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Marion Bienes

Marion Bienes was a classmate of Margot Frank at the Municipal Lyceum for Girls in Amsterdam.

Person

  • Marion Bertha Bienes
  • Born on: Aug. 29, 1925
  • Born in: Frankfurt am Main, Duitsland
  • Died on: Sept. 29, 2014
  • Died in: Den Haag, Nederland

Marion Bienes was the daughter of Arthur Lorenz Bienes (26 July 1889 - 9 January 1945) and Hermine Bienes-Cohen (14 January 1893 - 5 November 1987). Marion had a younger brother, René Siegbert Bienes (1 February 1928 - 12 April 1945).[1]

In Frankfurt, Marion was raised in a Jewish family. She attended the Varrentrappschule, the same school Margot Frank attended from March 1933. She was probably one class higher than Margot, as she did not know her from this time. In June 1935, she fled with her mother and little brother from Frankfurt to Amsterdam. Her father had preceded them in November 1934.[2] Malli Aschenbrand, also from Frankfurt, who had previously lived with the Frank family for some time as a domestic help, moved in with them on 1 November 1935 at 34hs Schubertstraat.[3]

In Amsterdam, Marion may have first followed Benjamin Reens‘ “Overgangscursus” after which she went to the Daltonschool at Jan van Eijckstraat 21.[4] In the school year 1938-’39, she started together with Margot Frank in class 1b of the Municipal Lyceum for Girls.[5] Marion remembered Margot well because in teacher Max Euwe's maths classes, she was the best student in the class. By her own admission, she herself was the worst student. She remembered being allowed to cheat off Margot once, but not understanding what Margot had written down.[4] From the second school year onwards, they were no longer in the same class.[6]

During the German occupation, her father held a position at the Jewish Council for Amsterdam. Marion also had a job there as a shorthand typist for the Centraal Bureau van de afdeling Hulp aan Vertrekkende, as a result of which she obtained a Sperr-stamp in June 1942.[7]

After briefly being in hiding in Woerden, she was arrested and sent to Scheveningen prison het Oranjehotel on 29 August 1943, her eighteenth birthday.[8] A month later, she arrived in Westerbork on 29 September 1943. The rest of the Bienes family had been detained there since April 1943. In February 1944, she was deported to Bergen-Belsen with her father and brother. Her mother had been baptised and remained behind in Westerbork until she was deported to Theresienstadt in September 1944.[9]

Marion recalled hearing from an acquaintance in January 1945 that the Frank sisters were also in Bergen-Belsen. She explained that she had not gone to the fence, like Hannah Goslar, because she was caring for her sick father at the time.[4] He died on 9 January 1945. Her brother died on 12 April 1945.[10]

After the liberation of Bergen-Belsen, Marion returned to Amsterdam. From October 1945 she lived for six months at Gerrit van der Veenstraat 127bv, together with her mother, who had survived Theresienstadt.[11] She married Bernard Kamarsky on 3 April 1946 in Amsterdam. With him, she left for the United States, but the marriage did not last and they decided to divorce in 1950. From 1950 to 1956, she was married to Herbert Alexander Horowitz, with whom she had one son. On 2 November 1956, she married the singer Justus Bonn in Amsterdam, with whom she moved to Germany. This marriage also ended in divorce in 1960.[12]

While living in New York, Marion took singing lessons. On her return to Amsterdam, she became part of the Hoofdstad Operette. From 1958, she sang in Berlin and performed in television films. In 1965, she performed as a cabaret performer at the Rembrandt Theatre in Amsterdam with Ramses Shaffy's company "Shaffy Chantant". There, she sang a 1941 Wagner parody of the fall of Hitler and the song "Säuberung am Zoo", in which an SS commando removes Jewish-looking animals from the zoo.[13]

Affected by her experiences in the concentration camps, Marion Bienes dedicated herself to being an animal rights activist from her fifties: "I cannot forget hunger, thirst and cold. I let the animals benefit from that and take care of all the animals that come near me." To this end, she had herself locked in a cage on Dam Square and the Binnenhof in 1979 and 1980 on the occasion of World Animal Day.[14] She later stood with this on Fifth Avenue in New York.[15]

Source personal data.[16] Addresses: Sophienstraße 12 ground floor, Frankfurt am Main;[17] Schubertstraat 34hs, Amsterdam ('35); Gerrit van der Veenstraat 127bv (’45).[16]

Footnotes

  1. ^ Stadsarchief Amsterdam (SAA), Dienst Bevolkingsregister, Archiefkaarten, toegang 30328, inv. nr. 66: archiefkaart A.L. Bienes; inv. nr. 1366: archiefkaart H. Cohen.
  2. ^ SAA, Dienst Bevolkingsregister, Gezinskaarten, toegang 5422: gezinskaart A.L. Bienes.
  3. ^ SAA, Gemeentepolitie Amsterdam, inv. nr. 3867: vreemdelingenkaart M. Aschenbrand.
  4. a, b, c Anne Frank Stichting (AFS), Anne Frank Collectie (AFC), Getuigenarchief Bienes: interview door Dineke Stam, 24 november 1993.
  5. ^ SAA, Gerrit van der Veen Scholengemeenschap en rechtsvoorgangers, toegang 623, inv. nr. 307: rapportenregisters klas 1B, 1938-'39.
  6. ^ SAA, Gerrit van der Veen Scholengemeenschap en rechtsvoorgangers, toegang 623, inv. nr. 421: rapportenregisters klas 2A, 1939-'40.
  7. ^ Arolsen Archives, Index cards from the Jewish council file in Amsterdam, Reference Code: 01020402 017: Marion Bertha Bienes.
  8. ^ Nederlands Instituut voor Oorlogs-, Holocaust- en Genocidestudies NIOD: digitale collectie onderzoek Oranjehotel: Marion Bienes.
  9. ^ There was a group of Jews in Westerbork who could prove they had been baptised and had therefore been deferred from deportation by the occupying forces. However, on 4 September 1944, five hundred baptised Jews were nevertheless deported to Theresienstadt, see: J. Presser, Ondergang. De vervolging en verdelging van het Nederlandse Jodendom, 1940-1945, 's-Gravenhage: Staatsuitgeverij, 1965, deel I, p. 84-87.
  10. ^ Arolsen Archives, Index cards from the Jewish council file in Amsterdam, Reference Code: 01020402 017: Arthur Lorenz Bienes; List of names of Jewish victims of the Nazi regime in the Netherlands 1941-1945, Reference code: 2360002: René Bienes.
  11. ^ Arolsen Archives, Index cards from the Jewish council file in Amsterdam, Reference Code: 01020402 017: Hermine Bienes-Cohen.
  12. ^ SAA, Dienst Bevolkingsregister, Archiefkaarten, toegang 30328, inv. nr. 1298: archiefkaart M.B. Bienes; inv. nr. 92: archiefkaart J. Bonn; AFS, AFC, Getuigenarchief Bienes: interview 24 november 1993.
  13. ^ 'Marion Bienes bij Shaffy', Het Parool, 12 februari 1965.
  14. ^ ‘Voor het dier’, Nieuwsblad van het Noorden, 5 oktober 1979; ‘Vandaag is het Dierendag’, foto, Trouw, 4 oktober 1980.
  15. ^ 'Marion praatte vanuit kooi met verbaasde Amerikanen', Telegraaf, 7 mei 1982.
  16. a, b SAA, Dienst Bevolkingsregister, Archiefkaarten, toegang 30328, inv. nr. 1298: archiefkaart M.B. Bienes; Wikipedia: Marion Bienes.
  17. ^ Otto Fischer (uitg.), Eine Antwort auf die Greuel- und Boykotthetze der Juden im Ausland, Frankfurt am Main: Otto Fischer, 1935, p. 19.