

Jacques (Yanek) Schop was born in 1933 in Krakow, Poland. His parents were skilled textile workers. The Schop family still resided in Krakow when Nazi-Germany invaded Poland on 1st September 1939. In March 1941 a ghetto for Jews was created in Krakow. Jacques Schop, his parents and his older brother Ludwig were forced to relocate there. Jacques’ father opened a clothing factory in the ghetto where he employed about twelve Jewish women. As the Schop family and their employees made themselves useful repairing uniforms for the German army, they were – at least temporarily – exempted from deportation. Eight-year-old Jacques and his eleven-year-old brother Ludwig were also employed at their father’s factory to protect them. The boys received the uniforms and brought them to the workshop. The Schop family was able to make a living because of their business, which made them less vulnerable to the harsh ghetto life. The Schop family was held at the Krakow ghetto for one to two years. In that period of time, Jacques was smuggled out of the ghetto and was taken to a non-Jewish acquaintance of his father who had a cutlery shop just outside of Krakow. This catholic Polish family hid the boy in return for payments made by the Schop family. Jacques was able to maintain contact with his parents and brother in the Krakow ghetto, while he shared the sweets he received from his parents with the children of the family. In 1943 Jacques’ parents learned of an escape route from Poland to Hungary via a member of the Jewish police in the Krakow ghetto. The policeman offered to bring the Schop family in contact with the smugglers if the Schops would also pay the smugglers to take the policeman and his family. The Schop family agreed, but did not want to leave without Jacques. Fearing that the boy’s ‘rescuers’ would denounce them as they would lose the money for Jacques’ upkeep, Jacques’ parents asked the Polish catholic family to bring Jacques to Krakow for a visit. However, the catholic Polish family suspected something and on their way to Krakow, his ‘rescuer’ tried to throw Jacques in a river to get rid of the ten-year-old child. Jacques was able to escape and rejoined his parents and brother Ludwig in the Krakow ghetto. After the return of Jacques, his parents collected small diamonds to pay for the trip. They left for Hungary on foot and were passed on from smuggler to smuggler. Some of them did not want to take Jacques along since he was too little to keep up with the other refugees. In those cases, Jacques’ father payed the smuggler after which the issue was resolved. It took the Schop family six weeks to reach Budapest, Hungary, where Jews were still living in freedom at the time. Jacques’ father opened a small clothing factory. Meanwhile the Schop family tried to warn Hungarian Jews about what might happen to them once their protected status would be redrawn. Presenting themselves as Polish and not as Jewish, the Schop family was not targeted during the Nazi-invasion of Hungary in March 1944 or during the deportations from May to July or the massive shootings from October onwards. The Schop family witnessed the liberation of Budapest. As all their family members in Krakow had been killed, they emigrated to France and later to Israel. Jacques lived in Montreal for a few years with his first wife in order to save money to buy a house in Tel Aviv. Unfortunately, his wife died after childbirth leaving Jacques with their young son. Jacques then met and married the Belgian born Malka Rozenberg with whom he had a second child. Malka took on Jacques’ eldest son as if he were her own and the family relocated to Belgium where they still live today.

Jacques Schop was interviewed in Antwerp by Dorien Styven, archivist at Kazerne Dossin, on 10 October 2022.

Jacques Schop, 2022