Tina Strobos: Dutch Rescuer

Tina Strobos’ work exemplifies the courage and moral convictions of ordinary citizens during extraordinary times. Her legacy continues to inspire those studying rescue and resistance movements, humanitarian efforts and moral rectitude in the face of oppression. Through her bravery, she not only saved lives, but she also showed the power and force of individual action in the midst of a brutal occupation. Once the decision to help had been made, and the rescue had begun, a different self – a “rescuer,” and in her case, a “resistance self” – emerged, to do what had to be done and to keep this new person from becoming overwhelmed by new responsibilities and pressures. The rescuer/resistance self had to, in order to operate effectively, be secret and have all efforts and activities remain clandestine. Her courage was continually tested but as long as people needed her, she would be there – risking everything to insure their survival.

Tina remembers that even in the 1930’s, they had miners’ children staying at “282.” So, this offering of lodging was long a tradition in the family. Tina’s mother was the secretary of the women’s peace movement and helped German and Austrian refugees also for as long as Tina could remember. The image to the right is a painting of Tina Strobos. 

Starting at the age of six, Tina was sent to the Montessori School. The theory behind the school was that children should have the freedom to make their own choices and be allowed to act independently for optimal development. Tina’s father demanded Tina’s beloved grandmother Maria Abrahams, whom she was so close to, move out of house “282.” Maria found an apartment in the south of the city, a 45-minute walk away from her daughter and granddaughter.

By the time Tina turned ten (1930), her mother began to rent rooms in the large house to earn money. She also began sheltering children who had fled Germany due to the starvation there. After Hitler seized power in 1933, the number of refugees increased rapidly. Jews, communists, socialists, and other unwanted citizens fled Germany and found temporary accommodations at “282.” After Tina’s father left and she saw how much her mother did to help others, she not only admired her for her acts of selflessness, but also for her vast cultural and linguistic knowledge.

Like Willem, he was anticlerical and a freethinker. The Nazis targeted him, since he was the first CEO of the General Diamond Workers’ Union of the Netherlands and founder of the Dutch Social Democratic Workers’ Party, a Jew, a Marxist and a trade unionist. Polak was also a journalist who wrote articles in a newspaper called Het Volk (The People). He was highly respected for his emphasis on building order, education respectability among union members, improving of wages, shortening work hours, and improving cultural activities of union members, many of whom were previously marginalized in Dutch society and lived in the “Jordaan” (the working class district of Amsterdam).

Tina and her mother jumped into action. They thought it would be safer for the Polaks to go to Tina’s grandmother’s apartment. Maria Abrahams had a spare room and being over 80, was probably above suspicion. Polak and his wife stayed with Tina’s grandmother for several weeks in 1940 and they then moved on. Six weeks later he was arrested and imprisoned, and ultimately died in 1943 of pneumonia, after he was unexpectedly released by the NSB (the Dutch Nazi Party). Milly was deported to Westerbork transit camp, where she died in 1943.

Tina then joined a resistance group. They were involved with peaceful activities such as placing people in hiding and making passports, ID cards, etc. This organization would call on Tina and her friends to deliver Jews and Jewish children to safe addresses. She remembers spending a great deal of time each week on her bicycle that no longer had rubber tires (the Nazis had confiscated all the rubber tires in the Netherlands for the war effort) to bring passports to people in hiding in the north and providing them with printed food stamps and helping them to stay connected to their family members who were hidden elsewhere.

“282” became a kind of transit station. The goal was to shelter Jews and move them from one sympathetic house to another. They couldn’t keep most people for more than a few days because the house was raided so often. Furthermore, it wasn’t very safe because Tina and her mother were involved in too many activities. They had a forbidden radio that they listened to, hid people, forged numerous kinds of documents, stored contraband, and held underground medical classes.

Between 1942 and the end of 1944, the Gestapo (the Nazi Secret Police) visited Tina and her mother’s home eight times, and Tina was arrested nine times. In the autumn of 1940, Marie Schotte secretly began preparing her house so she could not only continue taking in boarders, but also assist people in hiding. The attic was only accessible by means of a loose ladder. This space was primarily used for washing and hanging the laundry to dry. Behind a tapestry on the first floor, a second house bell – an alarm bell – was installed. Tina and her mother could press that bell when the Gestapo were at the door downstairs. The people in hiding on the second and third floors could then quickly take cover.

One day a man with a toolbox came to the door and announced he was a carpenter. He said he had been sent by the Resistance to build a hiding place. Tina’s mother looked at her daughter and asked if she knew who this man was. “Of course not, but if we can’t trust him, whom can we trust?” So, they agreed to let him in and showed him the entire house and the attic. That was how Tina found out she was part of a second network of Resistance fighters. The carpenter built an attic within their attic – almost inaccessible. He fashioned a wall that closed off a gable. The gable window provided an escape route. The wall was so skillfully made that when Tina’s son and his family returned to “282” in the 1970s, they could not find the entrance to the hideaway without their mother’s assistance.

Each time the Gestapo made a raid, which lasted about three hours each time, they banged on all the interior walls, but they never discovered anything. It was the perfect lair but could cram three people into it at most. The Gestapo would also poke bayonets through walls, remove pictures wherever they were hanging, and roll up carpets. They never found anyone, nor did they discover the weapons, radios, or documents hidden elsewhere in the house.

Tina also would help bring her boarders to the next hiding place when she received coded messages from the Resistance that a new address was made available. She would provide new I.D. cards and passports. Several times she would help people travel to the Belgian border on her bicycle that had only the metal rims. Marie also played a role in organizing the house as a transit station for the Jewish families they sheltered. She monitored supplies, prepared food, and managed the home with precision. They developed a system of covert signals - a simple bell, a coded knock, a phrase - to issue the safety of those hidden in their attic.

Tina found herself involved in one of the most dangerous aspects of the Resistance – document forgery. She began creating false passports, ration cards, and I.D. documents, all essential for the Jewish families and Resistance members in hiding. These forged documents were lifelines often the only thing between safety and arrest. Tina knew the Nazis would kill her if she were caught. Yet the urgency of her work gave her the strength to continue. One of the most nerve-wracking parts of her work was transporting false passports to different safe houses scattered throughout the countryside. Tina would ride her bike for miles, the document hidden in the lining of her coat. Each check point was a potential death sentence. She quickly learned to assess the officers at each station. She knew when to act friendly, when to be disinterested, or when to appear innocently naïve. Her charm often diffused tense encounters allowing her to pass with a quick nod. One night she was questioned about her journey. With a calm, smile she said she had been visiting a sick relative, holding her breath as they inspected her belongings. After what seemed an eternity, they waived her off – oblivious to the documents hidden in her coat.

“282” became a machine of well-coordinated Resistance activity; some stayed only one night, others lingered for weeks waiting for safe passage to a new location. Tina always found herself comforting terrified families, helping them cope with the anxieties and the uncertainty of hiding. Her compassion brought comfort even if only for a short while. The Gestapo loomed heavily over every aspect of Tina’s life.

From 6:00 – 8:00 PM every evening, everyone would listen to the BBC broadcasts which started with the strokes of Big Ben in the background. Listening to foreign broadcasts and even Dutch ones was strictly forbidden and would, if discovered, lead to severe punishment and even being shot on the spot. Often the neighbors and Jews in hiding within walking distance would come and listen as well. So, Tina and Marie agreed that those coming from the outside would ring the doorbell with the Morse code V for Victory (3 short rings and one long one) the first notes of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony. Nevertheless, Tina and her mother were very fearful. When Churchill or the Queen of the Netherlands spoke on the BBC, as many as 35 or 40 people would come over after dark then run back to their respective hiding places before curfew at 8:00 PM.

End of the War

After that time, her Sachbearbeiter (clerical assistant), a young man and a protégé of Himmler, fell in love with her. To save her own life, she agreed to work for the Gestapo. She was taken to a hairdresser where her hair was bleached. She was also given a new identity. Housed in a spacious room in a Gestapo officer’s house, she was put to work. She maintained that she never betrayed anyone while working as a double agent. She managed at a certain point to contact another underground group to whom she told her true story. They began feeding her information that she could then bring back to her Gestapo “boyfriend.” The stress of being a double agent took its toll. By sheer luck, after several months of living under stressful conditions, she was able to escape using her former contacts because her parents, who were hidden elsewhere, knew Tina’s mother. She found her way to “282,” still dressed in the same summer clothes and sandals she had worn when she had gotten arrested in the summer of 1943.

Erika suffered from terrible backache as a result of rough treatment during questioning when she was arrested by the Sachbearbeiter. When she arrived at “282” she could barely walk. She posed a high risk for Tina and her mother. She couldn’t be transferred to another safe place after a few days like the other hiders, and she was extremely dangerous because the Gestapo were looking for her. Ordinarily, Tina, the medical student, attended to all illnesses among the “guests.” Taking great risk, Tina decided to discuss Erika’s backache with the doctor with whom she worked. On his advice, Tina took Erika to a Catholic hospital in Amsterdam for an operation.

Erika entered the hospital under a false name and false papers and had the surgery illegally. This surgery was new in the Netherlands, the surgeon who performed the operation had never done this procedure before, he had just read articles about it in his medical journals. The doctors did their best at great risk to their own lives to help those in hiding. Tina put her own life – and that of her mother – at great risk as well. Erika was in the hospital for more than six weeks. During this time, Tina visited her frequently in between all the other work she had to do. By the time Erika was discharged, the Netherlands had been liberated and her days of hiding were over.

Tina knew that the legacy of resistance, the lives saved, the friendships formed, and the hopes sustained, would endure – as each act of bravery solidified her place in history as a beacon of humanity amidst unimaginable hardship. By 1945 and the liberation of the Netherlands, Tina emerged from years of secrecy and sacrifice. Her commitment to others was unwavering. She was determined to make a positive impact on a world scarred by violence, trauma, and loss. Her work was deeply influenced by the strength and endurance she observed in those she sheltered and to whom she was dedicated.

Post-War Life: Recognition and Legacy

Because of the war, Tina had fallen behind with her medical studies and still had a number of exams to take. While at the University of Amsterdam she met a fellow medical student, Robert Strobos. He had a similar background as Tina’s. He was brought up in an atheist, liberal household. Unlike Tina, however, he was not active in the resistance, but he did not collaborate with the Nazis either. He just wanted to concentrate on his studies, but since he, too, had refused to sign the declaration of loyalty that Hitler had demanded, he went into hiding and studied medicine illegally during the war years.

After she obtained her M.D. degree in December 1947, Tina only wanted one thing after the war: to get away from the Netherlands. “It’s a weird form of patriotism,” she said. She needed to forget the war, the five long years of occupation, the sound of German boots on the streets and the evil songs of the German soldiers. Several of Tina’s close friends were leaving the country. In December, 1946 she left “282” and started a new life with Robert in an old warehouse apartment. On April 30, 1947, they married. In September 1949, Tina and Robert with their son Semon, headed for London. Robert became a fellow at the Department of Neurology in one of the hospitals there and qualified for a Fulbright scholarship. Tina found a job where orphans with mental disorders were housed. The director there was Anna Freud, the daughter of Sigmund Freud whom Tina greatly admired. Tina studied psychiatry under her tutelage from 1949-1951. In March 1951 Robert received a Fulbright from Columbia University. They moved to Westchester County where she undertook a residency at the Westchester Medical Center in Valhalla. They felt at home finally in New York.

In 1952, their second son, Jur, was born. In 1958, Tina received a part of her father’s inheritance. It was enough for them to buy a house in Larchmont, New York. On June 10, 1960, they became naturalized American citizens. A third child was born, but the marriage suffered. Tina and Robert divorced in 1964. In 1967, she married a renowned economist of Jewish descent, Walter Chudson. He had an interesting job working for the United Nationals Industrial Development organization. They settled in Larchmont, New York and stayed together until his death in 2002.

Tina built a career as a family psychiatrist with a special focus on working with the mentally impaired. She received the Elizabeth Blackwell Medal for her work in 1998. Her work was always immensely important to her. In addition, Tina spoke with both educators and students about her rescue and resistance work in the Netherlands through the Holocaust & Human Rights Education Center in White Plains, New York.

In 1970, twenty-five years after the end of World War II, Tina and her mother Marie had begun to reminisce more and more about that period of their lives. Tina and her mother had spoken to each other only once during the war about what they were doing and its dangers. “We’re hiding people. There are posters all over the city announcing the death penalty for helping or hiding Jews. Do you know we can be killed?” Marie said to her daughter. “Yes,” Tina replied. They never discussed the matter again. “We knew we couldn’t just stand by while Jewish people were killed,” Tina later stated.

Marie had gone to a nursing home, but “282,” the house that sheltered so many people during the war, remained in the family. In 1972, Tina wrote to her mother that it was so remarkable how many ideas about social justice and the struggle of the underdog she had learned from her and now was using in her own work. On November 25, 1973, her mother passed away. A small advertisement appeared in the newspaper stating that Marie Schotte’s body had been donated to science. There were no obituaries. Even in death Marie Schotte was modest.

After the war Tina said she felt guilty for many years that she hadn’t done enough. She knew people who needed shelter, and she couldn’t find it for them. Some things she did she felt she had done wrong. She said: “I wouldn’t call what I did a sacrifice because we believed so strongly that we were doing the right thing. Today, I simply feel that if there are altruists and egoists, I’d like to be counted as one of the good guys.” 

In 1989 Tina Strobos and her mother, Marie Schotte (posthumously), were officially recognized as "Righteous Among the Nations" by Yad Vashem (the World Holocaust Remembrance Center in Jerusalem, Israel) for being actively involved in saving Jews from the threat of death or deportation and for having risked their own lives and liberty in their attempt to save Jews. The motive for rescue was to protect and save Jews from the Holocaust. Tina, working with her mother and her maternal grandmother, Maria Abrahams, saved more than 100 during the war. Tina denied any heroism.

“It was only decent,” she said. “I never believed in God, but I do believe in the sacredness of life.” She said that she didn’t care whether they believed or didn’t believe in God or that they were Jewish but cared that they were being treated inhumanely. She believed that all life is sacred and that now that the Nazis were killing millions of Jewish people, she could not bear it.

In 2009, Tina was honored for her rescue work by the Holocaust & Human Rights Education Center in White Plains, New York with its Courage to Care Award. When asked in interviews why she had risked her life to save others, Tina said: “It’s the right thing to do. Your conscience tells you to do it. I believe in heroism, and when you’re young you want to do dangerous things.” Tina retired from her private practice in 2009 at the age of 89. She passed away in 2012 at the age of 91.

In a study of rescuers Ervin Staub states, “Goodness, like evil, often begins in small steps. Heroes evolve; they aren’t born. Very often the rescuers made only a small commitment at the start – to hide someone for a day or two. But once they had taken that step, they began to see themselves differently, as someone who helps. What starts as mere willingness becomes intense involvement.” Daniel Goleman “Great altruists: Science ponders soul of goodness” (Berger, 2012)