Henryk L. Holocaust testimony

Videotape testimony of Henryk L., who was born in Warsaw, Poland. He recalls his older brother's emigration to the United States; German invasion; he and his brother being drafted; his unit ending up in Lwo?w under Soviet occupation; returning to Warsaw to help his parents; their move into the ghetto in 1940; his parents' deaths; starvation, typhus, and daily deaths; smuggling his niece out of the ghetto in 1943; going in and out of the ghetto using false papers with assistance from Polish friends; smuggling his girlfriend and her sister through the sewers to a hiding place on the Aryan side (his girlfriend died there); participating in the Warsaw ghetto uprising; joining Polish partisans, posing as a non-Jew; his arrest and deportation as a prisoner of war to a stalag near Hannover; sharing the secret of his identity with his best friend when he realized that an impending medical examination would reveal he was Jewish; organizing an escape; liberation; and becoming commander of a camp for Polish prisoners. Mr. L. recounts incidents when he should have been killed in the Warsaw ghetto period and discusses the importance of his mother's inspiration, his strong character, and luck to his survival.

2 videocassettes