The Diary Of A Young Girl
by Anne Frank
Table of Contents
July 8-July 12, 1942
Summary: July 8-July 12, 1942
By Wednesday, July 8, the Franks have been forced to go into hiding. Anne relates how the situation came about. On Sunday afternoon, Anne is reading on the balcony when her sister, Margot, comes out looking agitated. Margot says that Mr. Frank has just received a call-up notice from the SS (which they all know means being sent to a concentration camp). Their mother has gone to meet with Mr. van Daan, a friend of the family and Mr. Frank’s business partner, whose family is also planning to share the Franks’ hiding place. Mrs. Frank returns to the house with Mr. van Daan and speaks with him privately while the girls quickly pack up their favorite items in their school bags. Margot confesses to Anne that the call-up notice was really for herself, and Anne is horrified that the Nazis are now taking girls as young as sixteen away from their families.
That evening, Miep Gies, who works in Mr. Frank’s office, comes with her husband Jan to take some of the Franks’ possessions—clothing, books, and other small items—inconspicuously to the hiding place. The next morning, the Franks layer themselves in several changes of clothing—because as Anne says, “No Jew in our situation would dare leave the house with a suitcase full of clothes”—and depart for the hiding place. Anne is sad to say good-bye to her cat Moortje, who must be left behind.
As the family walks through Amsterdam in the pouring rain, Anne notices sympathetic looks from passers-by. She imagines someone would offer them transportation if it were not forbidden because of the yellow stars the Franks wear. They arrive at the hiding place, which is above Mr. Frank’s office. The four-story building at 263 Pinsengracht consists of a ground-floor warehouse where spices are milled, several separate offices and storerooms, and the secret annex where the Franks will hide. The annex is concealed behind a plain gray door and consists of several separate, low-ceilinged rooms including one bathroom and a...
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