Martin D. Holocaust testimony (HVT-735) [videorecording] / interviewed by John Tiebout and Mark Jacobs, November 10, 1985.

Dallas, Tex. : Memorial Center for Holocaust Studies, 1985.

1 videorecording (1 hr., 14 min.) : col.

English

Associated material: Donald, Martin. Interview 20956. Visual History Archive, USC Shoah Foundation. Access at https://vha.usc.edu.

Videotape testimony of Martin D., who was born in Berlin, Germany in 1920. He recalls apprenticing as a furrier when he was fourteen; increasing antisemitism; warnings from non-Jews of a round-up; hiding with his father; applying with his sister to emigrate to relatives in London; obtaining a visa; emigrating with a cousin in January 1939 (he never saw his sister or parents again); his relatives refusal to assist him; futile efforts to obtain visas for his sister and parents; arrest as an "enemy alien"; transfer via Liverpool to an internment camp in Ontario, Canada; fights between German and Jewish internees; the Jews' hunger strike to protest internment; release and return to London; enlisting in the British military; training in Ilfracombe; admiring British behavior during the blitzkrieg; serving in an intelligence unit; changing his name to conceal his German origins; landing at Normandy; moving through France and Belgium to Hamburg; vainly searching for his family in Berlin; serving with a war crimes commission; interrogating Nazis; arresting von Ribbentrop; returning to London; marriage in 1947; emigration to the United States; and the births of two children. Mr. D. notes he is the sole survivor of a family of fifty; seeking revenge through his war crime commission work; visiting Bergen-Belsen two months after its liberation; and not sharing his experiences with his children.

June 01, 2002

Martin D. Holocaust Testimony (HVT-735). Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies, Yale University Library.

Martin D. Holocaust Testimony (HVT-735). Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies, Yale University Library.

Oral histories (document genres)