Zdenka Kmochová

"A week before the end of the war, I had an argument with him [Max Tschunko]. He had three children. All their names started with an 'I' - Irmfried, Ingrid, Ingo. Little Ingo was always in this little pen. He was young, about a year and a half. He [Max Tschunko] called to him, 'Ingo, Heil Hitler!´ The little boy raised his little hand, he couldn't speak, but his little hand was up. I went home one day and Tschunko said to me: 'How can you say a greeting properly?' I said: 'Goodbye - Auf Wiedersehen.' He said, 'No, it's on the sign I put above your desk. Unser Gruß - Heil Hitler!' And again, 'Zdenka, Heil Hitler!' I thought, oh man! I went and he followed me again: 'Zdenka, Heil Hitler!' I was so angry, silly girl, I was seventeen. I turned around and said, 'When there was a republic, we didn't force you to say hello our way. You could say hello the way you wanted, and so I say hello the way I want. Auf Wiedersehen!' I started to run away. Luckily he didn't follow me, a silly girl. I said to myself, 'I'm not going in there anymore.' I was so scared of him; he kept painting those crossed bones and telling me that's what I'd look like when Beneš comesr. I came home and I said, 'Mom, I'm not going there anymore, I'm scared.' My mom said, 'You'll be home, there's nothing to be done.' It was exactly one week before the end of the war.

"All the friends from the district authority in Krumlov who went to Budějovice were there, they all knew each other, and they all got together and did those things. They stole a print press to print stuff. Grandpa [witness's father Václav Kmoch] saved them. When the Gestapo came to the office, a colleague of his drove up to him on the road [doing a road check] and told him that he might want to go home to say goodbye or so. Dad said to himself, 'If I go home, there's going to be a scene. There's a child there and my wife there, so it's pointless to go there.' He recalled that the printing press was at the the Dvořáks' house. He drove to the Dvořáks', took the printer and went back to the district. The Gestapo were in there, waiting for him. He put the printer in an office and saved the day. He said, 'Had they found out, they'd search our homes and then shoot us all. It would have been obvious that we were printing it, that we were doing it.'"