Does anyone know what happened to Peter and the rest of the Van Danns after they were sent to the camps?
Posted: January 24th, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: Q & A | Tags: after, Anyone, CAMPS, Danns, happened, know, Peter, rest, sent, they, were | 1 Comment »In the Diary of Ann Frank
Peter van Pels (November 8, 1926 – c May 5, 1945), was a German Jewish refugee who hid with Anne Frank and six other people in the Secret Annex on the Prinsengracht, Amsterdam, during the Nazi Occupation of the Netherlands, and who died in the Mauthausen concentration camp. In the published version of Anne Frank’s diary he was given the pseudonym Peter van Daan.
Following an anonymous betrayal, the eight refugees were arrested by the Gestapo on 4 August 1944. They were imprisoned in Amsterdam for several days before being taken to Westerbork on August 8, where they were held in the Punishment Barracks, reserved for those arrested in hiding. On 3 September the group was deported on what would be the last transport from Westerbork to the Auschwitz concentration camp. They arrived after a three-day journey, and were separated by gender, with the men and women never to see each other again.
Peter, his father, Otto Frank, and Fritz Pfeffer were assigned to a forced labour group from which Hermann van Pels was selected for the gas chambers in September or October 1944, in a selection witnessed by Peter and by Otto Frank, who subsequently protected Peter during their period of imprisonment together.
Evacuations from the camp started shortly before the Red Army arrived to liberate it on January 27, 1945, and Peter was among those removed. Otto Frank later recalled that he had urged Peter to hide and remain behind with him, rather than set out on the forced march. Peter decided that he would have a better chance of survival if he joined the march. It is not known whether Peter was included in the many death marches out of Auschwitz, or transported by train or truck, but he was registered in the Mauthausen-Gusen concentration camp on January 25. According to the camp records he was placed in quarantine until January 29, then assigned to an outdoor labour group until April 11 when he was sent to the sick barracks. His death at the age of eighteen occurred at some point before the liberation of Mauthausen on May 8, 1945, but in the absence of a recorded date the Red Cross designated his date of death as May 5th.