“They came to see me and they asked me whether we also came to fight with them, and I replied that we had been simply sent to them. We became friends, and I joined the partisans as the first one. I stole some grenades and bandages and other necessities from the sergeant major of the Slovak army, and ran away. The news of my escape to the partisans reached Slovakia, we were spoken of as bandits, and they told me father that he had to make a compensation for the damage I had caused. Father said: ´We don’t know, we didn’t send him there.´ Eventually, they didn’t put him behind the bars for that, and he was not held responsible for it.”
“We were mainly taking things from German buildings and destroying their magazines, but only very few of us were stealing something from the locals. There were some undisciplined members among us, but our commander was strict and he opposed drinking and taking the last bread from the local people. There was poverty. We have obtained everything through combat.” Interviewer: “Were you also taking any weapons?” – “They were airlifting them to us, and dropping them on a parachute. We were not receiving much food, and we were thus taking it from the Germans.” Interviewer: “Were you sleeping in the villagers’ houses?” – “No, we constructed dugouts in a remote place in the forest, and we were setting out for our raids from there. The place was difficult to reach for the Germans. It was cold inside, but we were young, and thus we endured it.”
“The Soviets were responsible for the safety of President Beneš – we were a symbolic unit. We held a parade in Košice, and the orchestra played the Soviet anthem. The Soviets paraded, and our guard of honour as well, and then we went on to Bratislava, made a stop there with Mr. President, and then we continued to Brno and Prague. There were three of us in the guard of honour; there were even some legionnaires of President Masaryk among us. When the political consolidation was taking place, the Soviets were no longer needed, and those soldiers thus received medals of merits and they went to their homeland.”
“We would go and mine a railway track, or a magazine, or blast a bridge, and sometimes there would be more partisan units setting out for one raid together if more people were needed for the task. We blew up a transport train. The Germans fled away, panic ensued, and we had to get out of there quickly, because they had reinforcements at hand. We were also taking Germans prisoners, and one German officer told us that they hadn’t thought that we would have such support from the local people, and that they had underestimated the strength of the partisan movement. Stalin never forgot to include greetings and orders for partisans in his orders. Sometimes it didn’t turn out well, Germans would also pursue us, and if they caught one of us, they would execute him, too, just like they executed one of our members from Poland.”
“Our village of Bernolákovo became a Hungarian territory. I had had friends among the Hungarians, but then they all became somewhat stiff. Since we had been growing up among Czechs, Moravians, and Jews, this was disappointing for me. Then my brother found a flat in Bratislava, and we moved there. Seven months after the village became a Slovak territory again, but we didn’t return there anymore.”
Viliam Voštinář was born December 26, 1920 in the Slovak village of Bernolákovo. After the declaration of the Slovak State he was forced to join the Slovak army in October 1941, and he eventually got to Belarus with a regiment fighting alongside the wehrmacht. He deserted from the army and joined a combat unit of local partisans. After two years he joined the Czechoslovak foreign army. He served in the Castle Guard of President Beneš. After the war he continued serving as a professional soldier. He died on July 1, 2013.
