HOLLANDSCHE SCHOUWBURG (DUTCH THEATRE)

From 26 January to 31 May 2010, the new presentation Auschwitz now. Three generations later will be on display every day in the entrance hall of the Hollandsche Schouwburg. Find out more . . .

During part of the Second World War, in 1942 and 1943, the Hollandsche Schouwburg (the Dutch Theatre) was used as a deportation centre for Jews. The theatre, built in 1892 as a centre for relaxation and entertainment in the heart of the old Jewish quarter of Amsterdam, became a place of grief and anguish. Thousands of men, women and children were sent by train from here to Westerbork transit camp in Holland, and from there to death camps. Few of them lived to return. In the course of the Second World War 104,000 Dutch Jews were killed in Nazi extermination camps.

In 1962 the Hollandsche Schouwburg formally became a war memorial, in remembrance of the Jews who perished under the Nazi regime.

The theatre auditorium has been replaced by an open courtyard with an obelisk where the theatre stage once stood. The entrance hall leads into a memorial chapel where an eternal flame is burning. Engraved on a special Wall of Remembrance here, are the family names of all the Jews from the Netherlands who perished during the Second World War.

On the first floor there is an exhibition covering the persecution of Jews in the Netherlands. The second floor is used for educational activities.