Elisabeth Cassutto

Who was Elisabeth Cassutto?

Elisabeth "Elly" Cassutto was the wife of Rev. Ernest H. Cassutto, a fellow Holocaust survivor from The Netherlands.

Elly Rodrigues as she was known, was born in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, on April 23, 1931. She and her older brother, Henry, came from an observant Jewish family. She was a neighbor and schoolmate of Anne Frank. Like Anne, she and her family were forced to go into hiding when the Nazis occupied Holland during WW II. She and her brother were split up and sent to the Dutch countryside. They were hidden by two Christian sisters, Margriet "Grietje" Bogaards and Annie Ketel. During that time, Elly had to assimilate herself in the community as a Christian young girl and was told she had to change her last name to Van Tol, a generic Dutch name. She had to learn the New Testament and Christian songs and go to church to avoid detection. After the war, she and Henry learned that their parents had been captured and gassed in Auschwitz.

She had become a Christian and her guardian, Miss Bogaards, was allowed to adopt her. She did not want to abandon her Jewishness and joined the Hebrew Christian Youth Alliance. Henry, however, did not convert.