Jaroslav Weigel

“I was fifteen in 1945 and Boy Scouts helped the national committees as connections. I was a kind of medical connection, I rushed from one pharmacy to another, brought bandages, medicaments etc. When people were returning from concentration camps a lazaret was established in the Police’s monastery, which was without a religious order. There were many people from concentration camps in the lazaret. I have a very sad memory. There was this old man, well, old from my perspective, perhaps he was in his forties or fifties. He had open wounds and lice in them. I still have this memory in me. It is a moment I always remember time to time.”

“My dad had large handkerchiefs because when he used to walk from heat to the fridge, my mum made him two red handkerchiefs with white margins. When we learned the Morse code I, idiot, took the two red handkerchiefs, put them on sticks, climbed up over Police on the Hlavatka hill and sent signals to my two friends below. A man came to me shouting: ‘Are you stupid? You can’t wave red flags!’ From Police the place where I sent signals was clearly visible. This is how I learned the Morse code. Quickly I rushed down with the handkerchiefs.”

"The club was, of course, managed in the spirit of scouting. We had a number of scout things, because the house of the Strauchs was a major hiding place for the things of our troop during the war.For example, we had a number of Svojsík's brochures on scouting and other brochures that we had hidden in our clubhouse, that was situated in the garden of the brewery. We also had a totem, we had everything. Our club Chronicle, the Chronicle of the Club of the Guardians of the Political Walls dates back to 1945. So we were quite successful in continuing the scouting throughout the war."

"The first camp after the war was interesting in that there were still Werwolfs roaming the area and thus we were fully armed.For instance Vašek Hybš, who was a cub scout and acted as the camp bugler.He was the guard and would pull behind him a big machine gun on the ground."

"In the 1960s, I was employed as the editor of the Mladý svět magazine that actually initiated a discussion about tramping. We established a section of the magazine called "The campfire" and we founded a "Settlement of ostriches" in the editorial board. We were interested in the tramps. We had access to the Golden Key with the Ryvolovi brothers and others."