“As we started flying on our own, we had this duel, using a gun camera. Above Považský Inovec, we climbed up, Emil Kráčman and myself, first lieutenant Sokol was directing the whole thing, he kept watching us, and at first, Emil was supposed to shoot me down. We made these marks on a window, and as you would get a plane into that mark, you would take a photo by pressing the trigger. Then it was my turn, and as I turned, something just flew above my head and I saw there was oil on my window. So I turned again, I decreased the throttle, and I was heading from Piešťany towards Nové Mesto nad Váhom. So I told them that I was in trouble, that there was some oil on my window, asking them whether I could land from the north, as I was heading that way, as in Piešťany, you would always land from the direction of the railway station. And we were taught that we should do emergency landing without a landing gear. And I kept telling myself, as the engine was still going, maybe 200 meters above the ground, I lowered my landing gear. As the landing gear didn't depend on the engine, as there were pressure bombs. And indeed, it would just hit the ground, so I managed to land. I was sweating, completely exhausted. Mechanics came right away, they towed the plane away, and got off. The problem was that the first cylinder was blown off, the head exploded and it was all smashed to pieces. I was punished for not landing without the landing gear, and, at the same time, I was praised for saving the plane.”
“They drove us... as it was repaired already... to this cinema, when there was this Slánský trial, this Secretary Slánský, or maybe a So-Secretary. They wanted us to sign that he should be punished by death, to sign this declaration. And we were... the people who enrolled in the pilot school, we were... There were people from grammar schools, then there were people from technical schools, like us, then those from ŠDD, who did it in eight months, and they were there as well, and we were privates-academics and they were sergeants. And this Šafra, he was a communist, he was a lieutenant in my group. As I belonged to this group. 'Franta, you need to sign this.' And I said: 'Look, Áda, I won't sign this. I am just a civilian, I can't just send someone to his death. As we have courts to do this, and I refuse to take responsibility, the responsibility you are trying to pass on us, so we...' So I didn't sign. And he just signed it for me. So I went out, across the courtyard to the headquarters. And there was this staff captain Kočka, he was a soldier, he came from Russia with the army and all, and he said: 'Private-academic, what happened?' I said: 'Mr. Captain, I am in trouble, I have to tell you, what am I supposed to do now?' And as I started telling him, he said: 'Wait, let's go outside.' And we went behind the barrack and I explained everything to him. He said: 'You can't just leave, they would either lock you up or you would end up in an Auxiliary Battalion. Just endure it, let it be. Mind mine words, let it be, just endure it. You need to pretend.”
“So we got this dog, this beautiful German Spaniel, he had these fringes, such a nice dog it was. Then came the revolution, so we managed to survive. Then the Soviet army started liberating us, but that was just a... it was all over. There were just a few Germans, they were hiding in a cemetery, and they would just shoot them. And I went for a walk with this dog, we were in Černokostelecká Street, and there were those Russians going on a truck, and there were senior citizens standing by, and they would throw cigarettes at them. And then, all of a sudden, there was this gesture, they stopped and this soldier jumped from the truck, he came to me and he took my dog. We fought and he took the dog away from me. I came back home and I had no dog.”
“Then there was the year of 1938, and policemen, for example, as there was this Munich Agreement, we had to leave the border areas in the autumn of 1938. Soldiers moved us to Louny, where they unloaded our furniture, in a gym, and we couldn't find it. So we moved to my father's side, where his mother was living. And my father was serving, it was this so-called SOS, he was guarding the borders. Then he would let us know that he would be transferred to Kladno. So we moved to Kladno, in the spring of 1939.”
František Sedláček was born on July 5, 1931, in Liberec. After the Munich Agreement, he had to leave the town with his family, moving to Louny, then to Kladno, and in the end, to Prague. He has no traumatic experience from the end of the war, yet he has bad memories of the arrival of the Red Army, as one of the soldiers took away his dog. After the war, his family returned to Liberec, and František joined the local Boy Scout troop. He graduated from a technical school, then he trained as a pilot and became a fighter pilot. In 1957, he was forced to leave the army. In 1958, he got a job at the State Heating Machinery Research Institute. In 1968, he was a member of the Club of Committed Non-Party Members. He retired in 1991. In 2020, he had been living in Liberec. František Sedláček died on January 26, 2022.
Hrdinové 20. století odcházejí. Nesmíme zapomenout. Dokumentujeme a vyprávíme jejich příběhy. Záleží vám na odkazu minulých generací, na občanských postojích, demokracii a vzdělávání? Pomozte nám!
