Anna Paličková

* 1941

  • "The floors and everything were ripped up, ripped out, because the gold diggers who were looking for gold after the Germans were already there before us. We actually came into a ruined house. What could be taken away was gone, because what the Germans had taken was just something into the suitcase. Everything there was bad. It was a small house, just a kitchen and three small rooms. There was no bathroom toilet was in the yard, but there was a field all around. The house was right next to the forest. We were shoved in there."

  • "We are still taking care of the grave. Those people have all moved to Kadaň. They are happy for that, because we actually appropriated the grave. It was Frantisek's classmate Mirek Kalabus. He sat with him in the classroom. He was the son of a financial guard, and unfortunately his father brought home a grenade. My František was at a wedding in Krnov that day and he wasn´t sitting next to Mirek at school. Unfortunately, Mirek was doing something in his desk and it exploded. A few children were injured and Mirek, as his stomach was torn, ran out of the school to the crossroad and fell down. Then the people there picked him up and rushed him to the doctor and the next day he died in the hospital."

  • "We always made a fire when we came to work in the morning, even though it was August at the time, in case someone wanted to heat up a sausage. There were four of us girls, well, one woman had two boys in the army already. Suddenly we were surrounded by soldiers with loaded guns. Two Poles, two Russians and one had some other uniform. Now we were accused of being spies. They were aiming at us. I was pregnant and I was sick and this one had two boys in the army. That was quite a situation. We explained in vain that we belonged to the Javorník plant and that we had a forest in Černá Voda, and that they should call there and ask, that we were not spies. It took maybe two hours."

  • Full recordings
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    Vidnava, 09.04.2024

    (audio)
    duration: 01:38:33
    media recorded in project Stories of 20th Century
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Towards a better future

Anna Paličková
Anna Paličková
photo: witness´s archive

Anna Paličková, née Nedavašková, was born on 14 July 1942 in the village of Křekov in Wallachia. In 1948, her family moved to a farm left by the displaced Germans in the border settlement of Štachlovice near Vidnava. During collectivization, the family left the farm in Štachlovice and in 1954 they moved to a house in the center of Vidnava. After studying to become a weaver, Anna worked in Moravolen and then for thirty-five years as a forestry worker. In 1963, she married František Palička, with whom she had a son František, a daughter Ivana and the youngest Peter between 1966 and 1969. However, the eldest František died in 1971 at the age of six during heart surgery. While working in a clearing in the woods in August 1968, Anna Paličková and three women were surrounded by armed soldiers of the occupying forces, saying that they were using fire to send coded signals. Everything was explained only after the arrival of the forest management. In 1997, Vidnava experienced extensive flooding. At the time of recording in 2024, she was still living in Vidnava.