Juraj M. Holocaust testimony

Videotape testimony of Juraj M., who was born in Darda, Yugoslavia (presently Croatia) in 1920. He recalls moving to Žilina in 1928; celebrating religious holidays; participating in Hashomer Hatzair; attending school in Rajec and a Jewish school in Žilina; working at a drugstore in Martin beginning in 1935; anti-Jewish laws after Slovak independence in 1939; his and his father's exemptions from deportations due to their jobs; his sister's deportation in March 1942 (he never saw her again); release when he and his father were rounded up due to their jobs; his parents' disappearance in September; fleeing to Bratislava; working in a drugstore and for a veterinarian; using his own name, although he had false papers; moving frequently; living in Inke with Bulgarian students; traveling to Ružomberok after the Slovak national uprising; encountering people who knew him en route who let him continue; living with relatives of a non-Jewish friend; liberation in spring 1945; and marriage to the sister of the non-Jewish friend whose family hid him. Mr. M. discusses several narrow escapes; the importance of luck to his survival; identifying himself as a Jew, as does his son, although married to a Catholic for fifty-two years; and recent visits to concentration camps in Germany and to Birkenau, where he recited kaddish for his family.

1 videocassette