Major General (ret.) Miloš Knorr

„The invasion to Normandy started. Our division was part of the second wave. When we were cruising across the Channel to France, Normandy was occupied already. We were boarded on an ordinary steamer. Unfortunately we hit a mine and the ship started to sink. From 600 people only 50 remained on board. I was one of them. The mine was drawn towards the ship by the screw propeller. People were jumping into the sea, but I decided to wait for help, which finally came.”

„I left for a week on leave. I made no stop at home, I went straight to Znojmo. We went for a walk with Mucha and his young son from their villa towards the border. It looked like an ordinary walk in a wood. Then we met Mucha’s agent who guided me across the river Dyje. More then one hour we continued to a gamekeeper’s lodge. There I was taken into the loft. One my friend, who was regularly driving to Vienna, managed a car for me. They picked me up in the morning and gave me false Austrian documents. The driver brought along his wife and their infant as well. I have asked why he was risking safety of his family: ‘You will see’, he answered. When we came to a checkpoint after the thirty minutes drive, a Russian soldier stopped us and started to inspect our documents. The wife nipped the child. The child started to cry. The Russian soldier stopped checking our documents and occupied himself with the baby. The driver said: ‘Pleas let us go. My baby will calm once we are on the way.’ – ‘Ok, lets go.’ We were checked three times. In Vienna Americans were waiting for me already.”

„At the end of the war prisoners of concentration camps started to return home. I was asked to lead one of these convoys. We put 300 Czechs and Slovaks on trucks. I drove my own armored vehicle. In Northern Saxony we arrived to an area which was already abandoned by German army but no allied troops had come yet. I visited the local mayor and told him: ‘300 people are arriving. All of them are to be accommodated: bed and food.’ He arranged everything without a protest. Germans felt guilty. The mayor provided me with his own bedroom and he even suggested his daughter would spend the night with me. Of course I refused. Then we left for Pilsner. American army was already there.”

„In February 1948 I worked as a professor at the Military University in Prague still. I came to my office in the morning and there was a letter on the table: ‘You have been fired from the University. You have been assigned to a regiment in Northern Moravia. You have to leave Prague within 48 hours. Without a special permit you are not allowed to return. You must not hold a position in the headquarters for ever.’ My chief of the University told me the letter came from the Ministry.”

„My local commander lost a big part of his high ranking military staff, so he wanted me to become a chief of his headquarters. I told him I am not allowed to serve in such a position. But he replied: ‘Don’t care about it, I will manage this. You just have to become a member of the Communist Party.’ I took few days to think over and left on leave to home. I made a stop in Znojmo by a local chief of the State Security. His name was František Mucha. I knew his brother from the wartime in France and England very well. Mucha was in charge of guarding the border. When I knocked on the door he asked me what I wanted: ‘To guide me across the border.’ – ‘It won’t be easy task, but ok. Get back in ten days. I will arrange it for you.’”