Ernest B. Holocaust testimony
Abstract
Videotape testimony of Ernest B., who was born in Debrad?, Czechoslovakia in 1920. He recounts moving to another village when he was three; fighting back against anti-Jewish violence; attending Catholic school; his father's death when he was thirteen; Hungarian occupation; moving to Budapest to support his mother and siblings; draft into a Hungarian slave labor battalion in 1943; assignment to a uniform factory; German occupation in 1944; learning his mother had been ghettoized (she did not survive); friends assisting him to alter his documents to show him as Catholic; posing as a Nazi; warning Jews of round-ups; working for Raoul Wallenberg, guarding Swedish safe houses as a "Nazi"; helping Wallenberg distribute protection papers to Jews; locating his brother in a labor battalion; bringing him to a safe house; incarceration with his brother; transport to Mauthausen; escaping with his brother and Slovak POWs; liberation by United States troops; his brother's death five days later; learning his sister had survived; returning home; marriage; emigration to Israel; the births of two daughters; and emigration to the United States. Mr. B. expresses great admiration for Wallenberg.
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
- Wallenberg, Raoul, -- 1912-1947.
- B., Ernest, -- 1920-
Corporate Bodies
- Mauthausen (Concentration camp)
Subjects
- Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) -- Personal narratives.
- Men.
- Forced labor.
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Personal narratives, Jewish.
- Escapes.
- World War, 1939-1945 -- Conscript labor -- Hungary.
- Postwar experiences.
- Brothers.
- Aid by non-Jews.
- Safe houses.
- False papers.
- Mutual aid.
- Antisemitism -- Prewar.
- Hungarian occupation.
- Holocaust survivors.
- Video tapes.
Places
- Czechoslovakia.
- Debradสน (Slovakia)
- Israel.
- Budapest (Hungary)
Genre
- Oral histories. -- aat