Emilie Závodská

And now for the units, where did you go?“ “Well, I went to the 3. ambulance battalion. Together with one, another one from our village, she was also there with me. So there were two of us so we weren´t lonely.” “What was or what is her name?” “Milča, Emílie, as me, Červinková.”

„There was such a rally, all young boys, and they sort of guarded the village, but they, you know, didn´t want get involved in some kind of fighting, only when the dairy was attacked, I think there was some shooting, but nobody wanted to get into such skirmishes.” “Do you know any details about that attack on dairy?” “No, no, I don´t.”

„I´d like to go back a little bit and ask Mrs. Závodská if she could tell me something about Blaník and her activities in the organisation Blaník.“ „ Well this Blaník, it was that we had some kind of a look-out point in a loft and we took turns and were watching, there were mostly girls, the boys had some weapons, you know, and when we heard they were coming, they usually came in such convoys to rob or to get someone, we were terribly afraid, well, so we were signalling to the boys.“

„I wonder if you could tell me how the course went on, what it was like.“ „ Well, I have to say there were two elderly nurses, and they were really kind. They told us everything, you know, we spoke no Russian at all, so what we could understand from that, it was what they were explaining and we were also training practically. They let us in the hospital but, you know, we were fledglings, we couldn´t do much, what can you learn in four months…” Then we took this interview or an exam, they said: if you don´t know it in Russian, say it in Czech. And we sometimes didn´t know even in Czech, but we all passed with “atlično” – the best marks, so it was O.K., you know.”