Jitka Růžičková

"One morning, I went to school. I said goodbye to my mummy, as usually. I returned from school. I came home. Mr. Bašta who owned a shoe business in the house ran out and told me that mum was taken away by the Gestapo. I went home and found our lodger there. She said they went through all of our things and took mummy with them. I then learned that she was imprisoned at Karlovo náměstí, in the black tower. Once, she managed to smuggle out an inscription on a piece of cloth: a trial in six weeks and then perhaps soon back home."

"I don't know because I never found out whether the arrest was a consequence of her not paying a fine, not having Jewish papers or not wearing the Star of David. I don't know. I simply went to school and said goodbye. Then I came back home and mummy was no longer there. I had never seen her since. I was completely lost. I sat in a park with my classmates from school. I was crying there, saying my mummy was not home and that I had nobody to go to. One of my classmate's mum was passing by, walking their dog. Her daughter told her I had nowhere to go, that my mum was arrested by the Gestapo. She said I'd go to their place and we'd see. So, she brought me to theirs. They gave me dinner and a place to sleep. So I stayed with them. I felt good there. I stayed there up until the end of the war."