Mirko L. Holocaust testimony

Videotape testimony of Mirko L., who was born in Novska, Yugoslavia in approximately 1920. He recalls cordial relations with non-Jews; attending school in Novska, Nova Gradiška, and another town where his sister and her husband lived; German invasion in 1941; emergence of local Ustaša; anti-Jewish regulations including the armband and forced labor; empathic indignation from most of the population; imprisonment of Romanies in Jasenovac; learning they were being sadistically killed; corpses floating in the river; local Ustaša killing Serbs, then rounding up Jews; arrest with his brother as communists in August 1941; their release in November; learning his father was sent to Jasenovac (he was killed); joining the partisans with his brother; hiding with non-Jews; many partisan battles; organizing a communist youth group (SKOJ); learning the Jews in Novska were sent to Jasenovac and killed in July, including his mother; recruiting partisans to fight the Ustaša; training as a radio operator; serving in many battles; joining the party in May 1944; learning his sister died after her husband was killed (her son perished in a forced labor battalion); his military career after the war; and marriage to a non-Jewish Serbian woman. Mr. L. notes his family identifies themselves as Yugoslav.

2 videocassettes