“At the time I was a lance-corporal, which was quite a rank against others, so I decided to convey a wounded soldier to a peaceful area for us, which was in Revúca about a kilometer and a half further. I tried to get to the infirmary of the Red Cross in whatever way. As it was impossible and the granades were falling on us, we decided to grovel. So I put the wounded friend, who was also called Rudolf, over my shoulder and down on my four I pulled him out. Yet before he got any emergency assistance, he was already dead when they pulled him off me. Later, when I had to change my surname, already in peace times, I decided to took his.”
„They pressed us in a wagon as sardines. In one wagon there were thirty seven people. In whatever position we were at the departure, we were getting off five days later in Altengrabow. It was more like falling out of half-dead people. We were full of fleece and when I was just brushing them off outside.”
„It was worse at night, when I was driving the wounded. I could drive the dead during the day. At night we could not use any lights. I was leading the car so that I would not crash into anyone as the car in front also had no lights. My nose and face was stuck to the front glass window and I was watching the road intensely for any car driving at us.”
Rudolf Neuszel, later Dlugopolský, was born on December 13, 1921 in the village of Lovča, Slovakia. In 1941 he joined the Slovak army and in the summer of 1944 participated in the Slovak National Uprise. He fought in the 53rd infantry battalion at the 6th tactical group in the 1st Czechoslovak army in the Slovak Republic in the trenches near the village of Biely Potok in Revúcká dolina. In October 1944 the Germans began general offensive fight against the Slovak soldiers. Dlugopolsky was captured by the Germans, and sent to a prisoner camp near the village Altengrabow. After war he changed his German surname to his fallen friend´s Dlugopolský. He stayed in the army and after 1948 he joined the communist party. During cadre checks after 1968 he was expelled from the party. At the time, he was already serving as a training officer, instructing soldiers how to handle massive destruction weapons. He retired as a lieutenant colonel in 1974, but he still worked in various jobs for the next fifteen years. He currently lives in Olomouc.
