Gijsbertus V. Holocaust testimony (HVT-4081) [videorecording] / interviewed by Hessel Daalder, January 27, 1997.

Brussels, Belgium : Fondation Auschwitz, 1997.

1 videorecording (3 hr., 13 min.) : col.

Dutch

This testimony is in Dutch.

Videotape testimony of Gijsbertus V., a non-Jew, who was born in Rotterdam, Netherlands in 1915. He recounts attending school until age twelve; working for the Holland-America Line on ships, traveling many places; in 1939 working in a Rotterdam restaurant; German bombardment in 1940; losing his job due to the massive destruction; baptism as a Jehovah's Witness in June 1940; working as a preacher in Haarlem; arrest in Heemstede; incarceration in Scheveningen; his refusal to cease proselytizing in order to obtain his release; three months in solitary confinement; deportation to several prisons in Germany, then to Sachsenhausen; placement in a barrack with other Jehovah's Witnesses; their clandestine bible studies on Sunday; their dispersal to many barracks when they were exposed; forced labor in the forests; refusing any tasks that were war-related; observing more severe treatment of Jews; public hangings; two hospitalizations; recovery due to treatment by prisoner doctors; receiving a Red Cross package; a death march in January 1945; liberation by United States troops; repatriation to Nijmegen; returning to Rotterdam; and working for the church in Zutphen, then Brussels. Mr. V. discusses the impact of being hungry for four years; relations between groups in camps; and crediting his survival to his faith.

June 01, 2002

Gijsbertus V. Holocaust Testimony (HVT-4081). Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies, Yale University Library.

Gijsbertus V. Holocaust Testimony (HVT-4081). Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies, Yale University Library.

Oral histories (document genres)