Judita Stavrovská

“Together with other two families, the village people who saved us took us to the mountains, where we stayed in an underground bunker. There we lasted out the winter and spring of 1944/1945, until the Soviet Army came and liberated us. I still can’t explain myself how we were able to survive that. My sister was so weak because of the lack of food, that she was even unable to cry. However, it was quite fortunate, on the other hand, because the Germans used to walk above our bunker and if she started to cry, we would surely be revealed. Those people from Baláže saved us. They brought us food even though they themselves didn’t have much. My mom used to say they counted the beans, how many can eat each person in the bunker. My father always went to wash my diapers down to the stream, where at first he had to break the ice and only then rinse them. Simply, I still cannot imagine how could we survive that, but we did.”

“As I said before, my father was very smart and he was promoted from one office to another; however, only until the 1952, when the trial with Slánský took place. My father was dismissed from his job and accused he was a Zionist. I remember my parents were horrified the father would be arrested too, since my mom already knew that within the Slánský trial, her cousin Edo Goldstücker was imprisoned. Back then it was labeled that the person was sent to ‘a production’, what simply described the fact, he was found a new job – without a choice – and thus he was sent to work as a roofer. My father was nearly 50 years old, he had never worked manually before; he was only a travelling salesman, so this was something terrible for him.”