Leon F. Holocaust testimony (HVT-1867) interviewed by Rayzl Kalifowicz-Waletsky,
Videotape testimony of Leon F., who was born in Berez︠h︡any, Austro-Hungarian Monarchy (now Ukraine) in 1908. Mr. F. recalls hiding with his family when the town was burned in World War I; antisemitic harassment; attending yeshiva in Stanisławów; membership in Hashomer Hatzair; attending medical school in Prague and theological school in Frankfurt; working as a gynecologist in Warsaw; his father's death in 1938; German invasion; draft into the Polish military; finding his unit had been destroyed in Mińsk Mazowiecki; escaping to the Soviet occupied zone; imprisonment as a spy; draft into the Soviet military; assignment to front lines in Finland in 1941; returning to Soviet territory; organizing surgical units; German attack in 1941; participating in Yom Kippur services with Jews near Kineshma; joining Armia Ludowa; liberating Polish cities, then Berlin; entering Hitler's chancellory; returning to Poland; helping to collect Jewish children from Catholic institutions in the Łódź area; discharge; leaving Poland due to antisemitism; working in Schlactensee and other displaced persons camps organized by UNRRA in Berlin; marriage to a Jewish nurse he had met during the war; emigrating to the United States in 1948; and working as a gynecologist. Dr. F. discusses episodes during the war and after; his identity with his family's rabbinical heritage; his mother's difficult life; and his interest in Jewish rescue by non-Jews. He shows artifacts.
- Published
- New York, N.Y. : A Living Memorial to the Holocaust-Museum of Jewish Heritage, 1991
- Interview Date
- November 6, 1991.
- Locale
- Austria
Berez︠h︡any (Ukraine)
Stanislav (Ukraine)
Prague (Czech Republic)
Frankfurt am Main (Germany)
Warsaw (Poland)
Mińsk Mazowiecki (Poland)
Kineshma (Russia)
Finland
Berlin (Germany)
Łódź (Poland) - Language
-
English
- Copies
- 2 copies: 3/4 in. dub; and 1/2 in. VHS with time coding.
- Cite As
- Leon F. Holocaust Testimony (HVT-1867). Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies, Yale University Library.
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View in Yale University Library Catalog: http://hdl.handle.net/10079/bibid/4284746
Record last modified: 2018-05-29 11:58:00
This page: https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/hvt4284746