Milena Šotová

“The bakery was mine by then. I received an invitation to the town hall to come to sign the consent to the expropriation. I was not even twenty years old. I came there, there were two clerks, they had knot sleeves like in old movies. 'Well, Miss Boturová, sign here for us that the bakery is expropriated according to the law such and such.' I replied that I would not sign anything at all, as when a thieve comes with an intention to steal, it never asks for a signature. They froze. They were old officials who knew it was terrible. So I told them, such a young tail. The one said to the other, 'Then write down that the signature was denied.' So they wrote it and I went.“

“My mother and I lived in a beautiful villa in a sublease with a lady who also had a daughter. There was another lady with us. We went down the cellar. All women, not one guy. And now the front arrived and terrible shooting began. At first, we heard a huge bang blowing the bridge up. Many civilians who were nearby were killed at that time. We then learned from a neighbour. Then German soldiers knocked at our door to hide. They were boys aged fifteen to seventeen years. It was the last batch to save Hitler. One of them was sick, probably with angina. The women gave him some pills, made him tea. They looked at the situation like mothers. The boys were shaking with fear. They gave them food and drinks, but they said they had to leave because they would shoot us. And so they left. We slept and everything was silent. In the morning I went out to the balcony and saw a Soviet soldier riding. He sat opposite, holding the horse's tail. He was drunk. He stopped, came to us and wanted to eat. We greeted him, so he only just stood up on his feet. Then the officers came to have a crew with us. There was also a major general. Then they took me and my daughter Helenka home and drove us with a gazebo around the city. We saw a lot of dead people in the park.”