Jan Darsa

“When we came to the first square, the sirens went off announcing the arrival of American airplanes. So my father decided that we would not go anywhere down the cellar. And now we went to the second square and the third square up to the industrial school, today’s museum. So we were riding our bikes along the road and everyone was hiding in chaos. And when we got to the gymnasium, they stopped the sirens and the air aid was called off, as American planes went elsewhere. So up here out of breath and tired with fear and all the biking, we just rested. Well and then we went back home.“

“Then I was in the village of Vidovle. German soldiers accompanied the whole procession. It was back in 1945 just before the Red Army arrived. Those prisoners you know, they just could not go on. Germans had nothing to give them. And they were all so weak anyway. Just bones and skin and I was them coming to a German farmer begging for potatoes or a piece of bread. I saw the farmer woman saying: ‚Here in the yard you got a whole heap of potatoes. They have been cooked already, you can eat those.‘ They saw it, about ten of the prisoners. They jumped at it eating straight from the ground. They must have been really hungry.”