Antonín Szkandera

"When we were liberated, at eleven o'clock in the evening someone was banging on the door: ‚Otkryvajtě!‘ ('Open!' in Russian) It was clear that it was the Russians. Dad ran to open the door with joy that we already have liberators here. They came in and immediately: ‚Davaj kušať, davaj vodku!‘ And they started looting. They had their submachine guns ready. Dad told them that we are not bourgeois, that he is a manual worker. He knew Russian quite well, because he met Russian prisoners during forced labor and gave them bread many times. They looted what they could. Since we were after the pig´s killing, my mom gave them smoked meat. And we had canned yellow plums, which she also gave them. So they ate, but they just bit everything and spat it on the ground. They took two huge suitcases, one with food, the other with clothes, which we had ready in case the Germans might evacuate us when the front came. So, we were ready. They took everything. I was eleven years old and I had a suit that I had worn at Communion, and this Russian guy was trying on my jacket. When he found out that it was small, he left it. They took everything. The two suitcases, the food.'

"It was in 1944, in August, when there was already fighting near Krakow. The front continued and the Partisan resistance was very involved here. In August 1944, the Russians dropped ten paratroopers. And in the morning, I went to herd cows with my cousin and he called me: 'Tondo, come here, there is something here. Probably a dead guy.' So, I secured my cow and went to him. It was the harvest time, the sheaves of grain were made there, and he was lying dead on the ground next to it. He had a belt and parachute cords, but the canvas was missing. A machine gun in one hand, a bag in the other, but the canvas was nowhere to be found.”