Abraham L. Holocaust testimony

Videotape testimony of Abraham L., who was born in Gumbinnen, Germany (presently Gusev, Russia) in 1922, the second of four children. He recounts living in Šiauliai; his father's executive position at a large leather factory; participating in Maccabi; summer vacations in Palanga; attending a Jewish elementary school, Hebrew high school, then a Lithuanian gymnasium; antisemitic harassment; Soviet occupation in 1940; German invasion in spring 1941; briefly fleeing east; he and his brother being forced by Lithuanians to bury corpses of Soviet soldiers; arrest by one former classmate and release by another; forced labor building an airport next to Soviet prisoners of war who received no food; a mass shooting of the Soviets; brief imprisonment; ghettoization; forced labor outside the ghetto; smuggling food into the ghetto; his grandfather's death; deportation to Batcum; slave labor; meeting his future wife; being returned to the ghetto; his father's death; being injured at work; a six-week hospitalization; obtaining a German railway uniform; escaping; assistance from a Lithuanian friend; smuggling food into the ghetto; his family's round-up; escaping into a forest with others; assistance from a Lithuanian Communist; arming themselves; repelling some Germans; liberation by Soviet troops; returning home; leaving to find food; being beaten as Jews by Soviets; traveling to Vilnius, Kaunas, then returning home; assuming his father's former position; caring for an ill cousin; traveling with a group to Vilnius, Švenčionėliai, Łódź, Szczecin, Berlin, Heligenstadt, Hannover, then Munich; and living in Landsberg displaced persons camp. Mr. L. discusses his continuing efforts to obtain information about his family. He shows photographs.

7 videocassettes