“On September 1, 1939 Germany invaded Poland. The Poles were fighting on two fronts, with Germany and with the Soviet Union, and it was decided that Ukraine would fall to the Soviets. That’s why the Soviet army advanced and captured us and we became prisoners of war. I was in the Soviet Union for a year and a half; I don’t want to spread the word about the conditions we were in.”
“We had had a wonderful life, until the 1950s came, unfortunately, and with it the communists. The communists came and sadly they had nothing better to do than to kick us out of the army. Even this general Malec, who was head of the placement committee, well I couldn’t get a job without his permission, so I went to him and he sent me to break rocks. And I told him: ‘Mr. general...’ – ‘Don’t mister me, comrade!’ [he snapped at me] – ‘Mr. general,’ I told him, ‘I have no qualification.’ – ‘You’re not qualified? And what did you do in England? After all, they trained you to be dissidents, apart from that you did nothing!’ And I said: ‘And the dead ones, what about them?’ – ‘Out!’ And he kicked me out. I was told that he had so much hate because he had his sins and he might have collaborated during the war but that he was untouchable because he was such a great communist.”
“As we came to Tobruk, there were only old machines available there, and they told us: ‘Put a sandbag under your bottom because there are mines everywhere here.’ I was allotted a car and they said: ‘If you drive onto a mine, you’re dead.’ So we had to be very careful and had to carefully follow the track. I was assigned to the third company and was responsible for this section, I won’t even tell you what crazy stuff I did when I was getting mortared – stopping, driving on a bit, stopping, driving on a bit, and they thought I was continuing on and they threw grenades in front of me and it was okay. Until one time they probably saw through it; I was taking mortar fire and was supposed to make a turn but I missed it, so I hit the brakes. And I saw I was outside the track and I figured I had to get out of there the same way I had gotten in. I didn’t move the steering wheel, I put the car in reverse and then, boom…! And I was sitting next to the car.”
Imrich Lom, née Leichter, was born May 4, 1918 in Dolní Kubín in Slovakia but spent his childhood and youth in Ostrava. After the break-up of Czechoslovakia and establishment of the Protectorate he managed to escape to Poland (still free at that time) on the second attempt. Poland was then invaded by the German and Soviet army and he ended up in Soviet captivity and spent a year and a half in detention. The situation changed when Germany attacked the Soviet Union and the interned Czechoslovak soldiers were sent to fight in the Middle East. He took part in the fighting at Tobruk. Later he joined the air force and became member of the Czechoslovak No. 311 Squadron of the Royal Air Force. He fought the Nazis alongside the greatest men of that time, only to be left – just like the others – with no gratification after the war. He didn’t get to reunite with anyone from his family as all his relatives had died in the concentration camps. After the communists seized power he was discharged from the military, supported himself as a laborer and worked on the Slapy reservoir construction. He died in December 2003.
