Warrant Officer Josef Vazač
* 1920
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“It was a thin time. So called 'contingents' started, corn supplies in other words. It was very difficult to meet the requirements. If you gave for the first time you had to give for the second time as well. If you managed for the second time you had to manage for the third time as well. You had nothing to eat, there was nothing left for your cattle. And you had just nothing. And if you let the cat out of the bag you were right away in Siberia.”
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“It looked different in Volynia after the war. It was not the same any more. Stalin didn't want to let the Czechs from Volynia. He siad: 'If they don't like it there I'll take them to the Caucasus then.' But we kept saying to ourselves: 'We will cut your Caucasus out, we want home!' But when we were saying good bye to Svoboda in 1945 he said to us: 'Don't worry, guys, we will get you here.' The Soviets played a dirty trick on us, you see. They said that who doesn't come back to Volynia after the war they would send his family to Siberia.”
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“Such groups were formed and they called themselves Bandera group (Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists). They came and said: 'You give us this and that, this much and that much.' We had to give them what they wanted. But the Germans were not allowed to know about it. Then the Germans came and took from us and the Bandera group were not allowed to know about it. And the Czechs were giving all the time.”
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“I was wounded in Poland. A bullet came and you didn't even know where from. The commander and I stood face to face and I was with my arms akimbo. The first bullet flew between my body and my arm. It didn't hit me. I only heard it swishing. In a while my hip was hit. I even didn't notice that, I only felt something damp warming me in my shoe all of a sudden. There were blood footprints in the dust. I took the shoe off and it was full of blood. It was only a centimetre from my kidney. However, it was not a bad wound, I was not ill with it too long either. I spent just a couple of days in the dressing station.”
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“The Germans destroyed the river banks. When you looked down it was some height! The way was very narrow. The tank went just barely through. However, it never happened that a tank fell down. You simply had to drive slowly. The drivers took their doors out so that they were ready to jump out in case it skidded. I also went at the back and very slowly.”
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Full recordings
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Lovosice?, 27.02.2004
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Svoboda told us in 1945: Don’t worry, boys, we will get you home!
Josef Vazač was born in Český Straklov in Volynia on June 23rd, 1920. His father Adolf was a shoemaker and his mother Marie was a housewife. His only brother Vladimír got also later involved in the fights in the First Czechoslovak Independent Army. Having finished his primary school young Josef went on in locksmith apprenticeship in his birthplace Straklov. Then he got some practice in Josef Kvapil’s Factory in Dubno. In 1941 he married Marie Končická, a countrywoman of Straklov. He joined the First Czechoslovak Brigade. He was conscripted in Rovno in 1944. Due to his original profession and his long practice he was chosen to repair tanks in the First Czechoslovak Tank Brigade. With the tank troopers he went through all the important places of their combat service. He also got to Budapest besieged by the Soviets. He returned to his family in Volynia straight after the demobilization. Josef Vazač moved with all his family to Czechoslovakia to Žatec in May 1947. Then they moved to village Prosmyky in Litoměřice region. He worked as a locksmith in a chemical factory in Lovosice for the next 32 years. Later he moved to Žitenice and worked in the workshop of the State Farm in Ploskovice. He has got two sons with his wife.
