František Beneš

„Po tom únoru [1948] v květnu byly volby. A z komunistického sekretariátu už večer před volbami chodili úředníci. Chodili po Hruškách a vyhrožovali, aby lidé volili jednotnou kandidátku. Skutečně vyhrožovali, co jim všechno udělají, a starší generace z toho měla úplně strach. Z druhých stran, třeba lidovci nebo sociální demokraté, dělali proslovy, aby lidi podpořili jednotnou kandidátku. A to byli komunisti, že!?“ – „Ale tak ještě se dal hodit bílý lístek, myslím.“ – „Jo. Buďto volili jednotnou kandidátku, nebo bílý lístek. My kluci, už nám bylo po dvaceti letech, co jsme nebyli komunisti, jsme volili bílé lístky. No ale porota, co to kontroluje, to byli všichni komunisti. Tam nebyl z jiné strany nikdo. A komunisti volili veřejně, nechodili za plentu. A kdo šel za plentu, tak viděli, že volí bílý lístek. Bílý lístek nebyl stejně nic, ale ukázal, že s tím nesouhlasí.“

„Asi v jedenáct hodin přišli Rusi. Čekali jsme na ně u jednoho kamaráda. Nás bylo asi pět kluků tak po těch šestnácti rocích. Došli dva Rusi, tací mladí, výzvědná hlídka. Ptali se: ‚Jsou tady Němci?‘ – ‚Nejsou.‘ Tak jsme jim dávali něco napít, jsme jich přivítali, našich bratrů. Ne, fajn!? Rusi nechtěli nic pít, napili se jenom vody a povídají: ‚Všecko si schovejte, protože naši vojáci vám všecko seberou,‘ to povídaly ty hlídky. No jo, ale Rusi – obyčejní vojáci tam už za hodinu anebo za dvě už byli a všecko brali. Za dva dny nebylo v celých Hruškách seno, protože přivedli milion koní a Hrušky byly nacpané vojáky. Neparkovali někde venku, ale v dědině. Cesty si dělali přes zahrady a tak. Všechno sebrali a všechno sežrali. My na ně máme špatné vzpomínky doteď.“

“We corresponded with that Bartoš man. We had a good relationship, Hruškers and Lanžhoters from Moravian Slovakia. We asked right off the bat, perhaps he had more information, we wondered what the politics were actually like here [in Czechoslovakia]. Well, he said: ‘Well, boys, it’s fucked up here,’ he wrote, ‘it’s fucked up, go get yourselves a life in Canada.’”

“The way it was after that February, it was a complete catastrophe. Well, and then there were elections, right after that February, sometime in the summer. And that was a united candidate list. Those were Communists, and if you didn’t want to vote Communists, well you could throw in a blank ticket. Except the blank ticket wasn’t any use, no use at all, it was just some kind of protest. Well, and we boys had just passed twenty about then, so mostly we all voted blank tickets. The boys back then had a bit more spunk.”

“My brother, he wanted to get into Canada. He even applied to get permission to leave. It was possible to do that, but it was of no use anyway. They didn’t let anyone go. But you could apply for it, it was something like that. Well, so they denied it to him, so he reckoned stuff them, he’d make himself a cart. So he made a cart, but he only drove it as far as Břeclav. It broke down there. Now what? It took him a day before he decided to escape by himself. Except that he had to leave his wife and children at home.”

“There was one rumour that started up in Hrušky, that I had helped someone escape, but I had nothing to do with it. People were just running away, so they did, that’s it. Except that someone had supposedly seen me somewhere, and this got out in Hrušky. And it was making the rounds there, and they were starting to watch me and follow me, and so I reckoned things weren’t looking very good. I felt it was tightening up around me, that I didn’t have much space left. So there was no choice, I had to get up and leave. Well, and also, I was supposed to start my army service in about a week, I was to be in Orlová, near Ostrava, and there weren’t anything but mines there, those AECers [forced labour corps]. So I added one to the other. And I came to the conclusion that I had no choice but to leg it.”

“The water was cold, so we undressed, wrapped our clothes up, and crossed the Dyje [Thaya] to the other side. They would’ve, if they had seen us there on the Dyje, they would’ve shot us dead. Because it was all dark everywhere, only the Dyje glittered with light. It was a pretty wide river. Luckily, we crossed it. Well, and we were resting on the other side, and I was playing around, that Gajda had a sub-machine gun, so I was playing around with it, and I remember Gajda taking a bullet out of his pocket and saying: ‘This one’s for me, this bullet.’ Well, and really, some three weeks later they waited for him there, and that was the end of him. Whether he shot himself, or they shot him, I don’t know.”