Nusan Weiss with Josef and Maria Paserin in partisan group
Gift of Joseph Garay
Id no. 319.96, Photograph
Subject(s): Resistance
This photograph shows Josef Paserin (left), his wife Maria (center), and Nusan Weiss (right) in Slovakia in 1944, where they fought as partisans (soldiers unaffiliated with formal armies) against the Nazi-collaborationist Slovak state. They are standing in front of a tent-like structure Czech partisans called a Hata, which was camouflaged at the top to prevent being seen from above.
After the Slovak national uprising began in August 1944, Weiss and Paserin joined the partisan ?Stalin Brigade.? Later, Weiss joined the advancing Soviet army that, by April of 1945, had liberated most of the country. With the help of Paserin, who had saved information about his American relatives, he immigrated to the US after the war.
Weiss was born in 1921 in Kerecky, Slovakia. In 1942, his family was deported by the Slovak Hlinka Guard, a nationalist paramilitary organization that collaborated with the Nazis. Weiss escaped this fate by hiding with Josef Paserin, a non-Jewish friend. He received a false identity from Rabbi Michael Dov Weissmandel, a leader of the Working Group, the Slovak Jewish underground organization, who focused on rescuing Jews. Weiss kept this non-Jewish name, Joseph Garay, after the war.
After the Slovak national uprising began in August 1944, Weiss and Paserin joined the partisan ?Stalin Brigade.? Later, Weiss joined the advancing Soviet army that, by April of 1945, had liberated most of the country. With the help of Paserin, who had saved information about his American relatives, he immigrated to the US after the war.
Weiss was born in 1921 in Kerecky, Slovakia. In 1942, his family was deported by the Slovak Hlinka Guard, a nationalist paramilitary organization that collaborated with the Nazis. Weiss escaped this fate by hiding with Josef Paserin, a non-Jewish friend. He received a false identity from Rabbi Michael Dov Weissmandel, a leader of the Working Group, the Slovak Jewish underground organization, who focused on rescuing Jews. Weiss kept this non-Jewish name, Joseph Garay, after the war.
