Van Pels Family Essay

Imagine not being able to go outside for over two years and living with another family you have never met. As difficult as this may seem to believe, this is exactly what the Frank family and the Van Pels family had to go through, along with many other restrictions on their daily life. After the innocent killing of Jews during the Holocaust began, thousands of Jewish families were forced into hiding just like the Franks and Van Pels. Miep was one non-Jew who helped these families stay hidden by providing them with food, information, and many other items. They hid in the secret Annex in the back of Mr. Frank’s warehouse. To ensure they were well hidden, they disguised the door leading to the Annex as a bookcase. Mr. and Mrs. Frank had two
They were usually stuck living off of bread, beans, and rotten potatoes. On rare occasions, Miep brought them strawberries and cake to celebrate special holidays like New Years. However, the group had a very restricted food supply for eight people, so everyone was extremely hungry and desired more appealing meals. Furthermore, Mr. Van Pels was caught stealing bread when everyone was asleep. This pushed Mrs. Frank over the edge. She was furious that he was taking food that didn’t belong to him when the children were getting thinner by each day. Everyone started turning on one another just because someone had more food. This is proof of how important the food was for
Some of these rules included not going outside or even looking out the windows. From 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. everyone hiding in the Annex were completely silent. They removed their shoes to ensure that no workers below them could hear their footsteps. Since there were workers below them during the day, they only flushed the toilet and burned trash at night, after the workers went home. It was their top priority to remain undiscovered, so everyone remained cautious and froze every time a car drove by or stopped. The group was well aware of the dangers of being discovered by the