Vlasta Šafránková

"I had seen, how the Germans hung three Poles, young boys/ They shepherded us there, that we would have to come and watch that. But I ran away, I didn't come there. Then long after that there was a memorial stone there. And the gallows. Three hung together side by side. It was horrible, when I think back to it today, everything that people lived through. You don't even want to believe it."

"One soldier, my father had told me this - he came to my father. And we had a windlass on our well. The water was brought up with the windlass. And that soldier came to my father, that he would there in that well - we had a twelve-meter deep well - that he would dig out some soft of place for himself and that he would wait out there, so that he wouldn't have to continue in the war. So that he wouldn't have to go to Germany for resettlement. Because they chased them towards the forest with revolvers. And behind them the Russians were coming."

"I worked on the tracks in Karviná. In the morning I was on my way to work and surprised that the bus, which was always packed full, but already on the way and we were behind Orlová, and opposite us lots of soldiers were going in black shirts. And they brought in horses, lots of troops. I told myself: 'They hadn't said, that there were maneuvers scheduled.' Nobody talked about anything. Then we got out in Karviná and music was playing from the speakers. And I thought, that somebody was also reading some book out in that broadcast. I told myself: 'It's weird, I don't about anything that could be happening.' And when I came in to work there was a storm of anger there. That the Russians had attacked us. I can remember that foremost. That they broke through the border barriers and were speeding onwards. And at the station we had a sign saying Karviná-město. That was painted over and instead there was written 'Jerusalem'."