NOVA

Hey, how are you? - Good. (clapperboard clicks) (melancholy music) My name is Richard Freund, and I am the lead archeologist for the Holocaust Escape Tunnel. Almost 40% of the population of Vilnius was Jewish. It was called the Jerusalem of Lithuania. And it was a magical place. The Nazis came into Lithuania and began a systematic eradication of Vilnius. The archeological expedition that came to Lithuania was there to excavate the remains of the great synagogue. This is like the Vatican in terms of its size. We mapped the entire subsurface. And what did we discover? The entire synagogue is still there. This is a story that really has not gotten very much attention. The Nazis brought their victims to a forest called Ponar and had them shot one by one. They conscripted 80 Jews to come in and to burn the bodies. So they decided they were going to build an escape tunnel. (melancholy music) I've been involved in this story all my life as I was growing up. Although my father didn't want to talk about it a lot. My father is one of the 12 survivors of the Punata now. He was 17 and a half years old. The kitchen area, that's where they started the tunnel. And they said, "Can you find this legendary escape tunnel? We have not been able to find it." And we did. I had a phone call. He said, "I just heard on the news. They found your father's tunnel." I said, "What are you talking about?" One of the good things about this documentary we did, children of the survivors, they heard about it. To do what they did. That is heroism. It's unbelievable. (melancholy music)