VICTIM OF NAZI TERROR

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 19979, 3 July 1939, Page 6

VICTIM OF NAZI TERROR

AUSTRIAN JEW REFUGEE DEPRIVED OF BUSINESS GLAD TO BE IN N.Z. (Tor Press Association.) AUCKLAND, this day. Deprived l of 'his means and manufacturing business and twice imprisoned for no other reason, than for reading foreign newspapers, an Austrian, a non-Aryan, Mr. H. C. Grossman, of Vienna, arrived by the Avvatea on Saturday determined to make good in a position he has accepted in Hamilton. Mr. Grossman said he was glad to bo as far from European political strife as it was humanly possible to get.

“Almost exactly a year ago, I was serving a. term of three months' imprisonment for nothing.” Mr. Grossman continued. “The secret police sorted me out for reading English newspapers and threw me into prison, without trial, among many other political prisoners. It was not a concentration camp where I was taken, but a criminal prison, although I had committed no crime.

“There were 50 others in the same cell in a position .similar to mine.” Shortly after being released, Mr. Grossman added, he was again arrested on a similar pretext and, on that occasion, served two weeks’ imprisonment. In the meantime, he lost all his money arid was forced to abandon a well-established business associated with the manufacture of forestry products and particularly veneer panelling. "It is common knowledge among our people that New Zealand is a pleasant country to live in, and I am glad to be here,” said Mr. Grossman. “I will be happier still when, I have signed my naturalisation papers and I hope it will not be long before I can be regarded as a good New Zenlander.”