Nora Hermanová

"My mother was not Jewish, my mother was also imprisoned on denouncement. She had a friend, Mrs. Malířová, she was Jewish and she was a language teacher - French, German, English. My sister and I also used to go to her place. She was locked up as a Jew, and they put a confidante, Mrs. Chalupecká, in her cell, who asked her what she could, and among other things, where she kept her things. She just said that she hid them at the Metzls, which was us, and with Mrs. Šustrová. That was the maid I haven't mentioned yet who used to come to us to do laundry and wash the stairs. She also served to that extent at Mrs. Malířová's place. And she also named Mrs. Šustrová, because she also had things hidden there. Based on Chalupecká's testimony, my mother and Mrs. Šustrová were also arrested. We were both at home. The reason for the arrest is paradoxical, my mother was arrested for keeping Jewish property, which is inexplicable, everything we had at home was Jewish. My sister and I were both there. That was the rest of the home atmosphere that mom was there. Three days before Christmas Day 1944, when someone rang the doorbell, my sister went to open the door, there were two Gestapo officers behind the door - Steinhauser and Kastner, who arrested my mother. I don't remember the reason, just 'You come with us' and that's it. They kicked us out of the apartment, sealed it up and took my mother away. It was before Christmas Eve and they told mum to find a staple anyway, they put her in solitary cell because if they were to tell her what they were going to do to us she's going to hang herself.'

"It was because of the denouncement of the assistant who was in the office of my brother-in-law and my father. His name was Postl and he was a person who - nobody came to our place anymore because they were afraid. But he was coming to us very often, he always wanted something from my father and needed advice, and we had no idea that he was a confidant of the Gestapo. He finally denounced dad saying that he goes to the office and doesn't have a star on his jacket when he takes off his coat, and when he walks down the street, in the place where the star is, he carries a briefcase. And that it was him, the informer, we learned from the fact that my father was in Budějovice in the so-called Justice, the third window on the second floor. One time we were walking by, dad appeared in the window, then we tried to go there every day, hoping to see him. And he once cut out, or I don't know to this day if he was gluing bags or something, on that window, there he made letters that made sense - and there was 'Pst, Postl and Edlman' - and from that we concluded that they were the informers."