"Those interrogations in 1985 happened every day for three weeks, including Saturdays and Sundays, four or five hours every day, three hours in the morning and two in the afternoon or so for a total of four or five hours a day, including Saturdays and Sundays, day after day. Now, I realise that nobody from that community had been interrogated because of me. I owe it to the Lord that somehow it worked out and I didn't betray anybody. I'm pretty proud of that, I'm so happy about that. I was worried about some people because I might have said something and wrong them. I could also have said something unintentionally. You never know if they spike your meal or whatever and then you start talking. But that didn't happen, so none of those people were questioned."
"Well, Václav wanted me to already be ordained should I go to prison. They were looking for ways to do this but there weren't many. Cardinal Tomášek's name was mentioned. That idea was rejected, not because of him but because he was too heavily guarded. Otčenášek's name was mentioned too, then I don't know who else's, and Davídek's name was dropped, or one of the bishops of that group. And I didn't really want that. Eventually, it turned out differently. The one who was to be ordained with me, the one who went to Rome... We were together at the exercises in September 1985, and then he went to Berlin in October with one... You always went with a guarantor, and so Jarda Karl went with him, I think. As for me, what happened was that I went on business in Prague one Wednesday, and I met Vašek Ventura in Vodičkova Street. He said: 'Oh, and do you know that you are to be ordained on Sunday?' - 'No, I don't.' I learned just before the ceremony. Bishop Meisner had sent his consecrating bishop Wolfgang Weider to Prague. He drove a Trabant car to Prague with a priest, and ordained me in František Pich's apartment late Sunday evening. It was after half past nine because he'd done a confirmation ceremony in Berlin that morning and then he drove over here."
"I came to Section D where we exited via gatehouse, and there was an image of Jan Palach on a column by the gatehouse. It was only then that I realised it was him. I was deeply moved, I must say, I really was. You know, he was so dedicated! For example, when we would leave the academic student council meetings that spring, all the students would read Reportér, Student, Literární noviny and what not, this free press, and only then they would study in any free time that was left. He, instead, cared about copying his classmates' textbooks which were in short supply or unavailable. He was really selfless that way. He thought of other people before he thought of himself."
"As far as I know, there were two ledgers in the mill. One was the official one, for the Germans, and the other was the 'black ledger' with unofficial records. And the gendarmes in the area were quite helpful. For example, they tipped us off if an inspection was coming. That way, my parents could prepare for the inspection and put the papers in order so they wouldn't get caught. Maybe the occupation, in a way, saved my father or grandfather from having the mill nationalized. It wasn't big, but it was terrible with Bolsheviks in Milevsko. There were a hundred and thirty families evicted. It was a small district, yet there were a hundred and thirty people evicted, some farmers arrested. My grandfather's attitude, even during the war, was that if somebody needed flour but didn't have any grain to have it made from, my grandpa would somehow get it and give it to them. He didn't care whether they were communists or differently minded people."
Václav Dvořák was born in Tábor on 6 January 1947 as the first son of Václav Dvořák and Růžena Dvořáková. He spent his childhood with his parents and siblings at the family mill in Vratišov, but was sent to Prague at age six and entered a boarding school for children with visual impairments. As a gifted student, he continued his studies first at the eleven-year school and at the University of Economics after graduation. He found his ‘second home’ in Prague in the Týnský Church parish led by Jiří Reinsberg and especially the community around Mons. Václav Dvořák where he found his place in life. The community consisted of secretly ordained priests who understood the hidden life among the people as their ultimate calling. After graduation, the witness was employed first in the Čakovice sugar mill and then at Oseva. In April 1985, shortly before his intended ordination to the priesthood, he was detained as part of the StB Project Saturn and charged with illegal distribution of religious literature. He spent more than a month in the Ruzyně detention centre. Despite being subjected to long interrogations, he did not endanger the life of the community and was eventually acquitted for lack of evidence. He was ordained priest secretly in December of that year. In the latter 1980s, the witness signed the Augustin Navrátil petition and Several Sentences. When attending the canonization of St Agnes of Bohemia in Rome in November 1989, he did not believe that changes in our society would come so soon. After the Velvet Revolution, he officially joined the Archdiocese of Prague and assisted priests in parishes. Faithful to the idea of his community, he continued to live a priesthood combined with civil life, remaining an employee of Oseva until 2012. Václav Dvořák died on 9 July 2024.
