Sally De Jong

Personal

Vocation

Traits

Dutch Jewish physician, who became an assistant of Joseph Mengele in his twin project and died after the war in KZ Buchenwald. Sally de Jong was the son of the milkman Godfried de Jong (17 August 1891, Amsterdam - 4 June 1943, Sobibór, Poland) and Betsij Aleng (22 December 1888, Amsterdam - 4 June 1943, Sobibór). His on the same day born brother was the Dutch Holocaust historian and journalist Louis de Jong. The two twin brothers had a strenuous relation. Years later, it came out that the twin brother of the famous historian Louis de Jong, of whom he never wished to speak about, had cooperated with Josef Mengele in Auschwitz in his weird twin experiments. Their younger sister Jeannette de Jong (12 October 1930, Amsterdam - 4 June 1943, Sobibór) was killed during the Holocaust before she could establish a family. According to his also very intelligent twin brother Louis de Jong, Sally (named after Salomon) was his parents favourite. Both followed the Vossius Gymnasium in Amsterdam. Sally then studied medicine at the UvA, and became a PhD physician on 3 October 1940 in Amsterdam. His thesis "The excretion of aneurin in urine, and related problems" dealt with vitamin B1. Lack of the thio-vitamine ("sulfur-containing vitamin") is a common cause of dementia or memory loss. Sally married Elisabeth "Liesje" van Male (7 May 1915, Deventer – 1 March 1944, Auschwitz) and got two children, who survived the Holocaust. July 1943 Sally and Liesje escaped from Camp Westerbork and fled to France. But here they were captured again, imprisoned in Camp Drancy and on 17 December 1943 transported to Auschwitz. He survived Auschwitz by becoming a member of the criminal twin experiments of Josef Mengele. But Mengele promised twins some more time to live. As they were "useful" for his criminal medical experiments. When the Russians approached the camp, he was transported to Camp Buchenwald, near Weimar, where he died of exhaustion after the war. His twin brother, the historian Louis was jealous of his twin brother Sally, even after his tragic faith. Early in sixties Louis had psychological treatment for it. It started 1959 on advise of his wife. But Louis never mentioned his twin brother in his partly autobiographical work. Sally died 31 May 1945 of exhaustion and chronic lack of vitamins in his food after the liberation of his camp, near Goethe's city Weimar in Buchenwald.