Ing. Blažej Ingr

“They brought me to the police station under the Špilberk Hill in Brno, and it was just like in detective books. They asked me whether I knew where I was and what had happened the evening before when Mr. Škorpík came and said that sister was missing.... I immediately realized what they were after, and I knew that I had to keep silent about it. I summoned all my courage, and I said that I did not know absolutely anything about Škorpík, because I had been sleeping all the time. But, this young guy slapped me so hard that I fell down from the chair. It was clear to me that I could not give in. He kept shouting at me that I was a Son of a Kulak, and how come that I had not known what they had talked about. And, he continued in this manner, and there was no end to it. Then he was relieved by another guy, an elderly man, who was sweet as honey, and who tried to assure me that we would certainly agree on something and nothing would happen to me.”

“Then there was 1948 and personal assessments were being written, and mine said that I was a Son of a Kulak, or a farmer who owned more land. Or, for example, if somebody was a son of a village blacksmith who shod horses and mended people’s things, and then spent all his earnings on drinking and never really had anything, he was still considered an independent tradesman. And that was wrong, although, in reality, he was a slave who toiled hard as a slave with his hammer.”