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 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 free.”
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 “exterminated” made its way around the barracks. According to the rumor, Ravensbruck was running out of food to feed all the prisoners, so it had been decided to reduce the number of prisoners in the camp by gassing the older ones. When Corrie heard this, despite her grief, she was glad Betsie had gone to be in a better place.
On December 17, 1944, three days after Betsie’s death, the morning roll call went as usual, that is, until dismissal. The whistle blew, and then, “ten Boom, Cornelia, remain behind,” bellowed through the loudspeaker. Corrie started to march away with the others. Even though she had heard the announcement, she had been number 66730 for so long that she hardly recognized her own name. Slowly the words sank in, and she stopped marching. They had called her by name. Names were never used in Ravensbruck. She tried to think what it could mean. What could the Nazis want with her now? Had someone reported her for visiting Betsie in the hospital? Or for holding Bible studies in the barracks? Corrie didn’t know. But whatever it was, she hoped she would be able to sit down soon. In the past few weeks her legs had become so swollen and the skin was stretched so tight across them that it stung when she stood.
“Follow me,” barked a guard. Corrie did her best to keep up. She followed the guard all the way to the camp administration building. Once inside, Corrie was motioned to sit on a long wooden bench with nine other prisoners. An officer was sitting opposite them behind a large desk. He had piles of papers in front of him which he kept moving from side to side. Eventually, he looked up and called, “ten Boom, Cornelia, step up to the desk.”
Corrie got painfully to her feet and shuffled over to his desk as she had been ordered.
“Birthday?” he asked.
Corrie had to think hard for a moment. “April 15, 1892,” she finally replied.
“Good,” the officer said as he pulled a large rubber stamp from the top drawer of his desk. He rubbed it on an ink pad several times and then thumped it down on the piece of paper in front of him. Then he handed the paper to Corrie and called the next name.
Corrie stepped back from the desk and stared at the paper. The rubber stamp had printed “Discharged” in red ink on the page. Could it possibly be true? After all she had been through, could she really be going home? Home to Nollie and Willem and the Beje? She looked around in wonder. Would this really be her last day in this terrible place?
“Follow me,” commanded another guard, and Corrie was led into the next room. “Clothes over there. Final health check,” said the guard, as she pointed to a pile of prison dresses on the floor. Corrie quickly took her clothes off and joined the group of naked women sitting at the far end of the room. They sat together and waited. Each of them held a piece of paper similar to Corrie’s, but no one spoke. The women were all deep in their own thoughts. At first Corrie was thrilled to be free, but then she began to think the whole think might be a trap. Maybe they were really on their way to the gas chamber. She had heard that the Nazis played tricks like that so that prisoners would go quietly and unsuspectingly into the chamber.
“Through the door,” motioned the guard.
All of a sudden Corrie could not move. She was too scared. What if there was a gas chamber on the other side of the door? Corrie saw panic on some of the other prisoners’ faces. But since she had no choice but to obey, slowly she stood up and walked with the other women towards the door. To her relief, on the other side was a young man in a doctor’s coat. “Stand against the wall,” he told the women.
The women obeyed.
“Bend over. Touch your toes,” he commanded. “Now, stand up straight,” he barked, and then walked along the row of women. He looked each woman up and down. “Passed,” he said three times; then he stopped at Corrie. He looked down and then said flatly, “Swollen legs. Hospital.”
Corrie hurried along behind a trusty. “Is it true I’ve been released?” she asked.
The trusty looked at her kindly and said, “Yes. If you have the paper, you are released. But they won’t let you go until you are well enough.”
