David Joskowiec lived in Belgium. In 1942, he and other Belgian Jews were deported from the SS-Sammellager Mechelen to Auschwitz-Birkenau.
David Joskowiec, born on 10 August 1923 in Wielun – Wilna, he was a person of Jewish heritage who lived in Belgium. He was a furrier by trade.
Belgium was invaded by the Nazi Germany on 10 May 1940. Subsequently, life for Belgian Jews worsened, as heavy restrictions were placed on their everyday movements. Every Jewish person in Belgium had to register for the Association of Jews in Belgium. Through this process, Belgian Jews were identified and registered by the Nazi regime.
David Joskowiec was registered in the SS-Sammellager on 27 October 1942.
Kazerne Dossin, a former barracks, served as the point of departure for Jews in Belgium heading towards Auschwitz-Birkenau and other concentration camps for forced labour and extermination. It was then known as the SS-Sammellager Mechelen.
He would only live till the age of 20. He was deported from Mechelen on 20 September 1943 on the Transport XXIIA with the transport number 37. There were 640 deportees on that particular train. Only five of them managed to escape from the train. Out of those who ended up in a concentration camp, 32 would survive.
Alongside him, his father Tobias Joskowiec, aged 51 and a business man by trade, was deported on the same transport.
His older brother Chaim dit Harry Joskowiec, aged 21, was deported a year earlier on 18 August 1942.
None of the three family members survived the Holocaust.
