Leon K. Holocaust testimony

Identifier
HVT 0422
Language of Description
English
Level of Description
Collection
Source
EHRI Partner

Abstract

Videotape testimony of Leon K., who was born in Sulmierzyce, Poland. He recalls moving to Cze?stochowa; attending high school; antisemitic incidents; learning the leather business; German invasion; mass killings; forced labor; deportation to a labor camp in Ukraine with friends from a Zionist youth organization; resisting the guards; escaping, with assistance from local Jews, to Hrubieszo?w; returning to Cze?stochowa; ghettoization; his family's deportation in 1942; disbelieving accounts of escaped prisoners from Treblinka; slave labor in HASAG/Pelzery and Racho?w; escaping with assistance from a Polish friend; hiding in his friend's apartment; returning to Racho?w due to fear of denouncement; carrying arms from the Racho?w ghetto to HASAG/Pelzery for the underground; the ghetto's liquidation; doing leather work at the HASAG factory; assistance from a Polish policeman and a German; arranging for his brother and others to be transferred to his shop; hiding with his brother and future wife in a barn during the camp evacuation; liberation by Soviet troops; antisemitic incidents; fleeing from Krako?w to Belgium; and emigration with his family to the United States.

Extent and Medium

2 videocassettes

Conditions Governing Access

This testimony is open with permission.

Conditions Governing Reproduction

Copyright has been transferred to the Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies. Use of this testimony requires permission of the Fortunoff Video Archive.

Rules and Conventions

Describing Archives: A Content Standard

Process Info

  • compiled by Staff of the Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies

People

  • K., Leon.

Corporate Bodies

  • Hugo Schneider Aktiengesellschaft.
  • Częstochowa (Concentration camp)

Subjects

  • Holocaust survivors.
  • Men.
  • Video tapes.
  • Antisemitism -- Prewar.
  • Mass killings.
  • World War, 1939-1945 -- Jewish resistance.
  • Concentration camp inmates -- Escapes.
  • Concentration camps -- Underground movements.
  • Resistance.
  • Aid by non-Jews.
  • Mutual aid.
  • Jewish ghettos.
  • Jews -- Poland -- Częstochowa.
  • Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) -- Personal narratives.
  • World War, 1939-1945 -- Personal narratives, Jewish.
  • World War, 1939-1945 -- Atrocities.
  • Brothers.
  • Jews -- Poland -- Rachów.
  • Forced labor.
  • Antisemitism -- Postwar.
  • Postwar experiences.
  • Hiding.

Places

  • Rachów ghetto.
  • Częstochowa ghetto.
  • Hrubieszów (Poland)
  • Częstochowa (Poland)
  • Sulmierzyce (Poland)
  • Poland.

Genre

  • Oral histories. -- aat
This description is derived directly from structured data provided to EHRI by a partner institution. This collection holding institution considers this description as an accurate reflection of the archival holdings to which it refers at the moment of data transfer.