Marie Holasová

* 1932

  • “I’d like to tell you something about our folk costumes after the war. It was a bit different then. We had a sort of a dark blue scarf. But because there was a lack of fabric for shirts, we didn’t have any khaki shirts but more like yellow ones made from a sheet. My mom made me one out of a bed sheet that she colored in yellow. Unfortunately I don’t have that shirt anymore. But I still have my scarf. On that scarf, we had a little painting of the symbol of our unit. I had a swallow there and you (turning to Milada Červená) a water lily. Each troop also had its own flag. I still have that flag. Then there also was a flag of each of the units. On the unit flag, there were the emblems of the two troops. Our flag had a swallow and a poppy. We would sew all of this ourselves. It was silk (Milada Červená).”

  • “We used to come to the Svojanov castle. If I’m not mistaken, I think that we would go there quite often. It was a nice place for camping. We would sleep in tents underneath the battlements. We mostly stayed there for a night or two. We cooked our own food there. There was a spot called ‘lady jump’… Milada Červená intervening: no ‘virgin jump’. Marie Holasová: See, we have differing recollections. Milada Červená: It’s important because she was a virgin. Marie Holasová: She jumped out of unhappy love – it was a tragedy. That night we only had a little smoldering bone fire. You know there’s a difference between a bone fire which can be festive like a pagoda, and a normal fire where you can grill your sausages. It still drives me mad today when someone makes a pagoda and then ends up grilling sausages. They can’t call themselves true Scouts if they do that. Well, anyway, on that night, we had a small bone fire, it was a dark night and above our heads was the silhouette of the battlements. You have to imagine this scene. There was one tower and a rampart next to it. All of a sudden, someone or something began to howl above our heads. It might already have been around midnight. Maybe we weren’t sitting by the bone fire anymore by then, we were probably already in our tents. We crawled out of our tents and out of nowhere… we saw a white-clad figure jumping over the battlements. We couldn’t believe our own eyes. I mean we didn’t believe in ghosts or legends about white ladies. But it was really impressive the way it jumped from one bulwark to another. Do you know what it was? The foreman of our group, a very witty guy, got together with the castle keeper and they put a white sheet on a long stick. At a long distance, you’d believe almost anything. Even in ghosts, if it’s midnight and if it makes howling sounds.”

  • “Our beloved leader Miluška was on a ‘24hour-on-your-own’ task. This was especially tough in a park. It was much easier on the fringe of a forest where you can hide and stick your head out every now and then but it’s much harder in a park. We didn’t do it on a purpose but incidentally we ran into her as she was hiding in bushes. But we didn’t say a word about it.”

  • Full recordings
  • 1

    Polička, 22.08.2011

    (audio)
    duration: 59:27
    media recorded in project A Century of Boy Scouts
  • 2

    Polička, 14.10.2020

    (audio)
    duration: 01:12:18
    media recorded in project The Stories of Our Neigbours
Full recordings are available only for logged users.

Illegal scouting in little towns was very dangerous

Marie Holasová (en)
Marie Holasová (en)
photo: ...

Marie Holasová was born on March 12, 1932, in Polička. She got engaged in the Scout as a little girl after the war. In 1945, she joined the 2nd unit of the swallows. She fondly remembers her time in the Scout after the war and likes to revisit it in her memories. After the Junák was prohibited, it became very risky to engage in scouting activities illegally. Therefore she eventually gave it up.