Erika Bednarská

* 1946

  • „Když to přišlo, tak nám všechno sebrali. Přišli financové. Nevím, jestli to bylo od obecního úřadu nebo, to opravdu nevím. Ale všechno přišli si pro brambory, pro obilí. Všechno odvezli. Krávy si odvezli. A vím, že tenkrát, já si to nepamatuju, já jsem u toho nebyla. Ale mamka to, vykládali to pořád jako když si. ,Přišli si pro poslední krávu.´ Jo. My bysme tam nebyli měli ani mlíko, nic. Teď je pět dětí. Babička s dědečkem. Jo. Obilí, všechno odvezli, takže ani mouka, nic nebylo jako. A tak maminka si vzala vidle, postavila se do dveří, a že jim říkala: ,Tu krávu vám nedám, jedině přes moji mrtvolu.´ Tak oni teda odešli a tu krávu nám nechali. Že aspoň jsme měli to mlíko, jo. Jinam maminka, ona, my jsme měli to obilí, tak ona vždycky to chodívala nechat mlít do, do Uhelné. To se jelo s krávama, s vozem, měla pár pytlů naložených, do mlýna, ale většinou do Vojtovic, tam byl mlýn. No a ona potom pekávala chleba doma. Pořád pekávala. A ona třeba pekla i čtrnáct bochníků. A to vydrželo čtrnáct dní. My jsme vlastně byli vychováni na chlebě a na bramborách. Takhle."

  • „Bydleli v takovým malým dřevěným domečku v ulici naší, kde teď bydlíme. Tam jsou dva takové malé, dřevěné domečky. A on. Děda tam byl. A já vždycky říká-. A děda, když jako Němci šli pryč, vykládal, že přišli Češi, tak on byl něco v tom, tak on jim přiděloval ty domy. A já vždycky říkám: ,Dědo, vy jste ty nejkrásnější vilky jste přiděloval, a proč vy jste zůstal sám v tom malým, dřevěným?´ On říká: ,Nemůže nikdo nic- Aby nemohl nikdo říct, že jsem někoho obral!´ To je prostě, to bylo jeho, jo. To bylo jejich. To nikomu nesebral. Takhle. On byl na to strašně hrdej. Vím, že on mi to vždycky říkal. On byl dobrej člověk, děda, já jsem s ním ráda vykládala. Děda Bednarský."

  • „Jak už jsem byla starší, tak maminka chodívala nakupovat k řezníkovi do Vlčic. A tak na Vánoce vždycky koupila debrecínský párky, jako jo. Ale ty tenkrát byly, buď to, že my jsme je měli jednou za rok, tak. My vždycky jsme říkali, ty bývaly tak dobrý! Jako ale my jsme je měli prostě jenom jednou za rok. Maso jsme mívali, protože naši jak chovali prasata, tak třeba jedno nebo dvě prasata zabili, že. A většinou v zimě, tak se udělala nějaká zabijačka. Něco vyudili v komíně, něco maminka zavařovala do sklínek. No, většinou všechno pozavařovala do sklínek, a to jsme pak. Ale maso bylo i přes rok v neděli jako. Přes týden se vařily nějaký moučný jídla. Jako to maso bylo vždycky jenom v neděli nebo něco takovýho. A když už nebylo, tak maminka musela chodit jako vždycky k řezníkovi do Vlčic. A v létě, když bylo teplo, tak to dlouho nevydrželo. Tak většinou chodila až před tou nedělí. A vím, že to dávala, tam je studánka, která stojí dodnes. Ona to dávala do nějaké mísy a postavila to takhle na vodu, v té studánce. A tak to do té neděle vydrželo úplně čerstvé to maso."

  • “When they were demolishing the church, stones were flying all the way down to the forest. The windows in our house were clattering, and it is quite far away. There were loud bangs. They arrived and they demolished it all during one day. But there was a dilapidated wooden cross which stood on a kind of an embankment opposite the church door. Stones from the church were flying all over the place, to the forest, too, but the cross was left unscathed and it remained standing. They later repaired it. Now, there is a kind of a metal circle placed on the spot where the church used to stand.”

  • “When I married in 1969, we had the wedding feast att home in Hraničky. We had the wedding ceremony in the church here in Žulová, and in the town administration office in Javorník. Then we went home and we had the wedding feast there on Saturday, and on Monday I had to go to work. I rented a room in Žulová so that I would not have to travel so far every day and I would come home only on Saturdays and Sundays. One day I left home on Sunday evening and so much snow fell that mom had to ski in front of me to make way for me. Mom was a great skier. She always used to say that she was going skiing under the moonlight because she did not have time during the day. The girls from Rejvíz were thus going skiing to the surrounding mountains. And so she was skiing with us in Hraničky as well. Dad could not ski, but for my mom it was no problem to grab a rucksack full of eggs and go on skis to the shop in Vilémovice to sell them there when she was sixty-nine years old.”

  • “When there was some Catholic holiday, my mom would always take a bucket with water to the church and clean there. When I was a little girl, I would pick flowers on the meadows. I would make a flower bouquet and place it into a jar on the altar. We would always decorate the church like this. But the state-owned farm from Nové Vilémovice started grazing their sheep there, and they were locking them in there for the nights. And so we stopped going there.”

  • Full recordings
  • 1

    Žulová, 15.02.2017

    (audio)
    duration: 02:02:19
    media recorded in project Stories of 20th Century
  • 2

    Jeseník, 03.07.2020

    (audio)
    duration: 58:03
    media recorded in project Stories of the region - Central Moravia
Full recordings are available only for logged users.

The last inhabitants

Erika Bednarská (Schlegelová)
Erika Bednarská (Schlegelová)
photo: archiv pamětnice

Erika Bednarská, née Schlegelová, was born February 18, 1946 in the now defunct village Hraničky (Gränzdorf in German) in the Rychlebské Mountains (Reichensteiner Gebirge). With its average altitude of 696 m a.s.l., the village was one of the highest inhabited places in the region, and Erika lived there until 1970. Her parents were German nationals, but unlike other people from the village they were not included in the deportation of Germans from Czechoslovakia. Together with four other families they were instead assigned to do work in local forests. However, these four families had to relocate inland in 1948 following an order for the dispersal of the remaining Germans. The only reason why the Schlegel family remained was that they had several small children who would not be able to do hard agricultural work. The other four families later applied for a subsequent emigration to Germany and their request was granted. The family of Franz Schlegel thus remained in Czechoslovakia as the only inhabitants of Hraničky. Nevertheless, they had to leave Hraničky already in 1948. The authorities ordered that the village was to be settled by Greek immigrants who were fleeing the civil war in their homeland. The Schlegel family thus had to move to a dilapidated house which was assigned to them in the village Vojtovice six kilometers away. As soon as they reconstructed the house, they had to move again, and this relocation was followed by another reconstruction of a devastated house. This happened again in May 1949, before the family was able to return to their farm in Hraničky in autumn of the same year. The family members then lived there alone for several years, without electricity and far away from the other villages. They witnessed the demolition of the remaining houses in 1959 and 1960 by soldiers of the Czechoslovak army. Erika left Hraničky in September 1970 and she followed her husband to Žulová. In 2017 she continued living in this village. A month later, her parents moved away from Hraničky as well. The only remaining testimony of the past life in Hraničky is now the viager house of their former farm.