Eva Krupková

“A traffic officer was standing in the morning at the crossroads by Atesa roundabout in Jilemnice. We went there and were wondering what was happening and went to have a look.” – “The entire family?”- “No, children, girls and boys. We were standing just down the street. There were people from Autobrzdy company there, some blue-collar workers came to see what was going on. And suddenly a man came there, he was acting the know-all and waving a camera in front of his [soldier´s] nose. He lashed out and pulled it (the trigger). And as he turned to the other side – a man and a woman were standing there – he shot them.” – “The soldier pulled it?” – “A machine gun. I turned to the right and a bullet flew next to me, it lodged in the ground. My father heard there was a shooting there and came running for me and said: 'Go home!' And I said: 'A bullet flew next to me.' He wanted to take a gun and wanted to kill the soldier. Grandma told him not to go anywhere that he would get in trouble because of it. So, he took me home, and they scolded me at home that I should have not been there. And the woman was pregnant, she had a miscarriage. The other man was badly shot and was in hospital.”

“It was in 1939, he was summoned, and he did forced labour in a camp somewhere between Germany and Belgium. They dug foundations. He and his four or five friends managed to run away to France. He said it was horrible – when they were escaping, the Germans were shooting at them but did not catch them. My father jumped into a pile of wood and his friend fell on dung. Then they were hiding in a wine cellar for two or three days so that they did not find them. The owner of the farm took them out and he had a connection to France where other liaisons smuggled people who had escaped. The liaison took them to France where it had already started to form. They took them to England crossing the English Channel. He said he was holding on to a mast, the wind was strong, and he could see drowned people. He was hoping he could get there. They got there and he met with his friends who had escaped with him in the port in England. They started to form them into our army in England and he was a tank driver."