"We used to work in two different pits. Three boys have run away from the pit where I wasn’t working. One of them climb up the spruce tree and refused to go back down, so they shot him down. Then they took him to the camp. We were just going back from the night shift; the guards dropped him on the ground and we had to walk around him. We could see his death body completely blast. What an awful experience. Eight men passed out from looking at him; they must have been carried to the ambulance. Some people didn’t want to look at him, but we must have. We all must have watched the death body. It was awful."
"I was supposed to enter the Backup officer school. I went through the interviews, but I knew I already got bad report on me from Šumice village. When they read it at school I had to come in and explain it. After I explained everything they contacted the local communist party in Šumice once again and after a long conversation with my father they approved the application for the Officer school. I was one of the 150 people who got accepted out of 700 candidates. The school lasted for 11 months and was located in Uherské Hradiště town. After 11 months spent at school I joined the 43rd Bakhmach unit in Hodonín town."
"We-the former prisoners-were afraid that we will be harassed and that we might get fired too. And that’s what happened in deed. Thank God I didn’t get fired. We were all reviewed though. When the review committee came the Russian army just arrived to our country. The committee members were asking me: ´What is your opinion on the occupation of Czechoslovakia by foreign armies? ´ I didn’t have to think twice before I said: ´You know my past well. I will not criticize anything. I honestly can tell you that I have already experienced enough of bad things, therefore I don’t wish to comment this.´ And they replied: ´Then you obviously disagree with the entry.´ So I don’t know what they wrote in my file after all. I didn’t care. I don’t know what they wrote there, but they didn’t fire me; unlike many others. If they would have fired me I would have stayed with the shovels and never made it through to the Velvet Revolution. I would have remained a worker until my retirement."
"When they brought me to Brno town I was investigated by captain at the beginning. I was sitting at the table and the 200 Watts bulb shone into my eyes. He was sitting in the shadow and was giving me questions: ´I wonder if you know why you’re here? ´ -´Well, no, I don’t know.´- ´Just try to remember why you could be here.´ - ´I really don’t know. I didn’t do anything wrong.´ - ´Try to think why you’re here.´ I tried to remember, but I still couldn’t think of any reason why I could be here now. Not in the morning and it was evening and I still couldn’t think of anything. He suddenly told me: ´Do you know some Private? ´ - ´Well, yeah, I do know some. Why wouldn’t I? ´ - ´ Then why were you seeing him? What have you talked about? What have you intend to do? Just remember that.´ I said: ´We didn’t intend to do anything.´ Then the major came and the captain said: ´We got him! He remembers now his friend.´ And then it started. ´We were talking about some things.´ - ´Like what? ´ - ´He was in university already and since I also wanted to study on university we talked about school.´ - ´What else? What did you want to do? You wanted to blow up the district center or the communist headquarters, you wanted to occupy the barracks.´ - I was just starring at him and I said: ´Who, me? Me and my friend? ´ Occupy the barracks - what nonsense! Another person came from behind me and spanked me. He was just about my age and he was the sergeant-student. The investigator told me: ´Look at yourself, how you behave and how does he behave. What are doing against the regime.´ Then this sergeant-student came to me and said: ´You rascal! ´ And he slapped me so hard I felt off the chair. That was the only time I got slapped. On the other hand, it was rather psychic terror. All those days of psychic action, it was unbearable."
"There was 750 meters long corridor leading from the camp to the pit. It had the barbed wire on both sides, in some place under electricity. We walked in so-called goose march ten by ten men. The outer ones carried a wide rope with two loops in front of it. These loops were locked by the guards with lock. They walked from the outside, one at the end, one in the middle and one always walked in the front. They all had dogs. At this particular mine No. 15 there was quite strong stream right above our camp. To prevent the stream from running inside the camp they made a groove leading to the corridor. So we trampled down in the mud, grass, water flowed through the corridor and went to the camp. In camp there were few different priests, university teachers, the cream of society, and several important chosen people. Not too many but quite a lot. I used to do toughest job at home - we had 12 hectares of fields and I was 14 I was already cutting the corn. But these people here were 50 years old and had fine hands. Now they must have gone down to work every day! Some people, who were less physically adapted, lost their boot when it got stuck in mud and they were not quick enough to pull it out again, because they would have stopped the whole march. When someone wanted to bend down the guards would shout at him and aim the machine gun at him. So people walked with only one boot on their foot. Until it wasn’t raining and was sunny and warm, it was not a problem. But later when it was cold and freezing the mud still couldn’t get frozen, because all three shifts were walking through it back and forth. The weather was quite rainy there. Our working rubber clothes were soaked and the prison uniforms were wet too. We climbed of the pit outside, where was 25 degrees below zero. When we returned to the camp the guards were not able to count 200 men. There was always someone missing. Before they counted the right number the clothing froze on us so we couldn’t make one step."
I served in Hodonín at the garrison management As an accountant, I straightened up the main card file beginning in the year 1945 As a reward for doing this, I got arrested and went to jail
Mr. Jaroslav Vaculín was born on November 11th 1926 in Šumice village in Uherské Hradiště. In 1946, he graduated from the business academy in Uherské Hradiště. On October 1st, he joined the military service in Uherské Hradiště where he studied in the backup officer’s school for eleven months. Beginning in September 1949, he worked at the 43rd Bakhmach military department in Hodonín town. Unfortunately, on October 1st 1950, he was arrested and taken in for questioning by the OBZ (Defense intelligence) in Brno. On September 6th 1951, he was sentenced to 16 years of prison for treason and espionage. He worked at the Jachymov mine for a year and a half, where he witnessed the death of fugitive prisoner. For the next three years, he worked at Barbora-Vršek mine, where he spent two weeks in local hospital while he was being treated for bronchitis. The prosecution in Jachymov evaluated Vaculín’s case and corrected his sentence to 8 years of prison, rather than 16. After four and a half of years, Mr. Vaculím has been released from the uranium mines. At the beginning, he could work only as a low paid worker, but later was able to return to his original profession in the economic field. He is presently a member of the Political Prisoner Association and participates in lectures at schools. He has been a chairman of the Central Auditing Commission of the Confederation of Political Prisoners in the Czech Republic for two years. Jaroslav Vaculín died on March 29, 2020.
