A large group of girls, some wearing white dresses, pose outside a grotto near the Convent St. Antoine de Padua following the first communion of some of the girls.

Photograph | Digitized | Photograph Number: 66477

Overview

Caption: A large group of girls, some wearing white dresses, pose outside a grotto near the Convent St. Antoine de Padua following the first communion of some of the girls.

Among those pictured are Jewish girls hiding in the convent.
Date: 1944 March 19
Locale: Sint-Pieters-Leeuw, [Brabant] Belgium
Variant Locale: Leeuw-Saint-Pierre
Photo Credit: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Anne Marie Yellin

Photo Source: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

Copyright: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

Provenance: Anne Marie Yellin

Source Record ID: Collections: 2002.413.1

Keyword: CHILDREN (4-12 YEARS) CHILDREN/YOUTH CONVENTS/MONASTERIES FIRST COMMUNION GROUP PORTRAITS JEWS (FOREIGN BORN IN BELGIUM) JEWS IN HIDING NUNS RESCUERS/RESCUE YOUTH (13-20 YEARS)
Photo Designation: RESCUERS & RESCUED -- Belgium

Biography: AnneMarie Feller (later Yellin) is the daughter of Hermann Feller and Frieda Happ Feller. She was born in Chemnitz, Germany in December 6, 1938. With her family, AnneMarie fled Germany and came to Belgium. In May 1940 Germany invaded Belgium and began instituting antisemitic decrees. When Germany began deporting Belgium's Jews, AnneMarie went into hiding with the help of Andree Guelen (Herscovici) from the Committee for the Defense of the Jews (CDJ), an organization devoted to the rescue of Jewish children. She was placed in hiding in the convent St. Antoine de Padue, outside of Brussels. The convent's Mother Superior hid a total of ten Jewish adults, twenty-eight Jewish children, British parachutists, resistance fighters, and various weapons.