Joseph L. Holocaust testimony (HVT-3826)

Videotape testimony of Joseph L., who was born in Novi Sad, Yugoslavia (presently Serbia) in 1931, an only child. He recounts his secular family's affluence; attending Serbian and Jewish schools; their move to Belgrade; German bombardment; returning to Novi Sad; Hungarian occupation; his father's incarceration in a labor camp; his mother securing his father's release; moving to Budapest; attending Hungarian school, then a Jewish gymnasium; learning of the murders of relatives in the January 1942 mass killing in Novi Sad; returning to Novi Sad; his mother visiting her ill sister in Budapest; German invasion in spring 1944; his father's arrest; bringing him food (he never saw him again); an uncle (a convert to Christianity) supplying him with false papers so he could bring him to join his mother and grandparents in Budapest; receiving a postcard from his father (he had been deported); living in a Swedish safe house in the ghetto; his bar mitzvah; Raoul Wallenberg saving his mother from a round-up; Soviet bombardment; round-up with his mother by the Arrow Cross; their escape; assistance from a non-Jewish acquaintance; returning to the ghetto; liberation by Soviet troops; returning to Novi Sad; attending school; two antisemitic teachers; emigration to Israel in 1948; and military enlistment. Mr. L. discusses nightmares resulting from his experiences; efforts as a radio broadcaster to increase awareness of the Holocaust; and visiting Budapest with his son. He shows a family tree and photographs.