Irma Trksáková

"We were all naked--the children as well as the old women. That alone wouldn't still be that bad but the rank-and-file soldiers in SS uniforms were walking among us with rifles before they turned on the showers and they were deriding us. We didn't know where to put our hands, which parts of our bodies we should cover and they were laughing at us. They even touched some of the younger ones. This was so humiliating. You know, today it's much more common to appear naked in front of other people but back then, it wasn't usual at all. We weren't raised that way. Nudity was much more intimate than it is today. So it was really humiliating to have young men stare at you and laugh. They weren't laughing at the young and pretty ones, they mocked the old grandmas whose belly or breast were loose. They laughed at their appearance. For me, this was even worse than if they had beaten us."

"It's impossible to describe it, they gave them poison to swallow, they injected it into their hearts, they let them starve and freeze. They battered them, beat them up – they simply killed them. They had lived just too long in their eyes - these old and sick women."

"After the war was over, they knew who it was and many of our comrades applied to serve in the ranks of the secret police. Honza Maršálek was one of them. He's quite a prominent figure but he didn't work with us. He left to Czechoslovakia. I have no idea what he did there. So Maršálek was also with the secret police and they found out that our traitor was taken over by the English. And they demanded that Peter Lunge as a high functionary at the police arranges for his extradition. And the English wouldn't hand him over and used him for the same purpose as before, he stayed in their CIA or how it's called. They didn't extradite him."

"I biked home and when I stood in front of our house, I saw a car parked there. That was rather exceptional since back than almost no one had a car. Still, not a single thought crossed my mind. If I had known it, I would have gone into hiding for some time. So when I walked inside I found two Gestapo men were already waiting for me. My father was passionate about mushrooms; he would often go into the forest for them. It was mushroom season and we had mushrooms for dinner. The Gestapo men said I could have a meal before they'd take me away. I didn't really feel like eating since my belly was tight but I loaded myself with mushrooms as I pretended to be absolutely calm and carefree. I didn't want to show them my anxiety."