The Wolfowicz family

Pessa Wolfowicz and Moses Händel were Polish Jews living in Vienna, where they married in 1932. Towards the end of 1937 they emigrated to Antwerp before the Anschluss of Austria.

Pessa Wolfowicz and Moses Händel’s wedding, Vienna, 1932 - Pessa Wolfowicz and her daughter, Evelyne Händel, in 1937, in Vienna - Pessa Wolfowicz and Georges Vandor, a friend, shortly before his arrest
Pessa Wolfowicz and Moses Händel were Polish Jews living in Vienna, where they married in 1932. Towards the end of 1937 they emigrated to Antwerp before the Anschluss of Austria.
Upon the German invasion of Belgium on 10 May 1942 the family became separated. Moses Händel was arrested as “suspect” by the Belgian authorities and sent to the camps in the South of France. Later he was sent to the Drancy Sammellager and was deported on 7 September 1942 on Transport 29. He did not survive his deportation. At the end of summer 1942, Pessa Wolfowicz entrusted her daughter, Evelyne, to her friend, Georges Vandor. As she had become an orphan of the Shoah, he became her guardian after the war. Her mother left Antwerp and sought refuge in Genval, in Walloon Brabant, then in Schaerbeek, a borough of Brussels. There she was arrested before being taken to the Dossin Barracks on 28 October 1942. Her registration for deportation on Transport 16, is the last record of Pessa Wolfowicz on this earth. 77% of all the women who arrived in Auschwitz-Birkenau on Transport 16 were sent for immediate execution.

 

Publication info

ADRIAENS Ward, STEINBERG Maxime (et al.), Mecheln-Auschwitz, 1942-1944. The destruction of Jews and gypsies from Belgium, 4 volumes, Brussels, 2009

Dr. Maxime Steinberg & Dr. Laurence Schram