John H. Holocaust testimony

Videotape testimony of John H., who was born in Brno, Czechoslovakia in 1918. He recalls a happy youth in an assimilated family; participating in Zionist organizations; beginning medical school; German invasion; unsuccessfully attempting to escape to Prague; anti-Jewish restrictions; a non-Jewish friend purchasing a train ticket for his escape; traveling to San Remo, then Nice, in July 1939; the outbreak of war in September; enlisting in the Czech military; retreating from the Germans; evacuation to Liverpool in 1940; continuing medical training in London; rejoining his military unit, which was incorporated into the British military; participating in the invasion of Europe; and liberating Plzen? in April 1945. Dr. H. recounts traveling to Brno; learning his family had been deported and had perished; discharge from the military; completing medical studies in Brno; working as a surgeon; assisting in obtaining arms for Israel in 1948; emigrating to Israel; serving as a military medical officer; marriage in 1958; organizing medical services in Ethiopia for seven years; and emigration to the United States. He discusses his return to the Czech Republic with his family when Va?clav Havel invited Czech World War II resistance participants to visit.

2 videocassettes