Miluše Kepková

“In Nuremberg in the large room there was nothing but an oak bench. Apart from sitting there, we would lie on the ground. It was a room for ‘zugangs’ – those who had arrived. We lied on the ground; I had a little bag with sand soap with which I brushed my teeth, a toothbrush and a comb. I do not even know who gave it to me. As soon as we lay down on the floor, a crazy air raid had begun. So terrible, so awful that dirt and brick splinters were flying by the small windows up there. Then the wall slid down. In horror, I crawled under the toiled in the corner. I had not been religious because my dad did not want me to go to religious classes. In any case, I asked my mom to buy me holy pictures. I hid my head below that toilet and said: ‘Mom, please, I don’t want to die. Please, do what you need to save me.’ Those women took the bench and banged it against the door. But it was a wooden door, covered in iron; there was no way it would let go. And from outside it was closed with a latch. We heard men from the upper floor running through the hallway to the basement. The Germans were already hidden in the basement. Those ‘heftrics’ were all running and opening latches. We were on the edge; there was a staircase there and a huge gate which was on fire. Beams were falling around. It was so horrible, dirt was flying all around. Someone opened our door; I saw the burning gate, stopped and said: ‘I am not going through’. Suddenly, some boy grabbed my hand and said: ‘You have to pass through. Let’s go.’ And he pulled me down by these beams to the basement. We stopped there and he asked: ‘Where are you from?’ I replied: ‘I am locked up here, I come from Plzeň.’ He said: ‘Me too. They are taking us to a camp. If you ever come back, remember that I wrote a poem collection called Polní tráva.’ However, his name I already forgot.”

“There were men standing out there at the railway station. It was cold, freezing and those railway workers brought me in to their office to warm up a bit because I stood there as a little girl. When they loaded us into trains, they also pushed me in. The whole transport was heading to Cheb. There they let us lie on the floor. The men had to keep standing. In the morning we travelled to Hof where there were only Russian women working in the prison. I was the only Czech girl there. I had to scrub floors for two weeks. A nasty scene took place there. The German who was guarding us kept staring at me all the time. I had no idea what could happen. I prepared a bucket, wet a rag and only when he saw that I was about to hit him with it, he left.”

Miluše was suffering from scarlet fever and was placed in the medical center of the Pankrác prison where Mrs. Ferrová worked. "She told me about a warden who let me see my daddy for a last time. Once she took me with her into a corridor that was used for taking prisoners from the death row to the execution site. The men walked through this corridor in pairs, handcuffed to each other. They had to cross an inner yard. An SS-man with a dog stood in each corner of the yard. The whole yard was filled with men. I went there with the others to empty a bucket into a huge hole in the ground. The warden said: 'Look!' So I looked at the men coming my direction. It was very hot and the window was open. I silently called 'Dad!' The inmate that walked in pair with my dad noticed it and told my dad. My dad turned his head and looked at me. He quickly looked at the guard with the dog, sent me a kiss and walked on. And I had to go as well."

"When Ferra ran away, one group of the 2nd Light Secret Division was tasked with hiding him. Its members took turns hiding runaway resistance fighters for a period of time. We were hiding Miroslav Ferra from October 1943 till 14. June 1944."

The prison was hit and was in danger of collapsing. Miluše and other women were trapped in the cell. "The women took the bench and banged it against the door of the cell but it wouldn't open. Finally after some time the door opened. Somebody opened the doors to the cells on the upper floor and the inmates came down the staircase and opened the doors to the cells on the lower levels. They opened our door as well. The majority of the inmates were men. I ran down to the entrance. There was a huge gate that was on fire and the girders were collapsing. I stood there for an instant and I said: 'I can't pass through there'. Suddenly, somebody grabbed my arm and literally dragged me behind him. It turned out that this person was a boy from Pilsen who had been in a slave-labor camp in Germany."

"Our class room was the first room at the entrance of the school. The girls told me that two men were looking for me. I walked out into the corridor and they asked me if I was Kašparová. I said: 'Yes, I'm Miluše Kašparová'. They told me to come with them. They took my hand, pushed me into a car and took me away. This produced a great stir at school since I was nowhere to be found and my class teacher thought that I had been kidnapped. The headmaster called the police and the police told her that I had been taken away by the Gestapo. At the Gestapo Headquarters, I was interrogated by an SS-man called Haas. After the interrogation was over, I was deaf on my left ear. It was a standard interrogation, just like any other that he did. He was said to be an ex-boxer so he probably needed to train his boxing techniques on his victims."