Next, the women were counted off into groups
154. Corrie ten Boom: Keeper of the Angels' Den
Next, the women were counted off into groups of fifty and told to wait. Since Corrie was at the front of her group, she could see what was happening. The first group of fifty women were told to leave all their belongings, including the blankets, in a pile by the door of a long, low building. No one was recording who had left what behind. Corrie's heart chilled. That could mean only one thing; they were not going to get the things back. After the women had handed over their belongings, they were told to strip naked and step into the building. For fifteen horrible minutes Corrie thought they had been ushered into a gas chamber. Then, to her relief, she caught sight of the women coming out of a door at the far end of the building. They were all wearing thin cotton dresses with a large "X" sewn on the front and on the back.
Panic gripped Corrie as she watched. What would she and Betsie do without their Bible? And Betsie needed the warm woolen sweater Nollie had sent her, too. "God," she prayed as she stood waiting for their turn to be processed, "please help me to find a way to get these things through."
Just then, Betsie doubled over. "My stomach," she groaned. "I have to get to a bathroom fast."
Corrie looked around. They were too far away from the ditch they had used for the past few days. Bravely she stepped out of line and spoke to a guard. "My sister has to go to the bathroom now. She is sick; she cannot wait."
The guard looked at the two of them and
Number 66730 155 growled, "Over there. Use the shower drain." He pointed his rifle towards the entrance the naked women had gone in.
Corrie helped Betsie to the showers, which were in a huge, dark, damp room with a row of moldy chairs stacked at the far end. In a flash, Corrie had an inspiration. "Quick, Betsie, take off your sweater," she said.
Without questioning, Betsie took it off and handed it to her sister.
"Watch for the guards," Corrie whispered as she pulled the Bible and its pouch over her head. She ran the length of the shower building and tucked the Bible, bottle of vitamin drops, and blue woolen sweater between the chairs. In less than a minute she was back beside Betsie.
"Let's get back into line, quickly," she said, helping Betsie up.
Once in line again they had another half hour to wait until it was their turn to strip and shower. The whole dehumanizing process was made bearable by the fact that they had their things waiting for them near the exit to the showers.
A pile of well-worn dresses was dumped on the floor, and the women scrambled to find one that fit them. Corrie found the perfect dress for Betsie. It had long sleeves, which would hide the sweater underneath. Betsie put it on while Corrie found a dress for herself. In the confusion of the other women trying to find a dress that fit, Corrie slipped away and recovered the things she had hidden between the chairs. She pulled the pouch with the Bible in it over her head. She slipped the bottle of vitamin drops inside the pouch as well, and she tied the sweater around her waist under her dress. Then she rejoined the group.
"Line up by the door," yelled a guard who had just walked in.
Corrie's heart sank as she joined the line. Three more guards had appeared, and by hand they were searching each woman from head to toe. They would surely feel the sweater and the pouch in an instant. "God," she prayed again in desperation, "we can go through anything if we have this Bible with us. Please send your angels to hide it from the guards."
Corrie took a deep breath; the woman in front of her was being searched. It would be her turn next. But her turn never came. Instead the guard reached right past her and began to search Betsie. Corrie just kept walking. Later, when she talked to the other women processed that day, Corrie discovered she was the only one who had not been searched. Tears ran down her cheeks as she thanked God for protecting the Bible, and she wondered about what lay ahead for the ten Boom sisters.
Passed Inspection any thousands of prisoners were being held in Ravensbruck concentration camp. Corrie and Betsie and the other women from Vught soon fell into the dull routine of life there. Every morning they were awakened by a whistle at four o'clock. A slice of black bread and cup of hot "coffee" were provided for breakfast, and then all prisoners were to be lined up in rows of ten outside their barracks by four-thirty. Sometimes they stood in line until six or seven in the morning. At first this was not so bad, but as fall turned into early winter, many of the women could not stand in the cold for that long. A thud would be heard as someone hit the ground, followed by the footsteps and shouts of guards. Every prisoner knew what would happen next, but it was seldom talked about in the camp—it was too awful.
Ravensbruck had a large gas chamber where weak and disobedient prisoners were put to death. Often, rumor had it, a prisoner was tricked into thinking she was going to have a shower before being sent to the hospital. She would strip of her clothes willingly, accept a fresh bar of soap, and join other prisoners "showering" in the room. Soon the metal doors would slam shut, and within minutes the surprised and terrified prisoners would be dead from breathing the poisonous gas that was let into the chamber. The bodies would then be thrown into a large incinerator that burned night and day.
After roll call, the women would go to their work assignments. At first, Corrie and Betsie worked side by side at the nearby Siemens factory. Siemens was a large German industrial company that supplied Hitler's army. At the factory, the two sisters, along with hundreds of other sick and dying women, were made to push huge boxcars filled with scrap iron along the railroad track and inside the building, where they unloaded the boxcars by hand into huge bins. Sometimes a piece of iron would weigh hundreds of pounds, and a group of women would work together to heave it into a bin.
The women worked beside German workers who were paid wages for their labor and came to work with cheese sandwiches and boiled eggs for lunch and at night went home to wives and children. Although they worked within a few feet of
Passed Inspection
each other, the German workers never once looked over at the women from Ravensbruck.
After twelve hours of backbreaking work, the women were marched back to the concentration camp, where they were given watery soup for dinner and then locked in their barracks for the night.
Corrie and Betsie were in Barracks 28, a long, low room. Instead of having cots to sleep on, it had rows of wide shelves stacked three high. Each shelf was only about two feet above the one below. The women were expected to sleep on the shelves. On her first night in the barracks, Corrie had been overcome by the noise and the horrible stench of vomit and human waste. The next morning, she found out why. One of the prisoners told her there were over fourteen hundred women packed into a barracks designed to hold only four hundred. And those fourteen hundred women were locked in at night, with only eight backed-up toilets to use. Corrie decided that if ever there was hell on earth, Ravensbruck must be it. She had never imagined a more dirty, overcrowded, and cruel place could exist than Vught.
On top of that, Barracks 28 had the reputation of being the most flea-infested barracks in all Ravensbruck. Because of this, the guards would stand at the door and bark orders, but they virtually never set foot inside. At first Corrie had hated the fleas, but when she found they kept the guards away, she was grateful for them. At night, the ten Boom sisters could hold Bible studies and prayer meetings for the other prisoners without being caught.
At first just a handful of women were interested in listening to the Bible study, but slowly the mood in the barracks changed, and many women wanted to hear what the sisters had to say. Of course, in Ravensbruck not all the women were Dutch. Women from all over Europe were imprisoned there, and a system for reading the Bible so they could all understand was soon developed. Betsie would read the Bible passage in Dutch and German, and then other women in the room would translate it into French, Italian, Polish, and Russian. Night after night the women listened to the Bible being read in this way. And after Betsie had shared about God's love for them all, they would sing a hymn together and pray. Soon Barracks 28 became known as the "crazy barracks where the women have hope."
As winter approached, the women who went to work in the Seimens factory were each issued a coat. Then one morning they were not sent to the factory at all. Instead, Corrie and Betsie found themselves sitting on their "bed" in the barracks knitting gray socks for soldiers. No one knew for sure why they no longer went to the factory. Some women were sure it had been hit by Allied bombs. After all, nearby Berlin was now a constant target of bombs from Allied aircraft.
Betsie was a lightning-fast knitter and finished her quota of socks for the day long before anyone else. As soon as she had knitted the last stitch, she would take the Bible from its pouch and begin reading it aloud. Groups of women knitted quietly and listened as she shared about the importance of what she had read. Betsie encouraged the women to pray for the men who would be wearing the socks they were knitting. At first they laughed at her. It was impossible to think of praying for German soldiers. Surely God didn't expect them to do that? But Betsie read them passages about how Jesus had forgiven the men who nailed Him to the cross. And they recited the Lord's Prayer together: "Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us." And slowly many of the women began to see and understand what being a Christian was really all about.
Even though knitting was easier than factory work, Corrie began to worry more about Betsie's health. Betsie coughed and coughed during the long morning roll calls, and when Corrie took her to the hospital, she was told that Betsie was not sick enough to be examined by a doctor. No one with a temperature under 104 degrees was seen by a doctor!
There was nothing Corrie could do for her sister but watch and pray. She noticed that when Betsie was holding a Bible study, she seemed quite normal, but the rest of the time, she seemed to be in a sort of dream. She would lie in her sleeping space and say to Corrie, "We will be free before the new year. I can see us walking the streets of Haarlem together. Yes, by New Year's Day 1945, we will be nee
Corrie would hug her tightly with tears streaming down her face. Then Betsie would go on, "Corrie, think of all the people who will need our help when the war ends. We will find a place for them to come to. It will be a beautiful place. There will be huge gardens, and the floors will be made of inlaid wood." Then she would speak as though she were standing in the entrance hall of such a place.
"Look," she would say, "there are marble statues set in little nooks all along the walls. And the staircase, it is so wide, and the windows are tall, right to the roof."
Corrie often wondered whether her sister was imagining heaven when she spoke like that.
With all her might, Corrie hoped and prayed that the war would be over soon so that Betsie could get the medical help she so desperately needed. Every day, Betsie had less energy than the day before. Finally, one morning in mid-December, it happened. Betsie collapsed during roll call. The guards came for her and dragged her away. But she was taken not to the gas chamber but to the camp hospital. Later that day, after she had finished her knitting, Corrie sneaked into the hospital to see Betsie. Betsie was lying comfortably in a bed. Corrie smiled at her. What a luxury—she had a whole cot to herself! But as ill as Betsie obviously was, she told Corrie she still had not been examined by a doctor. As Corrie bent over the bed to kiss her sister good-bye, Betsie grabbed her arm. Her eyes were shining brightly. "We must tell them, Corrie. We must tell them there is no pit so deep that God's love cannot reach it."
The next morning after roll call, Corrie raced back to see Betsie. She decided to check through the window first to see whether the way was clear. Corrie rubbed a clear patch in the icy glass and peered in. There were two nurses next to Betsie's bed. One was standing at the head of the bed and the other at the foot. As Corrie stared, they each lifted the corners of the bedsheet and carried it down the corridor with Betsie on it. Corrie stood rooted to the spot by the window. Her eyes had seen it, but her mind refused to accept it. Her big sister, her best friend, was dead. The nurses were carrying her body to the incinerator.
Finally, Corrie backed away from the window and walked to the barracks. When she got there, the other women clamored for news of Betsie. A sad hush fell over the room as Corrie told them what she had seen.
Even though she was surrounded by so many women, the next two days were the loneliest of Corrie's life, lonelier than when she had been locked up by herself in Scheveningen. She felt numb. Tears streamed across her cheeks, and she was lost in her thoughts. Instead of their being free before the new year, Betsie was dead. How could it be? And as if her grief at losing Betsie weren't enough, a terrible rumor that all women over fifty were soon to be