“The order was to concentrate the retreating army and partisan units, the remaining men so that the Germans would not capture or kill them. The Germans used propaganda. They dropped flyers saying: ‘Slovak soldiers, return back to your homes. You will be allowed back to your families without prosecution with this document.’ It was a hoax. Some believed it and they were captured and send to concentration camps. A clever tactic.”
[Did the Germans resist?] “They did, but it didn’t help them. All the traffic was stopped so that the local people wouldn’t get into it and the advance was concentrated on strategic points such as the barracks where the Germans had their headquarters, Hlinka Guard etc. All was seized and they couldn’t do anything. They saw they were outnumbered and it was no use to resist. People got weapons and the will to fight was really strong, because of the poverty...”
“The snow has already fallen down and in Martin, there were granaries full of grain that the insurgent army did not manage to take with them. We had to report to the commander of the retreating units. In order to keep the supplies from falling into German hands our task was to destroy the granaries. It was a pity because the granaries could supply a lot of people after the war. But we had to destroy them. The order was: Destroy at any cost.”
“As the frontline advanced, it was the second Ukrainian [front], Malinovsky’s and Romanian divisions – south of Slovakia and Hungary were mainly liberated by the Romanian army together with the Russians. We got an order to pack everything up and gather at the partisan headquarters. So we went through Prašivá a Kráľova Hoľa to Poprad and Kežmarok, those were already liberated. Then we came to the barracks, then we washed, got our hair cut and the army life began.”
“I was supposed to go to school but my mother could not take care of me so she arranged an orphanage for me. As a six years old child I came to the state orphanage in Slovenská Ľupča and stayed there till 1937. In 1937 the institution was reorganized and the orphanage became a correction home and I was sent to the Red Cross in Banská Bystrica where I stayed till the 4th grade and then I was transferred to the orphanage in Spišská Nová Ves.”
Retired warrant officer Josef Hiadlovský was born on 12th August 1927 in Ľubietová near Banská Bystrica in former Czechoslovakia. Due to family circumstances he grew up in orphanages and later wanted to become a cook, but instead of joining the apprenticeship he joined the J.V. Stalin 2nd Czechoslovak Partisan Brigade on 15th August 1944. After the outbreak of the Slovak National Uprising, he took part in the liberation of Banská Bystrica and other armed conflicts against the Geman forces. He suffered a minor injury by a shrapnel. In February 1945 he went back to eastern Slovakia where he joined the 4th Brigade of the Czechoslovak Army, with which he advanced through the whole Slovakia until Kroměříž. After the war, he worked in a textile company in Aš. Later he served the compulsory army service and stayed in the army with a short intermission for the rest of his life. He served in Kynžvart, Stříbro, v Nepomuk and Mariánské Lázně. Currently he lives in Třemošnice.
