Vlasta Ručková

"I also remember how the Russian soldiers behaved. Opposite Lemberger [textile factory] was the Hermann Löw liquor factory. Today it's called Seliko. He was also a private businessman, a Jew, who escaped. The Germans occupied it, and then the Communists nationalized it. And when the Russians came, they looted both the textile and the liquor factories. They took demijohns full of liquor. I remember we had a vase with flowers that we left on the table when we went hiding in the cellar for a week. The soldiers just tossed out the flowers and poured from the demijohn into that dirty vase and drank from it. You have no idea what they looked like. Those were the final days of the war."

"Then came February [1948], and I have an interesting memory from that time. A journeyman who had been apprenticed there [in the workshop of tailor Ťapťuch] was already a father of two children. February came, and the common people were being handed guns. His name was Gusta. I don't remember his last name any more. All of a sudden, Gusta didn't come to work. After about two days, he came in overalls with a beret on his head. I don't think he carried a rifle, but he said he was a militiaman. And he said to the forewoman, 'Forewoman if I wanted to, I could shoot you.' I remember that statement. And she says, 'Gusta, what are you saying? What are you saying?' She was terrified. He seriously said that he could shoot her. And we used to be just like a family. They had a nice apartment, and one of the rooms served as our workshop. There was a big table in the middle where the foreman would cut and iron and so on. There was a little stove where we heated the irons, it was called an iron, and there was also a counter with fabrics. And it was very peaceful. And suddenly, the man who used to work with you every day comes in and tells the foreman's wife that he may shoot her. What's gotten into these people all of a sudden? All at once, such a monstrous regime."

"My father was drunk, all the men, not just the soldiers, but our men too, were drunk. They were singing 'Volha, Volha'. They were so excited that the war was over. The Russians were running around the toilets with rifles. I was afraid that in the end, the Russians would end up shooting my father because they were so exuberant. And they were looking for women. Our people were telling them where the German women were. They were sending the Russian soldiers after the German women. And one of our neighbours had a sister who lived on the square in Frýdek. Her husband was a German officer, he used to be a pharmacist, an older man, and he served at the front. And she lived alone in a nice apartment on the square in Frýdek. The sister, our neighbour, was afraid for her. She took me to Sviadnov because the main bridge below the castle was blown up. It was blown up by our people when the war started. We saw it from our window. And the lady took me with her, and we walked along the river towards Sviadnov, where the Germans had built a wide wooden bridge for the needs of the war. It was built by German army engineers and now, the Russian soldiers were driving over it. They had horses and carriages loaded with ammunition. They drove from Zelinkovice and approached the bridge from Místek. Nearby is the weir of the Ostravice River and close to it is a house where my friend used to live. She was outside right then. She came running up to me and started telling me that Boženka Mondrziková, a girl from our school, had been killed. And Jarek Vondrák, the tinsmith's son, was also killed. I was stunned, and suddenly, there was a huge explosion. Horses were flying in the air. Some German missile must have landed on the bridge. They said they were carrying ammunition in the horse carriage. There was a huge explosion, and in the chaos, I lost the lady."