Viktor Veverka

„The Americans would summon the Germans to the town square, well, maybe fifteen or sixty of them, and they came and were assigned to labour tasks. So I could have had maybe sixteen of them under my command – to clean up in this barracks and so on. Everyone said: 'I was in this big Sokol organization during the First Republic.' 'He was in this big Sokol organization during the First Republic' and 'he was good, he was no Nazi.' And there was this long wooden house, in the barracks, and there was no one around. So I went there with this group and I opened the door and there were dead bodies lying on top of each other. Some prisoners, they were just those gabs of bones. So I told them: 'See what you have done.' And they claimed that they didn't do that, they didn't. – 'How did you treat them?' – 'Decently, we were strict but decent. Our commander, who was in charge, told us: 'Well, don't be violent unless you have to be.' So we were just decent as one could even stomach such a thing.'

“There we had been working on a grinder and there were two foremen – one of them was a good one, he had asthma or something, so he wasn't drafted, his name was Hans. And he treated us decently. But the second one was a moron who kept yelling and telling on people. And there was no warden downstairs, as it was obvious that no one could escape, there was just one upstairs who would bring us in and out. I was working at the grinder, on the 'hollow', where airplane parts were made, so you had to be really accurate. And the grinding stones were on this shank made of steel and it was going inwards, but not just one opening, there were four of them and you had to be precise to the one-hundredths decimal. So they gave me ten pieces – those large casings – it was meant for planes and I was grinding and the grinding stones were bad so it was all sliding. And maybe five of ten pieces were bad. And Hans the foreman, as I was lucky that he was there, came to me: 'What's going on?' He said that they were calling from the main 'werk', that they were waiting for this stuff. And I told him: 'Hey foreman, it's bad. The stones are bad, it won't hold, it's all sliding as I lay my hand upon it...' And he told me: 'Oh boy, they will hang you!' And there was this niche and there was a cupboard in front of it and he took the box with the stuff and he thew it beyond the cupboard and he said: 'If they would ask you, as they would came from the main 'werk', it had all been sent. Otherwise they would hang you!'”

“´Warden took me to Pitterman's office, he was sitting there and he told me: 'Sprichst du Deutsch?' I told him, 'Nichts,' I don't understand, so they turned me face to the wall and there was no interpreter. Half an hour passed and I was still standing there, she was nowhere to be found. He begun to swear, he slammed the door shut and he was talking to someone. She came maybe after an hour and he started to insult her, calling her a whore, stating that she was somewhere in the town or something, then he slammed the door and left. And I turned myself from the wall and said: 'He's one of a nasty bastard, isn't he?' And she was crying, she wiped her tears and said: 'What's your name?' - 'Well, I am Veverka.' And she said: 'You are an accomplice of Mr Nepeřený.' And she took Nepeřený's testimony and she read it aloud. And she begged me not to reveal this, so I knew exactly what Nepeřený was saying, and I could adjust my testimony according to it.”  

“Well I was a party member, as we came from Germany with Fanda Nepeřený, from that prison, there were Communists among us for who I could vouch with my life, as they were honest Communists. Like Karel Matoušek, he was the main scrutinizer at some government department, and just imagine that he would get his food and he would say: 'Show me you mess kit!' Three spoons of soup, three spoons of gravy, that's what he gave me. And on the next day, he did the same for Láďa... And I told him: 'What do you think you are doing, anyway?' - 'I am an old man, I can die right away, but you, you are the future.' So we met communists like this in prison and were supporting Communism.”