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Frederic B. Holocaust testimony (HVT-2016) interviewed by Jaschael Pery,

Oral History | Fortunoff Collection ID: HVT-2016

Videotape testimony of Frederic B., who was born in Karlsbad, Austro-Hungarian Monarchy in 1915. He recalls growing up in Kraków; his close, extended family; attending Polish school; occasional antisemitism; studying architecture; joining a Zionist organization; working in Katowice; German invasion; fleeing with his brother east to Jarosław; returning to Kraków; forced labor; ghettoization in 1941; working in an architectural firm (an exemption from deportation); round-ups including his parents and girlfriend; hearing of the resistance; seeing his father's corpse in a pile of hundreds (he never saw his mother or girlfriend again); transfer with his brother to Płasźow in March 1943; executions and beatings; escaping; obtaining false papers; hiding with friends and on a farm with his brother for seven months; paying to be smuggled to Slovakia; train travel to Jordanów; arrest by Slovak border guards; incarceration in Mikula; release; employment on a farm and in Sered ̕(his brother worked elsewhere); meeting his wife; hiding in bunkers in a forest and with a farmer; liberation by Soviet troops; living in Kežmarok; moving to Mikula; and emigration to the United States in 1954. Mr. B. notes better conditions in Slovak camps than those in Poland and the importance of luck to his survival.

Author/Creator
B., Frederic, 1915-
Published
New York, N.Y. : A Living Memorial to the Holocaust-Museum of Jewish Heritage, 1991
Interview Date
December 4, 1991.
Locale
Poland
Kraków
Karlovy Vary (Czech Republic)
Austria
Kraków (Poland)
Katowice (Poland)
Slovakia
Jarosław (Poland)
Mikula (Slovakia)
Jordanów (Poland)
Kežmarok (Slovakia)
Language
English
Copies
2 copies: 3/4 in. dub; and 1/2 in. VHS with time coding.
Cite As
Frederic B. Holocaust Testimony (HVT-2016). Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies, Yale University Library.