Leon P. Holocaust testimony (HVT-2788) interviewed by Jaša Almuli,

Videotape testimony of Leon P., who was born in Thessalonikē, Greece in 1920. He recalls studying Hebrew, French, and Greek in a private Jewish school; German invasion; his brother's emigration to Palestine; increasing hardships in the Salonika ghetto; arranging to join the partisans in the mountains; deciding to remain with his parents when they wept at his impending departure; their deportation to Birkenau; separation upon arrival (he never saw them again); assistance from a Polish block commander; transfer to Auschwitz; slave labor in a Krupp munitions factory, then in the Union Kommando; learning Polish; assistance from fellow prisoners when he was ill; hiding with friends, including two boys he had saved during the evacuation; liberation by Soviet troops; traveling to Kraków, Lublin, then to Chernivt︠s︡i; and joining the Soviet army in Slutsk. Mr. P. discusses the importance to his survival of his mechanical and linguistic skills and help from others; intergroup relations in concentration camps; emotional responses to camp life; and writing his memoirs, published in Greek, entitled "Mazel."