Betty Cohen papers

Betty Cohen (1920- ) was born in 's-Heerenberg, Netherlands, to Dutch-born shochet Benjamin Straus (1881-1943) and German-born Hedwig Levita Straus (1882-1943). She had three older siblings, Harry, Joseph, and Dini. During the Nazi period, Benjamin Straus helped organize the crossing of German refugees into the Netherlands, and Betty would bring them from the German border to the Straus home. Joseph Straus served in the Dutch Army and was imprisoned in a concentration camp. In February 1943, the rest of the family was warned that they would be deported, so the children were sent into hiding. Their parents were deported to Auschwitz and murdered. Betty and Dini were rescued by Tieme Beuving and Alie Van Gessel Beuving and stayed with Alie’s family for about a year in a small room in Dieren, Gelderland. When one of Tieme’s friends from the underground was arrested in January 1944, Betty and Dini joined their brother Harry hiding in a barn on the farm of Joep and Agnes Garben in Azewijn, Gelderland until liberation in April 1945. After the war, Betty married Rudi Cohen (1918-1995), another Dutch Jewish survivor, and immigrated to the United States in 1956. She and her siblings arranged for Tieme and Alie Beuving and Joep and Agnes Garben to be recognized by Yad Vashem as Righteous Among the Nations.

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection, Gift of Betty Cohen

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection, Gift of Betty Cohen

Funding Note: The cataloging of this collection has been supported by a grant from the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany.

Betty Cohen donated the Betty Cohen papers to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 1995, 1997, and 2013. Accessions formerly cataloged as 1997.27 and 2013.286.1 have been unified with this collection.