Antonie (Nina) Kohlíková

“I had already been at this time… There was a so-called wagon's shed. In this yard there was stored bob-sleight. So in the Summer I teached in this bob-sleight. And there I was with children as a little teacher. In the end then I was a teacher. I always had to have a good relationship with the children… [You had to play as a teacher, you were teaching tiny children?] Yes, I didn’t know any more, however it was nothing special, small bits of some paper that I had from home, which I gave out, and I didn’t know any more, if I had to paint or write, I can no longer remember it.”

“We took with us only some clothes, some dishes, and mainly before the journey some meat was killed and with some lard was put into a tub and that was the first time we had something to eat. Well, it was like going as cattle, in this wagon for livestock, so we went as two families in one, well blankets and such like, that we took with us. So in the end of this train the doors of the wagons were opened and we were put inside and the cattle, and when the train made a stop somewhere so they we were going to feed the cattle. [How was the long journey to Bohemia?] Well, we travelled with the first transport, so it wasn’t so bad. I don’t know, we arrived here sometime around 9th January, in Winter it was, or February? I have the legitimate written papers here somewhere that we were given on our arrival. The year was 1947, at the beginning. It took half a year, really, before several arrived, up to sometime in May. [But tell me, how long did you travel in total by train?] More than a week.”

“(Again I say. The Czechs, how I had learned from a different eyewitness, were trying to introduce to Volynia modern agricultural progress, for example, up to that time the Ukrainians didn’t know composting, ploughing from some wooden poles etc.) When I entered the country, well of course they brought manure into the field and the Ukrainians bellowed with laughter because they had this wooden cowshed erected and now it became this cattle shed for a long time, until then it hadn’t been anywhere so then they took the cowshed to a different place and this mature just ignited and burned simply. Well, and now they made fun of the Czechs for throwing it all over the field and how they had several fields next to the Czechs and they found crops and saw what the difference was. In the end they instructed them on farming management, well, and they learn much from the Czechs. The Czar acknowledged also that he wanted the Czechs to go there…”

“Gold we weren’t able to transport simply because whoever finds the gold on us, so then we will be sent to Siberia. Before we came here, as normal emigrants, so several women who also had their husbands so they also tried to get here. So of course, something, some valuables with us, but gold is the best, really. So in Uzhorod, perhaps it was on the border, they called us into their office from one side and checked the women over. So, the women decided to put the gold into some oven, (affectionately called) ‘Ukraine’ to hide it. And so when we came out of the office we could then take it back. But the women had to leave on the other side. So, in the end, all these women left with nothing. So, and now, it was just at Votruba’s place – Votruba was already an old man and my father was terribly reliable and we were some distant relatives, so he said to my father, can you help to clean up the gold. So my father on a plough-cart, made from wood, dug out a hole, deep, and stuffed the gold in there. Well but, now this plough-cart was there as an open wagon, so they always took care of it, if it wasn’t used as such. However, it was good. [And now some details, what can you say about the money that your father put inside?] Only gold, only gold, gold ‘pětky‘ we call it in our country. It was five, ten, fifteen and twenty gold ‘pětky’. [Yes, but which currency, from which state?] Well, Czar’s simply. [Old Czar’s golden roubles?] Roubles, I’m not able to remember. [Well, so it was stuffed into the plough-cart. And you don’t know about how much it was?] Well, it was a lot.”

“The hall was used as a car repair garage. [Quite, and anyway you speak about these people who were being kept safe there?] Yes. [Well, so when you began to talk about this, so if you could say from the beginning what you meant? There they had the Sokol House and in this House there was established a German repair garage and at the same time they created an asylum for Jewish families. So if you could give some details about these families, and about what went on where they were sheltered?] Well, I’ll show you. This hall was big and there was an elevated stage. Well, and under this stage they made a entrance and so on, and well, I can say how they got food there, for example from this window poking through the stage boards, they were looking out what was there, really, then one crossed the other side, went into the village, secretly of course, and I remember, someone in the evening came to us and knocked and then Dima went to open it and well, it was a normal fun evening in the family, and when he came, so mummy said, who was it?’ However, it was a neighbour. ‘Here we had a food store, on the left of the door we had this food store and there was, I don’t know, twenty loaves of bread, flour and so on, so he put there more things then left and… Also later when the Soviets came, so they were sent out and he came to us and said mummy, don’t cry (mummy didn’t know about her brother in the army), so don’t cry, surely nothing has happened to him.’ Me neither, really. [Still, could we add some detail, the name of the Jewish family?] The Volk family, I don’t know more.”