Biography
Elisabeth Elly Anholt (born Elisabeth Kleerkoper) is the daughter of Sigmund Emanuel and Hanna Kleerkoper. She was born on July 30, 1939 in Amsterdam where her father was a businessman, and her mother was his secretary. She has one older sister Marjetta born on December 31, 1937. In the spring of 1940, Sigmund went to England on business with the intention of only remaining a few days. However, while he was there, Germany launched a surprise invasion of The Netherlands on May 10. Unable to return home, Sigmund joined the Dutch free forces in England and fought with the Allies. He was in Australia when the war ended and only returned home in February 1946. Left alone with two young daughters, Hanna moved in with her in-laws. In the spring of 1942 the situation of Dutch Jews became much more endangered as the Germans began rounding up Jews and sending them to concentration camps. Through friends, Hanna made contact with the Dutch underground to find hiding places for daughters and herself. In April, a young woman Tiny (now Boeke) visited Hanna and told her that she was a nurse working with the underground and had found two families willing to hide her daughters. (Tiny was later arrested and sent to concentration camp; she survived the war and returned to Holland.) "Aunt Tiny" came back to the apartment on August 5, 1942 to retrieve Elisabeth, just one week after her third birthday. She brought her to the home of Anton and Wilhelmina Heger in the small town of Zeist near Utrecht. They told their neighbors that Elisabeth "Klinkhamer" was an orphan whose parents died during the bombing of Zeeland. The Hegers had three children of their own, including a 19-year-old son who had to go into hiding himself in order to escape conscription for forced labor in Germany. Not only did the Hegers lovingly care for Elisabeth as if she was their own daughter, but they also kept Hanna fully informed of her development and progress. The Hegers also were involved with other underground activities including manufacturing false papers and "legalizing" them by slipping information into city registries. Elisabeth stayed with Hegers until end of war May 1945. Elisabeth's sister lived nearby with the family of Dirk and Cornelia van der Kamp, relatives of the Hegers. Hanna also survived in hiding and reunited with both daughters after the war. In 1970 Yad Vashem recognized Anton and Wilhelmina Heger as Righteous Among the Nations and recognized the van der Kamps three years later.
