Arie D. Holocaust testimony (HVT-3535)

Videotape testimony of Arie D., who was born in Vilna, Poland (presently Vilnius, Lithuania), one of two sons. He recounts attending Poalei Zion and Tarbut schools; joining Hashomer Hatzair at age twelve; attending their summer camp in Nemenčinė; increasing antisemitism in the 1930s; participating in a Zionist march with Abba Kovner in 1938; attending engineering school; Soviet occupation; German invasion; an Austrian soldier providing protected jobs for him; his father's kidnapping in summer 1941; ghettoization; his mother and brother (Henoch D.) leaving the ghetto; the Austrian soldier hiding him from round-ups; his Zionist group joining the united underground (FPO); his job in a German weapon repair facility; stealing weapons and ammunition for the FPO; building a bunker; his mother and brother returning; freeing Yosef Glazman (an FPO leader) from arrest; an injury resulting from a detonator exploding; surgery in the hospital; deportation to Vaivara, Ereda, then Narwa; slave labor for Organization Todt; transfer to an Estonian camp; a Dutch forced laborer assisting him; transfer to Goldfilz, then Lagedi in winter 1944; finding his brother there; their transfer to Klooga, Stutthof, then Dautmergen; public hanging of escapees; observing cannibalism; brief hospitalization; escaping from an evacuation march with his brother and friend in April 1945; liberation by French troops; living in Sigmaringen displaced persons camp; assistance from the Red Cross; traveling to Milan, intending to emigrate to Palestine; contact with Hashomer Hatzair; meeting members of the Jewish Brigade in Antwerp; traveling to Munich; reunion with an uncle in Feldafing displaced persons camp; joining Kovner's “Revenge” group; poisoning bread for German prisoners in Nuremberg; fleeing to Prague; traveling to Tradate; emigration by ship to Palestine in June 1946; brief incarceration by the British; marriage; and the births of three children. Mr. D. discusses the prisoner hierarchy and attributing his survival to the hope of emigration to Palestine. He dedicates this testimony to his daughter who recently died.