Georges C. Holocaust testimony

Identifier
HVT 4234
Language of Description
English
Dates
1 Jan 1999 - 31 Dec 1999
Level of Description
Collection
Source
EHRI Partner

Abstract

Videotape testimony of Georges C., a non-Jew, who was born in Brussels, Belgium in 1909, an only child. He recounts attending school and becoming an accountant in Schaerbeek; marriage in 1934; working as an accountant; military draft eight months prior to German invasion; capture and immediate escape; forming a resistance unit with several others; observing round-ups of Jews; arrest in March 1942; imprisonment in St. Gilles; deportation eight months later to Bochum; forced factory labor; prisoners organizing cultural activities; transfer to Hameln; helping a priest organize clandestine masses despite his own atheism; transfer to Gross Strehlitz; constructing barracks and the kitchen (they built in a method to clandestinely obtain potatoes from storage); sabotaging the work when he could; giving his cigarette rations to a friend; slave labor in an armaments factory; conflicts with an English POW; transfer to Laband; a death march to Buchenwald; slave labor clearing bombing rubble; contracting dysentery; a French doctor saving him from selection; a death march and train transport to Theresienstadt; liberation by Soviet troops; hospitalization; repatriation; reunion with his wife; and his son's birth. Mr. C. discusses camp hierarchies and relationships between prisoner groups; dehumanization; sharing his experiences with his wife, but not his son; and obtaining benefits as a political prisoner.

Extent and Medium

9 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

Subjects

Places

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.