Nông Văn Hinh Oral History

Vietnamese language interview with Hinh Văn Nông who discusses his experience as a political prisoner in North Vietnam. Before his capture, he was a special forces soldier for South Vietnam who was parachuted to North Vietnam to live as a spy in the North for two years before he was caught and put in prison with a death sentence. He describes how people in the North lived during the Vietnam War. He was sent to an infamous prison camp named "Cổng Trời" meaning "the gate of the death" located on the border of Vietnam and China. When China invaded Vietnam in 1979 they moved the prisoners. He was released about forty years later because he was good in carpentry; he had built the prison and prison managers many pieces of furniture.

This interview is part of the Vietnamese in the Diaspora Digital Archive. http://vietdiasporastories.omeka.net Interviews were conducted by the Vietnamese American Heritage Foundation as part of the national 500 Oral Histories Project. The interviewee has granted The Vietnamese American Heritage Foundation copyright of the audio, video and photo materials and it is being made available for non-profit educational use.

Additionally, this interview was recorded in the process of producing VIETNAMERICA, a feature-length film and follow-up to the short documentary, Master Hoa's Requiem. Not all interview materials were included in the final film. The film follows Master Hoa back to Southeast Asia to search for the graves of his wife and two children. Hoa escaped Vietnam in 1981 on a boat with his family and friends. He is the sole survivor. http://www.vietnameseamerican.org/