Denise Beatonová

Bob and Truda were married on the 12th June 1945 in Troppau. My father always said: “Captured first on the 12th June 1940 at St Valéry-en-Caux and captured for life on the 12th June 1945.“ Bob repatriated following the marriage. Truda was required to wait in Prague for 9 weeks until her husband was cleared – checked out that he did not already have a wife in the UK. Truda travelled to London and they went to live with an uncle in Graves End for a few months. Truda had only a small suitcase of belongings and Bob weighed 6 stone only when he came home. Once paperwork was cleared, they travelled to the Highlands of Scotland, to Tain, where my brother and I were born and remained there until their deaths. Bob had a family in Tain: a widowed mother and 4 younger siblings. Truda was not welcomed into this large family. Being from Central Europe meant she was German/Nazi. She has grammar school English so language was an issue as was the fact that she was a Roman Catholic. There were extremely few Catholics in the Highlands of Scotland at that time, other than the Polish and German prisoners of war who had remained there after the war ended.

In 1995 a group of Czech Job Centre workers came to Stevenson College to see how we worked. This was funded by the British Know-How Fund. I was asked to lead the academic structure part of this funding. My boss knew that my mother was Czech and it was no coincidence therefore that I travelled with Celia (she also worked with students with special needs to Most in West Bohemia. Here we trained and shared skills with the Czech Job Centre staff in 1995/6. I was quite overwhelmed to see how Czech I was, insofar as the food and customs appeared to me. This was interesting because I had associated my culture with German because of the language. We worked very hard but it was a pleasure to find so many Job Centre staff so willing to learn as much as they could in the weeks we were there. We made lifelong friends. None of this would have been possible without our amazing interpreter Alena. We received great hospitality and kindness from Most people. We set up a course for disadvantaged young people in Most and focussed on trying to overcome the difficulties many areas have with integrating young people from the Romany and different communities.This is not only an ongoing Central European but even worldwide issue but I believe with education and tolerance attitudes can change.After the first year training, the Czech government allowed these courses and skills to be rolled out to other areas of the Czech Republic. It was most rewarding work to think I was able to put something back into my mother´s homeland.