Description
Object description
Yugoslavian student at University of Ljublajana, Yugoslavia, 1939-1941; member of Yugoslav Resistance in Yugoslavia, 1941-1943; escaped from Yugoslavia to Switzerland and France, 1943-1944; partisan with Yugoslav Partisans in Yugoslavia, 1944-1945; political prisoner in Yugoslavia, 1947-1954; escaped from Yugoslavia to Italy, 1955
Content description
REEL 1 Background in Kranji, Slovenia, Yugoslavia, 1920-1941: family; education; father's business background; interest in politics; support for political parties in Yugoslavia, 1930s; period as student days at University of Ljubljana, 1939-1941. Recollections of period as member of Yugoslav Resistance in Yugoslavia, 1941-1943: danger of being deported to Serbia; formation of Pravda Group, 5/1941; role of Liberation Front; Communist killings of alleged collaborators from late 1941; Communist insistence on monolithic character of Liberation Front; escape from Yugoslavia to Switzerland and France, 1943-1944; specific instances of Communist killings in Slovenia, 1941-1942.
REEL 2 Continues: political character of Pravda Group; attitude towards economics, 1941-1943; reasons for imprisonment by French Communists at Annecy, France during return journey to Yugoslavia, 9/1944; failure to get his message through to London, GB. Recollections of period as partisan with Yugoslav Partisans in Yugoslavia, 1944-1945: arrival in Split, 10/1944; Communist killings in Split, 11/1944-12/1944; joining Partisan Overseas Brigade; wish to get from Dalmatia to Slovenia, winter 1944-1945; observation by partisan secret police at Split, 1945; partisan suspicion of British liaison officers in Slovenia. Aspects of period as civilian in Yugoslavia, 1945-1947: translating work; cultivating westerners after 1945.
REEL 3 Continues: starvation in Split, 1945; question of organising political opposition towards Communist regime, 1945-1946. Recollections of arrest and imprisonment in Yugoslavia, 1947-1954: arrest, 24/5/1947; initial interrogation; prior recollections of earlier meeting with Francis Noel-Baker, autumn 1946; subjection to sleep deprivation, summer 1947; arrest of father; trial and sentencing, 7/1947-8/1947; nature of re-education; studying Marxism, 1947-1949; effects of Josip Tito's split with Soviet premier Joseph Stalin, 1948.
REEL 4 Continues: lenient policy towards political prisoners, early 1950s; reasons for release from prison, 11/1954; question of work he had to do as prisoner. Aspects of escape from Yugoslavia to Italy, 1955: problems of living in Slovenia after release from prison, 1954-1955; escape with companion to Italy, 1955. Aspects of period in Yugoslavia, 1941-1945: question of British forces sending back of Yugoslavs especially Slovenian 'Home Guard' units back to Yugoslavia in 1945; student demonstrations against signing of Tri-partite Pact by Yugoslavian Government, 4/1941; contrasting attitude of Germans in Slovenia and Croatia, 4/1941.
REEL 5 Continues: German plans for ethnic cleansing in northern Slovenia, 1941; reasons for contrast in Croatian and Slovenian political attitudes, 4/1941.