Monne de Miranda

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Salomon "Monne" Rodrigues de Miranda (born March 21, 1875 in Amsterdam , † November 3, 1942 in the transit camp Amersfoort ) was a Dutch trade unionist and local politician of the Sociaal Democratische Arbeiders Partij (SDAP).

Political career

Monne de Miranda was of Sephardic descent and grew up in the Amsterdam Jodenbuurt . At the age of eleven, at the behest of his father, he began training as a diamond cutter , although he would have liked to continue attending school himself. The training lasted around six years. After completing his apprenticeship, de Miranda was one of around 10,000 diamond cutters in Amsterdam, 7,000 of whom were of Jewish origin. Although diamond cutters were high in the workforce in terms of merit and prestige, the working conditions and the protection of workers in the event of accidents were "miserable" in relation to the high profits of the entrepreneurs. In 1894 there was a strike demanding a minimum wage; the demand was met after one day.

The Central Market Halls (1932)

This experience resulted in the establishment of the Algemeene Nederlandsche Diamantbewerkersbonds (ANDB), the first modern trade union in the Netherlands, in which Jewish and Christian workers were also organized together. Monne de Miranda became a member of the ANDB as well as the SDAP and emancipated himself from his Jewish faith; he never wanted to go into a synagogue again .

In 1903 Monne de Miranda traveled to Paris for a year to broaden his horizons; against the wishes of her parents, 20-year-old Selly Ellion followed him to live with him. The couple married in Amsterdam in 1905 and moved to the Transvaal district in 1911 ; it had five children. In the same year de Miranda was elected to the Amsterdam City Council for the SDAP, of which he was a member with short interruptions until 1939; In 1919 he became an alderman for the food supply, and later for housing. De Miranda's wife Selly died in 1923 after a long illness. Three years later, de Miranda married the teacher of his mentally handicapped daughter Janny, Wilhelmina Timmerman, and the couple had two more children. Wilhelmina Timmerman, who was not Jewish, remained employed until 1931, but then lost her job because a law was passed against the background of high unemployment, according to which married civil servants were dismissed.

As a politician, De Miranda initiated a large number of important projects in Amsterdam. He initiated the construction of the Centrale Markthallen in Amsterdam and promoted housing construction as well as large employment programs such as the Amsterdamse Bos and the Flevopark . In 1926 de Miranda presented a balance sheet according to which around 39,000 apartments had been built in Amsterdam over the past five years. He became particularly popular with the construction of several swimming pools, including the Amstelparkbad (today De Mirandabad ). His ambitious plan from 1926 to build a garden city for the Amsterdam workers failed due to massive opposition from the wealthy residents of Het Gooi . In 1929, the new Amsterdam-Zuid district was inaugurated, designed by the renowned architect Hendrik Petrus Berlage .

In 1939 the daily De Telegraaf published an anti-Semitic article accusing Monne de Miranda of financial irregularities. After an investigation by a commission of the local council, the allegations turned out to be incorrect. De Miranda was acquitted of corruption and bribery, but "political errors" were certified, including by members of his own party. Because of these events, De Miranda fell into a deep depression. He was unable to attend the relevant sessions and had to go to a mental health facility . He never returned to the parish council. He wrote Pro Domo for his defense, but it was no longer published because of the outbreak of World War II . The font did not appear in print until 1997.

Death in the camp

Due to his continued political activities during the occupation by the Germans, de Miranda was unpleasant to the occupiers. In 1941, during the February strike , he refused to support the Judenrat's appeal to the strikers to resume work.

De Miranda was arrested in July 1942 and taken to the Kamp Amersfort concentration camp in October . According to Barbara Beuys, he was already beaten and verbally abused at the "reception ceremony". Then the 67-year-old - a small, petite man - was assigned to physically particularly difficult work in the Jewish detachment and had to push wheelbarrows with heavy stones over sandy ground. He was continuously beaten. After a few days he collapsed. Beuys: "In the evening a Jewish fellow prisoner is forced to bring the unconscious, bleeding, mud-smeared old man in a wheelbarrow to the roll call area and to tip it onto the rain-soaked floor." Later, he is said to have been hosed down with cold water in the washroom, until he died. Monne de Miranda officially died on the night of November 3, 1942 of "weak heart".

According to the historian Loe de Jong , de Miranda was badly mistreated by three fellow prisoners, who are said to have been three former members of the Geuzen resistance group . These men were brought back to the Netherlands by the Germans from the Buchenwald concentration camp in order to terrorize their fellow prisoners there. The leader of the alleged murderers, Kapo Teun van Es, was sentenced to twelve years imprisonment after the war for a total of 55 acts of mistreatment and murder. In his biography of de Miranda, the historian Gilles Borrie again takes the view that these fellow prisoners were communists, and he named the camp elder Jan Hurkmans. Research by the former director of the NIOD , Hans Blom , came to the conclusion that Hurkmans was not involved. The circumstances of de Miranda's death continue to be debated in the Netherlands.

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Beuys, Leben mit dem Feind , p. 22.
  2. ↑ Beyus, Life with the Enemy , p. 23.
  3. ↑ Beyus, Life with the Enemy , p. 23.
  4. ↑ Beyus, Life with the Enemy , p. 29.
  5. ↑ Stephan Steinmetz: Asterdorp. Atlas Contact, Uitgeverij, 2016, ISBN 978-9-045-03031-9 ( limited preview in Google book search).
  6. ↑ Beyus, Life with the Enemy , p. 36.
  7. ↑ a b Beyus, Life with the Enemy , p. 37.
  8. ↑ Beyus, Life with the Enemy , p. 42.
  9. ^ Joost Lagendijk: De miranda's pro domo. In: groene.nl. April 16, 1997, accessed October 16, 2016 .
  10. ↑ SR de Miranda on Nationaal Monument Kamp Amersfoort ( Memento from January 29, 2009 in the Internet Archive )
  11. ↑ Beuys, Leben mit dem Feind , p. 233.
  12. ↑ a b Bert Bakkenes: Eindelijk de waarheid over de dood van Monne de Miranda. (No longer available online.) In: afvn.nl. November 2, 1942, archived from the original on October 16, 2016 ; accessed on October 16, 2016 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.afvn.nl
personal data
SURNAME Miranda, Monne de
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Miranda, Salomon Rodrigues de (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Dutch local politician and trade unionist
DATE OF BIRTH March 21, 1875
PLACE OF BIRTH Amsterdam
DATE OF DEATH November 3, 1942
Place of death Amersfoort transit camp