I felt like a refugee
Anežka Suchánková, née Zapletalová, was born on 29 May 1933 in Javoříčko, Litovel region. Her peaceful childhood in a small settlement was disturbed by the Second World War, especially its end, when she witnessed the tragic event of the burning of Javoříčko. She was twelve years old when Javoříčko was burnt down on 5 May 1945 by the SS commando of Lieutenant Egon Lüdemann. Together with other women and children, she was allowed to escape from the village into the forest to escape the destruction, but from where she hid she saw and heard everything - fire, shooting, screaming and crying, which is indelibly etched in her memory. Coincidentally, her father, Karel Zapletal, also survived the event. However, their family home was destroyed, so they moved to Nemilany near Olomouc, where they lived in the house of the displaced Germans. After the war she changed several jobs. In the 1950s she faced a series of interrogations by State Security because of a mocking poem about Klement Gottwald that was circulating in her work. However, no significant sanctions awaited her. During her lifetime, she worked in a factory and in a hospital. In 2020 she lived in Nemilany in Olomouc.