Josef Hána

* 1945

  • "That was sometime towards spring. They [the deportees] were put down at Lipka. The whole village, whoever had a horse, everyone went and brought them something. They unloaded them there, what they came with, they had about seven kilometers to Coronini, here it was about six. People went there with wagons and brought it to their homes. Free of charge. They unloaded them by the side of the road and people loaded it on wagons and took it home for them. They even brought corn and I don't know what else. They were in Bãrãgan for five years."

  • "They [the deported families] were the richest, they had the most fields, but they were not rich. Mrs. Klepáčkova had a shop where she sold threads, cotton, embroidery, lace, textiles, but they didn't... that they were rich. The Kovaříks didn't have so much... they were masons, they worked around the Danube so that the water wouldn't wash out the road to Oršava."

  • "It was June 1951 when they left. We got up in the morning and the street was full of soldiers. Daddy went to get water - there was a well in the centre where we drew water, and he came up with empty hands, the soldiers wouldn't let him in, he didn't bring water. Then there was somebody reading something in Romanian on the corner, I don't remember what exactly. Then the Kovaříks went past, I didn't see the Klepáček family, because they lived in Dlouhá Street, and they went out the other way to the main road down to the Danube. There were some trucks that took them up to Cãlãrasi, where they put them down on the stubble. They cut barley and there they dumped them on the stubble field where they had to build houses and work. Lojza Kovařík was leading a cow and crying, they were taking wagons, they had blankets, beds and I don't know what all on them."

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    Kraslice, 17.03.2024

    (audio)
    duration: 01:18:05
    media recorded in project Stories of the 20th Century TV
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Lojza was leading a cow and weeping, he died in exile in Bãrãgan

Josef Hána in 2024
Josef Hána in 2024
photo: Memory of Nations

Josef Hána was born on 16 March 1945 in the Czech village of Svatá Helena in the Romanian Banat. He was the first of four children of František and Alžběta Hána. His father sold various goods in a state-owned shop there. From an early age he was involved in seasonal work on the farm. Their relatives emigrated to Czechoslovakia after the war. In June 1951, the witness witnessed the occupation of the village by military units and the subsequent deportation of the Kovařík family to the Bãrãgan area. During the absence of another deported farming family, the Klepáček family (in 1951-1956), the state-owned shop was to be moved to their house, and upon their return from deportation, the shop was to be vacated and moved to other premises. After returning from military service in 1969, he joined the Suvorov coal mine and worked there for nearly 23 years. He was repeatedly offered membership of the Communist Party. He also lived through the events of the revolutionary changes of 1989 in the mines. He heard the news of the execution of dictator Nicolae Ceausescu and his wife Elena at the end of his shift. In the 1990s, after the decline and cessation of mining, his sons left for the Czech Republic and in 2001 he and his wife joined them. He managed to go through several more jobs before retiring. At the time of recording (April 2024), he was living in Plesná in the Cheb region.