Itzchak M. Holocaust testimony (HVT-3629) [videorecording], November 30, 1993.

Tel Aviv, Israel : Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies, 1993.

1 videorecording (1 hr., 31 min.) : col.

Russian

This testimony is in Russian.

Videotape testimony of Itzchak M., who was born in Kelmė, Lithuania in 1932. He recalls his rabbinical ancestry; his father's position as a Jewish bank director; attending a Tarbut Yiddish school with his older sister until 1941; German invasion; fleeing as the city and their home burned; forced location to a nearby village; his father's incarceration; visiting him once (he never saw him again); placement with his sister at the end of a line for a mass shooting; Lithuanian women, including their former maid, taking about fifteen of the children; living with the maid (his sister stayed with her friend); their baptism as Catholics, although maintaining their internal Jewish identity; local Jews retrieving him and his sister; their escape, thinking they would be killed; returning to the former maid and his sister to another friend; learning the other Jews had been shot; hiding with the maid's friends elsewhere when it became too dangerous; the maid's husband threatening to expose them; living on the street; a Lithuanian taking him in, despite his impoverishment; living as a family member; attending church; occasionally disguising himself as a girl to visit the mass grave site and his sister; reciting Catholic prayers when accused of being a Jew; remaining with the Lithuanian family after liberation; joining returning Jews in Kelmė in 1947; completing school; marriage in 1955; completing university in Kaunas in 1958; working as an engineer in Vilnius; writing novels and poetry based on his and others' Holocaust experiences; and emigration to Israel in 1972. Mr. M. discusses his instinct to survive despite fear, hunger, disease, and other hardships, and continuing contact with his rescuers.

June 01, 2002

Itzchak M. Holocaust Testimony (HVT-3629). Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies, Yale University Library.

Itzchak M. Holocaust Testimony (HVT-3629). Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies, Yale University Library.

Oral histories (document genres)