Etty Hillesum - Family

Family

Esther (Etty) Hillesum was born on 15 January 1914 in her parents' home at Molenwater 77 in the town of Middelburg, where her father Levie (Louis) Hillesum had been teaching classical languages since 1911. In Amsterdam, on 7 December 1912, he married Etty's mother, Riva (Rebecca) Bernstein, who was also living in Middelburg at the time. Etty's father was born in Amsterdam on 25 May 1880, as the youngest of four children, to the merchant Jacob Samuel Hillesum and his wife Esther Hillesum-Loeza; Etty, therefore, was named after her paternal grandmother. The family lived at the time at Sint Antoniesbreestraat 31. Louis Hillesum studied classical languages at the University of Amsterdam. In 1902 he completed his bachelor's degree, followed in 1905 by his master's (both degrees cum laude). On 10 July 1908 he published his Latin thesis De imperfecti et aoristi usu Thucydidis (On Thucydides' use of the imperfect and the aorist, also awarded cum laude). Middelburg was his first teaching assignment. In 1914 he began teaching the classics at the Hilversum gymnasium (grammar school), but, due to deafness in one ear and impaired vision, had trouble maintaining order in the large classes at that institution. That is why, in 1916, he moved to a smaller gymnasium in the town of Tiel. In 1918 he became teacher of classics and deputy headmaster in Winschoten. In 1924 he was appointed to similar positions at the gymnasium in Deventer, where he became headmaster on 1 February 1928. He remained there until his dismissal on 29 November 1940, at the request of the occupation government that was imposed by Nazi Germany.