Marie Antošová

“They came to my mom and told her that I was malnourished. I was nine years old at that time and they told her that I would go to a sanatorium and get food and treatment there. She was told that we would spend six weeks there. And then we would go home. They gave us clothing for the journey, nice blue woollen dress. With long sleeves, white collar, and embroidery. We received shoes, stockings, and a bag with school supplies. There were children who came from villages all the way from Nýrsko to Alžbětín and they were from families with many children. They selected those children who had German appearance. I had plaits and blonde hair... and so they gathered us and they sent us by train to Germany. On the train we were informed that the sanatorium was not able to accepts so many children and that we would therefore stay with families instead. They had already pre-selected which family would want to choose a particular child and the children were to be divided among childless families. Why? Because, like in my case... my dad was a Czech and my mom was a single mother and she had two children. And they took me away because I was a suitable type for a German family. Because I had this look… a German look.”

“The teacher left, the school bell was ringing, and he said: ‘That German swine is taking up space here, and when one needs help, she does not help him.’ He was so stupid... and as chance would have it, I have already had enough. When he said ‘German swine,’ I thought… at first we were called Böhmish, and now we are German swine? It made me so angry that I grabbed a wooden pen-case and I ran after him. He ran into the boys’ bathroom... and I gave him a beating there... I pushed his head into an urinal and I was beating him. And suddenly somebody pulled me up by my collar and led me out... it was the school principal. But I did not even get a worse grade for bad conduct on my school report for that, because the teacher called me a German swine. I just could not put up with it. During the war they were calling us Böhmish, and now we were German swine. I felt sorry about it… I was crying... and so I gave him a threshing. But since that time they began respecting me, and they knew that it was better not to provoke me.”

“At first I was untrustworthy… oh, how the world changes… and so I have served my term. My life was like this. I was fifteen and a half, and I got sentenced to four moths because I did not reveal his name. Who would have informed upon a neighbour who had been helping my parents? I did not want to escape, I was not even able to... my parents were penniless, and I had to go to work to earn money, and I was not even interested in running away. I did not want to… well, I have thus served my term. I was in prison in Klatovy. For the first three weeks I was in solitary confinement and nobody was allowed to come to me, and then I was in a group and I had to work. I was crying that I was hungry, and a female warden took pity upon me and they treated me well, and they were all nice to me there. Except the investigators, they were mean. Then they sent me to work in the kitchen and there were two SS female prisoners…two German women, and I was working with them. When they arrested Bruckdorfer and interned him in the Klatovy prison, they quickly transported me to Pilsen. Firstly because as a juvenile I was to be tried there, and secondly, they did not want me to learn that he was in prison. And then there was another interrogation and other court trials in Prague. I have caused harm to the Czechoslovak Republic…I have survived all this and I am here.”