Geoffrey D. Holocaust testimony

Identifier
HVT 4039
Language of Description
English
Level of Description
Collection
Source
EHRI Partner

Abstract

Videotape testimony of Geoffrey D., a Catholic, who was born in Brussels, Belgium in 1924, the younger of two sons. He recounts attending Catholic school; German invasion; fleeing briefly; his mother's involvement in the Resistance; he and his brother cutting German telephone cables; joining a resistance unit; his parents arranging for him and his brother to escape to England in 1943; their arrest; incarceration in Fresnes; separation from his brother; transfer to Aix-la-Chapelle /Aachen; learning their "smuggler" was a double-agent; solitary confinement for eight months; seeing his brother during air raid evacuations; learning his mother had been arrested; transfer to Essen in April 1944, then to Esterwegen, Gross Strehlitz, and Laband; slave labor in a munitions factory, then the kitchen, where he obtained extra food; a death march with a brief stop in Ratibor; many deaths from starvation and exposure; arrival in Buchenwald; hospitalization; assistance from a French prisoner-doctor; being unconscious during liberation by United States troops; recovering in Weimar; repatriation; reunion with his father; informing him of his brother's death; refusing visitors for a year; feeling unsatisfied when attending the execution of the double agent who exposed him; and becoming a professional pilot. Mr. D. discusses his isolation and despondence in camps and prisons; not being able to learn the details of his mother's death in Ravensbrück; and sharing his experiences for the first time in this testimony. He shows a photograph.

Extent and Medium

3 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

Corporate Bodies

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Genre

This description is derived directly from structured data provided to EHRI by a partner institution. This collection holding institution considers this description as an accurate reflection of the archival holdings to which it refers at the moment of data transfer.