0:00:03 > 0:00:07At the age of 91, Denis Avey was named
0:00:07 > 0:00:09a Hero of the Holocaust
0:00:09 > 0:00:13for helping to save the life of an Auschwitz inmate.
0:00:13 > 0:00:17The medal inscribed simply, for services to humanity.
0:00:17 > 0:00:21Denis wrote about this heroic act in a best-selling book,
0:00:21 > 0:00:26but he also claims to have broken into the notorious concentration camp itself.
0:00:26 > 0:00:31The stench in that room was ghastly, it was warm.
0:00:31 > 0:00:33There were nightmares, there were prayers,
0:00:33 > 0:00:37there was crying, there was screaming. It was murder.
0:00:37 > 0:00:39Denis says he entered Auschwitz
0:00:39 > 0:00:44to gain first-hand evidence of the Nazi atrocities.
0:00:44 > 0:00:47He's brave, he's just an amazing, amazing guy.
0:00:47 > 0:00:49He's a very important Holocaust witness.
0:00:49 > 0:00:52But following the publication of his story,
0:00:52 > 0:00:57some have questioned whether the break-in could have happened.
0:00:57 > 0:01:00I don't think it's practical or possible.
0:01:00 > 0:01:05I find it hard to understand that he waited for such a long time to tell the story.
0:01:05 > 0:01:10With so few witnesses to the Holocaust left to share their story,
0:01:10 > 0:01:13can this man's account be believed?
0:01:13 > 0:01:17I don't mind if they doubt my word. I don't mind that a bit.
0:01:17 > 0:01:19It doesn't... I know what I've done.
0:01:19 > 0:01:23Did Denis Avey really break into Auschwitz?
0:01:23 > 0:01:26And why is it so important to know the truth?
0:01:36 > 0:01:39In 1941, the world was caught in the grip
0:01:39 > 0:01:42of the most widespread conflict in history.
0:01:44 > 0:01:49Denis Avey was in North Africa, just 22 years of age
0:01:49 > 0:01:52and a member of the 2nd Battalion, The Rifle Brigade.
0:01:54 > 0:01:56I was in carriers at the time.
0:01:56 > 0:01:59We had very little intelligence
0:01:59 > 0:02:02and the whole idea was to get an easement...
0:02:04 > 0:02:10..to go through Rommel's army to split the army up.
0:02:10 > 0:02:15We went into to a funnel of activity and we got shot up to blazes.
0:02:17 > 0:02:22I remember coming to with the Germans pulling me out of the carrier.
0:02:22 > 0:02:25They took me to an advanced resting station
0:02:25 > 0:02:30and a Stabsarzt there took me in, laid me on a table,
0:02:30 > 0:02:33and they said, "For you, Tommy, the war's over."
0:02:33 > 0:02:36I thought, "Not likely. I'm still on duty."
0:02:39 > 0:02:43Denis was taken back to Europe and passed through a string of
0:02:43 > 0:02:48prisoner of war camps before ending up beside the Nazi concentration camp,
0:02:48 > 0:02:49Auschwitz.
0:02:53 > 0:02:57He was forced to work alongside Auschwitz inmates
0:02:57 > 0:03:01on the building of a synthetic rubber factory for chemicals giant IG Farben.
0:03:03 > 0:03:10When I saw them first of all when we got into IG Farben...
0:03:10 > 0:03:13I couldn't believe it. I thought I was seeing ghosts.
0:03:15 > 0:03:17There was death in their face.
0:03:21 > 0:03:26And the poor devils... it was ghastly.
0:03:26 > 0:03:29It was ghastly, being with them.
0:03:29 > 0:03:33I used to watch Jews come into the camp,
0:03:33 > 0:03:38especially Hungarian Jews, big chappies, 13 stone.
0:03:38 > 0:03:41They started work and with the food that they had...
0:03:41 > 0:03:44Well, call it food - it wasn't food.
0:03:44 > 0:03:49If they lasted three months alive,
0:03:49 > 0:03:52that was quite some time to live.
0:03:54 > 0:03:59A lot of our fellas built up a defence mechanism
0:03:59 > 0:04:03and that was accepted but not for me. I was very angry.
0:04:07 > 0:04:09Communication with the Jewish inmates,
0:04:09 > 0:04:13known by the prisoners of war as stripeys, was forbidden.
0:04:13 > 0:04:17But when the guards weren't looking, the rule was broken.
0:04:17 > 0:04:23Denis won a Hero of the Holocaust award for helping an inmate called Ernst.
0:04:23 > 0:04:28Ernst had a sister in England who Denis got a message to,
0:04:28 > 0:04:30asking for cigarettes.
0:04:30 > 0:04:32He smuggled them back in to the camp.
0:04:32 > 0:04:37Ernst later testified that Denis' actions helped to save his life.
0:04:40 > 0:04:43I got 200 cigarettes to him and a bar of chocolate.
0:04:43 > 0:04:46These cigarettes, obviously substantiated,
0:04:46 > 0:04:49he was able to trade them eventually.
0:04:49 > 0:04:52He said that I'd saved his life because he'd been able to
0:04:52 > 0:04:59get thick soles on his boots and on the death march it saved him.
0:05:08 > 0:05:12But it was a chance conversation with another Auschwitz inmate
0:05:12 > 0:05:15that Denis says set him on the path to his remarkable break-in.
0:05:19 > 0:05:24I can't even explain why I did this.
0:05:24 > 0:05:28I chalked an algebraic formula on pipe work.
0:05:32 > 0:05:35I'd just finished it
0:05:35 > 0:05:39and a stripey came up behind me.
0:05:39 > 0:05:41He said, "Have you got a cigarette?
0:05:41 > 0:05:44"Will you give me a cigarette, please?"
0:05:44 > 0:05:46And I said, "Yes."
0:05:46 > 0:05:50He saw this formula and he said, "I know that formula."
0:05:50 > 0:05:52And that's how we got talking.
0:05:54 > 0:05:57The man, who Denis knew as Hans,
0:05:57 > 0:06:00was of a similar height and build.
0:06:00 > 0:06:03Denis says this gave him an idea.
0:06:03 > 0:06:06If he could swap places with this inmate for a night,
0:06:06 > 0:06:10he could become a witness to the Nazi atrocities inside Auschwitz.
0:06:13 > 0:06:17He could find evidence needed to bring those responsible to justice.
0:06:18 > 0:06:25Now, to me, to tell me something is no good, that's all right.
0:06:25 > 0:06:27It doesn't prove anything.
0:06:27 > 0:06:32If I witness something, that is a different situation.
0:06:32 > 0:06:37So I realised I had to witness
0:06:37 > 0:06:40how they were living, how they were treated.
0:06:43 > 0:06:46Auschwitz was actually made up of several sites
0:06:46 > 0:06:49around the Polish city Oswiecim.
0:06:49 > 0:06:53As well as Auschwitz I and Auschwitz II-Birkenau,
0:06:53 > 0:06:58there was Auschwitz III, opposite the IG Farben factory.
0:06:58 > 0:07:01This labour camp was known as Monowitz.
0:07:01 > 0:07:06Also nearby was the prisoner of war camp E715.
0:07:08 > 0:07:13To change camps, Denis says he and Hans had to switch uniforms
0:07:13 > 0:07:17and deal with a man in charge of Hans' working party, the capo.
0:07:19 > 0:07:22The capo, I bribed.
0:07:22 > 0:07:25And all he had to do was to turn his head,
0:07:25 > 0:07:30and I then said, "I'll give you more cigarettes when I come out."
0:07:30 > 0:07:36I had to be absolutely certain that my hair was shaved,
0:07:36 > 0:07:42because it's during the Appellplatz, which is the counting area,
0:07:42 > 0:07:48the capo counts and the SS count and the capo shouts,
0:07:48 > 0:07:53"Mutzen ab," which means hats off,
0:07:53 > 0:07:57and you have to whip your hats off and stand to attention like that.
0:08:00 > 0:08:04According to Denis, a couple of his friends
0:08:04 > 0:08:07agreed to take care of Hans in camp E715.
0:08:07 > 0:08:10In Monowitz, Denis also had help.
0:08:12 > 0:08:17They took me to the bed... Well, bed for want of a better word,
0:08:17 > 0:08:22it was a slot where people should have slept and slept head to toe.
0:08:24 > 0:08:28The stench in that room was ghastly, it was warm,
0:08:28 > 0:08:32and the stench from their bodies and not only from their bodies,
0:08:32 > 0:08:36their stomach was all upset, whatever it was...
0:08:39 > 0:08:41There were nightmares, there were prayers,
0:08:41 > 0:08:43there was crying, there was screaming.
0:08:43 > 0:08:47There was a noise going on. It was murder.
0:08:52 > 0:08:55Nevertheless, I got to know what I wanted.
0:08:55 > 0:08:58I got to see the treatment inside.
0:08:58 > 0:08:59That's what I wanted to see.
0:09:01 > 0:09:04Incredibly, having survived,
0:09:04 > 0:09:07Denis says he repeated the exchange several months later.
0:09:08 > 0:09:12A third attempt had to be abandoned.
0:09:12 > 0:09:14It's a heroic tale.
0:09:14 > 0:09:15But is it believable?
0:09:18 > 0:09:22Once his book was published, Denis came under pressure
0:09:22 > 0:09:25to prove that the exchange had really happened.
0:09:25 > 0:09:29He's not the first to have claimed to have done it.
0:09:29 > 0:09:33So just how tough would it have been to break into Auschwitz?
0:09:42 > 0:09:47Auschwitz-Birkenau is preserved as a state museum in Poland.
0:09:50 > 0:09:54Its head of research, Dr Piotr Setkiewicz,
0:09:54 > 0:09:57is an expert on the IG Farben labour camps,
0:09:57 > 0:10:00including prisoner of war camp E715.
0:10:02 > 0:10:05The barracks were dismantled after the war
0:10:05 > 0:10:10so now on the site of the former camp, there are only some pieces
0:10:10 > 0:10:16of foundations, pillars of the gates, and also like this...
0:10:16 > 0:10:19There was, for instance, a part of latrine barrack.
0:10:24 > 0:10:27Just down the road is the site of the Monowitz labour camp,
0:10:27 > 0:10:29now a small Polish village.
0:10:31 > 0:10:35In 1944, in these 60 barracks, lived approximately 11,000 people,
0:10:35 > 0:10:3711,000 inmates.
0:10:37 > 0:10:40Over there, it was the road that led
0:10:40 > 0:10:43from the concentration camp to the factory.
0:10:43 > 0:10:48Every day, the prisoners had to walk along this road to the main entrance of the factory.
0:10:54 > 0:10:58Despite their close proximity, the opinion of Dr Setkiewicz
0:10:58 > 0:11:01is that any attempt to exchange places between the camps
0:11:01 > 0:11:04would have been extremely tricky to pull off.
0:11:06 > 0:11:08The appalling treatment of Monowitz inmates meant
0:11:08 > 0:11:13their general appearance was strikingly different from prisoners of war.
0:11:17 > 0:11:23The British prisoners received the same kind of food as other workers of IG Farben.
0:11:23 > 0:11:26Nevertheless, the situation was better
0:11:26 > 0:11:31because they might receive food parcels from the Red Cross.
0:11:31 > 0:11:36They got better clothes and they were not beaten
0:11:36 > 0:11:43practically by the guards, so the situation was many times better.
0:11:46 > 0:11:51And it wasn't just the difference in appearance that made an exchange difficult.
0:11:51 > 0:11:56Denis says he bribed the capo, or supervisor, to look the other way.
0:11:56 > 0:12:00But bribing one of these overseers was risky.
0:12:00 > 0:12:04There was no guarantee he'd follow through.
0:12:04 > 0:12:07And once inside Monowitz, desperate inmates acted as spies,
0:12:07 > 0:12:12ready to report anything unusual in the hope of better treatment.
0:12:15 > 0:12:19A big problem for us, I think, to understand the situation that
0:12:19 > 0:12:22prevailed in Auschwitz during the war,
0:12:22 > 0:12:28the overwhelming fear and lack of trust between people.
0:12:28 > 0:12:35So if you tried to talk to somebody, you'd not be sure
0:12:35 > 0:12:39what kind of person he is or she is,
0:12:39 > 0:12:41friendly or not.
0:12:44 > 0:12:47For experts on the Auschwitz and E715 camps,
0:12:47 > 0:12:52there are unanswered questions about how Denis managed to pull off an exchange.
0:12:54 > 0:13:00And for some former prisoners of war, there are also problems with the account.
0:13:00 > 0:13:04Brian Bishop was held in camp E715.
0:13:04 > 0:13:09He thinks that if a couple of PoWs were brought in on the exchange,
0:13:09 > 0:13:15as Denis says, then the swap wouldn't have stayed secret for long.
0:13:15 > 0:13:18He had to go into a barrack room.
0:13:18 > 0:13:22There was 20 people sleeping in one of those.
0:13:22 > 0:13:29Somebody in the room would have said something or noticed something.
0:13:29 > 0:13:31I can't say they were all blind.
0:13:31 > 0:13:34And what makes it worse - he's supposed to have done
0:13:34 > 0:13:36the same thing again a few months later.
0:13:36 > 0:13:39No, I don't think it's practical or possible.
0:13:39 > 0:13:41Not with British soldiers especially.
0:13:41 > 0:13:44It'd have been all round the camp in no time.
0:13:50 > 0:13:55The challenges to swapping places with a Jewish inmate were many.
0:13:55 > 0:14:00But this isn't the only aspect of the story troubling experts.
0:14:00 > 0:14:04There's also concern about what Denis did with the information afterwards.
0:14:06 > 0:14:08If he wanted to bear witness to the Holocaust,
0:14:08 > 0:14:11why did it take him so long to talk about it?
0:14:17 > 0:14:22Returning to Britain in 1945, former prisoners of war
0:14:22 > 0:14:26had to rebuild their lives in a period of austerity.
0:14:26 > 0:14:28They had to reconnect with families
0:14:28 > 0:14:31and make the huge transition back into normal life.
0:14:31 > 0:14:36Historians who've studied the experience of prisoners of war
0:14:36 > 0:14:38say this wasn't an easy task.
0:14:40 > 0:14:45There was, in general, an attitude to look forward rather than
0:14:45 > 0:14:50backwards and to focus on resettling in civilian life and to focus on
0:14:50 > 0:14:53the future, on the jobs and rebuilding their civilian identity.
0:14:53 > 0:14:59I went back to the military, which one had to go
0:14:59 > 0:15:04and during that time I was asked into an office
0:15:04 > 0:15:10and I was asked, "Would you like to relate any of your PoW experiences?"
0:15:10 > 0:15:14And I told them about Auschwitz and I could see,
0:15:14 > 0:15:18as I described this sort of thing to them,
0:15:18 > 0:15:20I could see the glazed eye syndrome.
0:15:20 > 0:15:24I could see they didn't obviously believe me
0:15:24 > 0:15:29because they hadn't had the knowledge or experience of this.
0:15:29 > 0:15:32And I thought, "That's it, finished."
0:15:32 > 0:15:36And I walked out of the office and from that day hence,
0:15:36 > 0:15:39I thought, "This is what people aren't going to believe."
0:15:39 > 0:15:41They've had a bad war in any case.
0:15:41 > 0:15:44People don't want to know about my experiences.
0:15:48 > 0:15:53But there was a key moment when the world focused on the atrocities
0:15:53 > 0:15:55committed during the war, the Nuremberg Trials.
0:15:58 > 0:16:02In 1947, the military tribunals turned their attention to
0:16:02 > 0:16:04the executives in charge at IG Farben.
0:16:06 > 0:16:12Testimony had been collected from former inmates of camp E715
0:16:12 > 0:16:15and several men appeared as witnesses.
0:16:15 > 0:16:18Why was Denis not among them?
0:16:18 > 0:16:21I didn't know anything at all about it.
0:16:21 > 0:16:24I went in to hospital for two years.
0:16:24 > 0:16:27I was suffering as well, and for a long time.
0:16:27 > 0:16:31Even when I came out of hospital, I was very weak.
0:16:31 > 0:16:34But, nevertheless, it was covered by other people.
0:16:34 > 0:16:39I think there seven or eight chaps from E715
0:16:39 > 0:16:45that went and were witnesses and they did the job.
0:16:48 > 0:16:51In common with many other former prisoners of war,
0:16:51 > 0:16:54Denis chose to get on with his life and didn't tell
0:16:54 > 0:16:58anyone about his exchange for another 55 years.
0:16:58 > 0:17:01He finally spoke out in 2001.
0:17:02 > 0:17:06But in this first account, key facts in the story changed.
0:17:16 > 0:17:19Lyn Smith interviews veterans of conflict
0:17:19 > 0:17:23for the Imperial War Museum's Sound Archive.
0:17:23 > 0:17:28I was sent to Denis for his prisoner of war experience
0:17:28 > 0:17:33and I'd also hoped, knowing something about IG Farben,
0:17:33 > 0:17:36that he could tell me something about the slave labourers.
0:17:36 > 0:17:39'Denis Avey, reel seven.
0:17:39 > 0:17:43'Was it important for your morale to do something like that?'
0:17:43 > 0:17:45'Oh, absolutely. Absolutely.'
0:17:45 > 0:17:51Denis gave Lyn his first ever recorded interview and, in it,
0:17:51 > 0:17:54he talked about his exchange with an inmate.
0:17:54 > 0:17:57But it wasn't the Monowitz camp he said he entered.
0:17:57 > 0:18:00And it wasn't Hans involved with the swap.
0:18:00 > 0:18:02'So over the days and weeks,
0:18:02 > 0:18:07'we arranged to have an umtauschen - an exchange.
0:18:07 > 0:18:14'I went in to Birkenau with Ernst and this stripey
0:18:14 > 0:18:21'got in to my uniform and got in to E715.'
0:18:21 > 0:18:24Ernst was the Jewish inmate Denis helped to survive
0:18:24 > 0:18:27by smuggling cigarettes.
0:18:27 > 0:18:33The prisoner of war camp E715 was some distance from Birkenau.
0:18:33 > 0:18:36So what had happened to Hans and Monowitz?
0:18:37 > 0:18:39For Denis, there's a simple answer.
0:18:41 > 0:18:46I only had Ernst in my mind at the time
0:18:46 > 0:18:49and, obviously, after 50 years,
0:18:49 > 0:18:54if you have to... And when she's asking you a question,
0:18:54 > 0:18:56you ask the question and I have to think.
0:18:56 > 0:19:00Sometimes I say things possibly wrong,
0:19:00 > 0:19:04that I haven't properly understood you or haven't
0:19:04 > 0:19:06properly made myself understood
0:19:06 > 0:19:09and that's it and it's quite simple.
0:19:11 > 0:19:15I can understand the confusion. I think it's perfectly understandable.
0:19:15 > 0:19:19You know, this was the first time he'd spoken about it
0:19:19 > 0:19:21and Hans didn't come into it.
0:19:21 > 0:19:24It was only later that I suppose he thought, "No."
0:19:24 > 0:19:27Don't we all have moments like this?
0:19:27 > 0:19:31I think it's, you know, human, particularly after all that time.
0:19:31 > 0:19:38The confusions between Denis' accounts became clear once his book was published.
0:19:38 > 0:19:42Suddenly it wasn't just Denis under pressure.
0:19:42 > 0:19:46A BBC journalist helped bring Denis' story to light
0:19:46 > 0:19:48and went on to co-write his book.
0:19:48 > 0:19:52How does Rob Broomby explain the differences?
0:19:52 > 0:19:56I think you have got to see that with a 92-year-old man
0:19:56 > 0:20:01you cannot really subject his entire testimony to
0:20:01 > 0:20:07the kind of forensic analysis you might use with a politician on the Today programme.
0:20:07 > 0:20:10You know, frankly we shouldn't beat about the bush.
0:20:10 > 0:20:15I mean, what's remarkable about Denis' whole story is not what he's forgotten.
0:20:15 > 0:20:19It's not the details that occasionally have got confused
0:20:19 > 0:20:22in the fog of war, to use a horrible phrase,
0:20:22 > 0:20:24but it's just how much he can recall,
0:20:24 > 0:20:27just how much he can remember of that detail.
0:20:27 > 0:20:31I am the first person to go through that story forensically with him
0:20:31 > 0:20:35and I am absolutely convinced we've got that story right.
0:20:36 > 0:20:41So how much of an issue are confusions in first-hand testimony?
0:20:44 > 0:20:49It's an interesting story, it's certainly a fascinating story.
0:20:49 > 0:20:52It's created quite a debate since he published his book.
0:20:52 > 0:20:56The real kind of interesting bit of the whole thing is does it matter?
0:20:56 > 0:20:59Dr Matthias Reiss is an historian and lecturer
0:20:59 > 0:21:02with a special interest in prisoners of war.
0:21:02 > 0:21:05He believes it's essential to be rigorous in assessing
0:21:05 > 0:21:07accounts about Auschwitz.
0:21:07 > 0:21:10We need to get it right, we need to understand
0:21:10 > 0:21:13whether that story is true or not
0:21:13 > 0:21:18to avoid any degree of ambiguity,
0:21:18 > 0:21:21any degree of uncertainty of the history of Auschwitz.
0:21:21 > 0:21:24We need to make very sure that everything
0:21:24 > 0:21:26we say about this place is indeed accurate.
0:21:26 > 0:21:30The story he tells might be uplifting and serves to raise new interest
0:21:30 > 0:21:35in the Holocaust and educate a new generation about the crimes committed there.
0:21:35 > 0:21:38If it's not true, we still face the problems.
0:21:40 > 0:21:44Denis has had to answer many questions about his testimony,
0:21:44 > 0:21:49how he overcame the practicalities of staging an exchange in Auschwitz,
0:21:49 > 0:21:53why it took him so long to share his story,
0:21:53 > 0:21:58and why there are factual discrepancies between his recorded accounts.
0:22:00 > 0:22:05But Denis' story also highlights a big issue about the remaining witnesses to the Holocaust.
0:22:05 > 0:22:10What is the right response to those who have stories to share,
0:22:10 > 0:22:13but their testimony is unproven?
0:22:13 > 0:22:18Is it enough just to be keeping the memory of the Holocaust alive?
0:22:24 > 0:22:26# Happy birthday to you
0:22:26 > 0:22:32# Happy birthday, dear Denis... #
0:22:32 > 0:22:37At 93, Denis is getting used to invitations to be a guest speaker.
0:22:37 > 0:22:40Hooray! Hip-hip, hooray!
0:22:40 > 0:22:46Albert Einstein, he said there's none so evil as they that passes
0:22:46 > 0:22:50by a situation, sees the situation and passes by and does nothing.
0:22:53 > 0:22:56Today, he's visiting the Nicky Alliance Day Centre,
0:22:56 > 0:22:59a Jewish-run charity in Manchester.
0:22:59 > 0:23:02Old age - there's no future in it.
0:23:07 > 0:23:11Some of those here are survivors of the Holocaust.
0:23:11 > 0:23:13I've been through hell.
0:23:13 > 0:23:16I've had typhoid twice.
0:23:16 > 0:23:20I was taken away from my mother, father,
0:23:20 > 0:23:24sisters, brothers, everybody. Six of us - I was left.
0:23:25 > 0:23:28But him, how he's done that...
0:23:28 > 0:23:32Well, God only bless him how he managed to do it.
0:23:32 > 0:23:34What was your number, 57?
0:23:34 > 0:23:35My number?
0:23:39 > 0:23:41152.
0:23:41 > 0:23:42152.
0:23:42 > 0:23:46Denis has a special connection with those of his generation
0:23:46 > 0:23:50whose suffering he was forced to witness first-hand.
0:23:50 > 0:23:54Yet even here his story has provoked some debate.
0:23:56 > 0:24:00My past, I don't often talk about it.
0:24:00 > 0:24:06I've listened to plenty of stories so how can I judge his story?
0:24:08 > 0:24:11With something like this, there's always a bit of doubt
0:24:11 > 0:24:13because you're never 100% sure.
0:24:13 > 0:24:16There were a couple of survivors who were there
0:24:16 > 0:24:20and two of them asking rather what I would call brusque questions.
0:24:20 > 0:24:23But he was OK. He stood his ground.
0:24:23 > 0:24:27But I'm not sure that they totally 100% believed him.
0:24:27 > 0:24:29But I mean, I do.
0:24:31 > 0:24:33For those in this community,
0:24:33 > 0:24:37it's important that the Holocaust is never forgotten.
0:24:37 > 0:24:41The whole subject has become much more emotional over the last 15 or 20 years
0:24:41 > 0:24:43because even myself, I knew about it,
0:24:43 > 0:24:45but you didn't really know too much about it.
0:24:45 > 0:24:49It was something that was there but no-one actually ever spoke about it
0:24:49 > 0:24:51and as it got spoken more and more,
0:24:51 > 0:24:57then they probably wanted to make people become aware of what actually happened.
0:24:57 > 0:25:02The story will not be told first-hand much longer
0:25:02 > 0:25:05and nothing like hearing it from the horse's mouth, is there?
0:25:09 > 0:25:13But having a book published about his experience of the Holocaust
0:25:13 > 0:25:15has been bittersweet for Denis.
0:25:15 > 0:25:19And, with no-one to verify his testimony,
0:25:19 > 0:25:21those questions are not going away.
0:25:24 > 0:25:27I don't want to blame the witnesses.
0:25:27 > 0:25:34I understand that they were in the camp under huge pressure
0:25:34 > 0:25:36and, even now, they're still under pressure,
0:25:36 > 0:25:39under pressure of expectations
0:25:39 > 0:25:41from the audience, from the other people.
0:25:41 > 0:25:46I know from my own experience that sometimes this story,
0:25:46 > 0:25:51that initially seems to be very problematic,
0:25:51 > 0:25:55after years, it's proved to be true so that's why I'm
0:25:55 > 0:26:01not saying yes, I'm not saying no. I'm waiting for the confirmation.
0:26:05 > 0:26:09I think there's a very serious side to this.
0:26:09 > 0:26:13I met some very fine people
0:26:13 > 0:26:16who had had the most awful experiences
0:26:16 > 0:26:20in the ghettos and the camps, and lost their families,
0:26:20 > 0:26:26but wouldn't be interviewed because they said at the time,
0:26:26 > 0:26:29"I can't remember names and places.
0:26:29 > 0:26:33"I just, you know, my memory, I can't... The details of this,"
0:26:33 > 0:26:36and the Holocaust-deniers will pounce on it,
0:26:36 > 0:26:39and I'll be playing in to their hands.
0:26:40 > 0:26:43But giving weight to the arguments of those who deny
0:26:43 > 0:26:47the atrocities of the Holocaust is a real concern.
0:26:47 > 0:26:51Could Denis' story be playing into their hands?
0:26:51 > 0:26:55We have to defend our insistence on historical accuracy
0:26:55 > 0:26:57when it comes to the Holocaust.
0:26:57 > 0:27:01If we allow these standards to slip and if we say,
0:27:01 > 0:27:03"OK, it doesn't really matter
0:27:03 > 0:27:08"because the general message is one of outrage about the Holocaust,"
0:27:08 > 0:27:14a line is crossed which might then kind of lead to more publications of these kinds,
0:27:14 > 0:27:19where the Holocaust is mixed with almost adventure stories and then we are slipping into
0:27:19 > 0:27:23a territory which might create all possible problems...
0:27:25 > 0:27:30..and eventually allow Holocaust-deniers to claim the Holocaust never happened.
0:27:32 > 0:27:36Look, it's absolutely right that people should ask questions if they want to.
0:27:36 > 0:27:39That's part of a historical process.
0:27:39 > 0:27:43Denis' testimony now enters that historical process where people
0:27:43 > 0:27:47will go over it and ask questions, and compare it with other sources.
0:27:47 > 0:27:51That's a genuine historical process but what you don't do is get...
0:27:51 > 0:27:54You won't get testimony from survivors
0:27:54 > 0:27:57if you make it illegitimate to talk about it.
0:28:04 > 0:28:07After 65 years of silence,
0:28:07 > 0:28:14Denis stands by his story and his decision to finally go public.
0:28:14 > 0:28:17It wasn't a big adventure, it was a must.
0:28:17 > 0:28:21I don't mind if they doubt my word, I don't mind that a bit.
0:28:21 > 0:28:24It doesn't... I know what I've done.
0:28:24 > 0:28:29I know... I hope I've got a few Brownie points for doing that.
0:28:29 > 0:28:31I only hope so.
0:28:51 > 0:28:54Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd