The Imperial Navy Music was almost entirely made up of Czechs
Download image
Václav Salač was born on 24 January 1888 in the village of Staré Košatky near Mladá Boleslav, into the working family of Josef and Františka Salač. He underwent military service in a military band of the Austrian Navy. During the three years he served on the ship Erzherzog Karl, he travelled around the whole of Europe. Upon returning to Bohemia he was employed at the State Railways, as a pointsman in Byšice, and he continued to play music. He married in 1912. During World War II he supported a local partisan group. He worked for the railways until 1941, when he retired. At the end of the war, on 9 May 1945, his wife Aloisie was fatally wounded during an air raid. Václav Salač died in 1977. The recording about his days in the Imperial Military Navy was made in 1972.
