Jan Mastný

“I was imprisoned in the Prokop camp, then transferred to Ležnice and back again. Originally, I was in Prokop together with my brothers. When we arrived there, three brothers , the other inmates were excited – ‘look, they are three brothers!’ Because my brothers had longer terms, they were then transferred to Jáchymov and I remained in Slavkovsko. I was shifted to Ležnice and from there I went back to Prokop. When my term expired in Slavkov, they transferred me to Jáchymov where I had my civil belongings and from Ostrov, I went back to Prague by train.”

“It was a kind of duty then, that every farmer had to submit, given his land, a certain volume of beef, pork, wheat or just corn. It was the obligatory tax and when you met it, it was to be fine. This was nothing wrong, people produced stuff to sell, so it should be it. But in order to get into troubles the bigger farmers, they kept raising the tax duty. Instead of fifty they got a hundred and when they met it, the next year they got even a higher duty. In this way they got them into trouble, they fined them a persecuted them, they didn’t get the food vouchers. These were the persecutions.”

“The conditions were dire for everybody and each of us had many things to worry about. But neighbours helped one another, because since I remember, whenever it was necessary to help, you helped without any claim to a reward or anything. No one asked for anything. When someone was harvesting and there was a storm coming, we all went to help. And I remember there was a fire in a neighbouring village and a barn burnt down. All of those who had a forest, gave him wood to rebuild it.”

“It is ridiculous but I was sentenced for listening to a foreign radio. I listened to the Voice of America. When I came home this was a channel that was listened to in public. So I was sentenced for listening to a foreign radio. I was sentenced for incitement to riot for listening to a foreign radio in the company of two more persons. These were my father, or my brother and my mother. In this company I listened to the radio. Had I listened to it on my own, I would have been fine. But since I listened to it in the company of my father and mother, which I never denied even admitted to, I was sentenced for three years of prison.”

“Our forefathers already had experience dating from the first World War. For the event of war or other disasters, they’d create shelters. It was a cellar no one knew about, underneath the floor and covered by a carpet. You opened the lid and a guerilla could spend a few nights there.”

“I don’t think the economy was not at its worst. It was the time when the Reich needed the food and stock. To nurture. The agriculture was quite preferred. There were directives – you had to provide a certain volume of corn for the government, but it was quite accessible and reasonable. When you fulfilled your duty, you were OK and were in peace. Contrary to what came under the Bolshevik revolution, the Bolshevik times.”

“It is not something one should celebrate, but there is nothing we can do today, it has passed, it is behind us. But I am told there were worse things. Sadly, at that time, there were thousands and thousands of such stories. The catchword, German, when they showed us the Prague Castle with talon, was fulfilled again: “If it catches you, you die”. The Germans knew very well what was in store for us. But they were no better in treating us during the Nazi occupation. And this was what awaited us under the occupation, says the Soviet one, although we had our free state. We were in fact directed by the Russian NVKD.”

“We had a partisan on the premises. His name was Vimr and the orchestrated or oversaw some connection. And whenever he had nowhere to stay, we had such a cellar hidden under the floor and it could be entered only through the floor. We took away the floorboards and he slept there whenever it was necessary. Our predecessors were wise and when they built their homes, they always built some covers. When our cottage was built in 1922, the one for retired people, they built in the cellar. The hole was cemented and covered by floorboards. Its purpose was to hide away corn. And during the war we did it and we stored wheat there which was the basis of our food.”