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Konrad B. Holocaust testimony (HVT-928) interviewed by Susan Millen and Mindy Brownstein,

Oral History | Fortunoff Collection ID: HVT-928

Videotape testimony of Konrad B., who was born in Berlin, Germany, in 1916. Mr. B. describes his childhood and education; his mother's decision to move the family to Paris after Hitler's rise to power; volunteering for the French army; and internment by the French in Nantes in 1939, then by the Germans in a POW camp at Montreuil-Bellay. He details a friendship; his parents' flight from Marseille through Spain and Portugal to the United States; his escape in October 1940; teaching in a Quaker school for children of Spanish refugees in Montauban; serving as a Resistance courier; reunion with his wife; and living with false identities. He recounts numerous instances of assistance from a variety of people; escaping a police round-up and hiding in the woods in 1942; eighteen months hiding with an elderly couple; and the death of his in-laws in a transport east from Drancy. He discusses his position after liberation as headmaster of a school for Jewish children hidden with Catholic families and the psychological impact of this experience on some of the children; regional differences in French attitudes toward the German occupiers; and his work translating the autobiography of Lucie Aubrac, a key Resistance fighter and principal in the trial of Klaus Barbie.

Author/Creator
B., Konrad, 1916-
Published
New Haven, Conn. : Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies at Yale, 1987
Interview Date
June 24, 1987.
Locale
France
Germany
Berlin (Germany)
Paris (France)
Nantes (France)
Montauban (Tarn-et-Garonne, France)
Language
English
Copies
3 copies: 3/4 in. master; 3/4 in. dub; and 1/2 in. VHS with time coding.
Cite As
Konrad B. Holocaust Testimony (HVT-928). Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies, Yale University Library.