Marie Dubská

* 1921

  • "They shot him, they brought him in from downstairs, he wasn't alone, his colleagues were with him. I went with him to take care of him. He was vomiting everything from the inside - the intestines, everything out. It was terrible. He died. He was still alive when I was with him. The doctors took tremendous care of him. The intestines out, you know, they put it back and stitched up his stomach, but he died. He was eighteen."

  • "And there was one, not this one, but one of my classmates from the English Institute as a partisan. I got a new liaison, Jiří Polidar. First I knew only his first name Jiří, only later I learnt his surname was Polidar. I didn't know this resistance group was communist. I didn't care. To this day, I don't care about political parties. Everybody has some idea of how they want their life to be. I respect them as long as they don't hurt anyone. So I worked with Polidar. That was in the resistance. I used to get jobs, once I wrote flyers at a friend's work... I didn't have a typing machine, she was employed in an office. I'd always write it in there after working hours. And then it was distributed around Prague." - "Can you think of any of the text on the leaflets?" - "It said that we had to fight and what to do. When they went to blow up the tracks, they didn't take me with them. I was unhappy, it was just the guys that went."

  • "When they occupied the borderlands, I was in Prague, we were demonstrating. One young man walked with a banner, followed by the two of us, me and my roommate behind him. By the time we reached the castle, we were a big crowd of people. So we got to the castle and there was tear gas, mounted police. President Beneš didn't come out, he didn't speak to the nation. People were making all kinds of speeches. Like a kind of rebellion. We didn't want to give up the borderlands, of course."

  • “After they had bombed us – and the floor we were on was in flames – one of the walls began to crumble in the room where I was on duty by the telephone. And the commander yelled at me: 'Move aside, girl,' so I jumped aside and it all fell down. And as I was on duty... clothing was scarce back then, girls wouldn´t even wear knickers. All I had was a skirt and a jacket. Then the boys found out that there were those black uniforms in the basement. So they wanted me to wear it, as I was among the boys day and night, they wanted me to wear trousers. So I changed my clothes. And my old clothes were just hanging there and of course it all burned. My backpack with my ID in it, it was all gone. And we had to move down.” - “To the Town Hall cellars?” - “Yes. But not where mothers with children were. And after that, I... as our phone broke down... As I had been running to get some food for the boys and bringing the wounded downstairs, I found out there was this other phone. So we had some connection after all, right? But downstairs, as we got there, we had been already saying our goodbyes, given that we had been expecting them to storm in and shoot us all. But the Germans, the Gestapo-men, they were so afraid of the Soviet Army that they just tried to run away in time to get to the Americans.”

  • “One of the German girls who were with me at the convent school was visited by her sister who brought something with her. And all the German girls gathered, talking and laughing. And I saw they had this leaflet. And after the sister left, the girl had been ordering her stuff in a drawer. And she would leave the leaflet on the table so I would just grab it and read it. And there was stated that Masaryk was a liar, despite having 'Truth prevails' as his slogan. And Czechs – they would all go to hell! And after that, we would have our land, our nation and our leader. So without hesitating I decided that as I would go to class I would report it to the police. But sister educator took that leaflet from me. But there was this girl in our class who didn´t live at the convent. And she helped me find out where the police station was. And I went to class I would go there and report it. And after that, it was already May.”

  • Full recordings
  • 1

    Praha, 28.12.2018

    (audio)
    duration: 44:50
    media recorded in project Stories of 20th Century
  • 2

    Praha, 03.11.2021

    (audio)
    duration: 02:36:47
    media recorded in project Stories of 20th Century
  • 3

    Praha, 16.11.2021

    (audio)
    duration: 01:02:24
    media recorded in project Stories of 20th Century
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My part was to deliver orders to the boys who were shooting

Marie Dubská, a portrait
Marie Dubská, a portrait
photo: Archiv autora

Marie Dubská was born on 26 October 1921 in the village of Zběšice, near Bernartice in South Bohemia, and grew up in nearby Srlín. In September 1937, she went to a convent school in the border-town of Poběžovice. Even the girls from the convent school couldn´t avoid the nationalism-fueled conflict between Czech and Germans – in May 1989, Marie reported at the local police station that in the convent anti-Czech leaflets spreading vitriolic hate are being distributed. In September 1938, she joined protests against surrendering the border regions to Germany. She joined the resistance during the war, serving as a messenger and distributing leaflets. During the Prague uprising, she was among the fighters trying to capture the Old Town City at the Old Town Square (Staroměstské náměstí) in Prague (Praha). From May 6th to May 8th 1945, as part of the ‘Matylda’ squad stationed in the City Hall, she resisted Nazi troops storming the building. She delivered orders, tended the wounded and maintained the rear for the men who were fighting. She left the burning ruins of the City Hall only after the final capitulation of the Nazis. On May 10th 1945, she received a certificate that she was a “fighter of the Revolutionary Guard - Matylda Attack Company”. Soon after the war she went to join a theatre group in Náchod - even during the war she performed with amateur actors and wanted to devote herself to theatre. She stayed in Náchod for two years, but in February 1948 she was already in the Prague with Friends of Lusatia Society, which sought to annex the historical territory of Lusatia (Lužice) to Czechoslovakia. After the communist takeover, she organized theatre and social life within the Revolutionary Trade Union Movement. In 1955, she had a daughter and later worked at the Central Committee of the Czechoslovak Union of Physical Education. At the time of filming (November 2021) she lived in Prague.