It was possible to escape from Terezín. But where would one go?

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Hanuš Hron was born on 18 June 1925 in Most as Hanuš Weinstein. His father worked as a doctor specializing in ear, nose and throat medicine. The family had to seek shelter in Prague after the occupation of Sudetenland. Hanuš’s father tried to move the family abroad at the beginning of the Protectorate. Eventually, he was given the opportunity to travel to China, hoping that he would later arrange emigration for the entire family. Before he could arrange everything, his wife and both kids were called in a transport to Terezín. Sixteen-year-old Hanuš, who had been an apprentice in waterworks before that, got a job as pumps and pipes repairman [in Terezín] which protected him, his mother and sister from being transported to the east. In 1944 he volunteered to work in Germany for several months, building a camp for SS officers together with other Jewish prisoners. He spent the end of the war in Terezín, soon after that he set out to Prague with a convoy of Russian soldiers. He became a member of the Communist Party after the war, worked in a pump factory in Lutín near Olomouc and later as an employee of the Czechoslovak Youth Union in Třinec ironworks. He was, however, expelled from the Party after the show trial with Rudolf Slánský and during the new wave of antisemitism. This was also due to his conflicts with the party administration at Třinec Ironworks. He spent the following years working as a labourer in Ostrava and Most regions. In 1968 he won an open competition for a factory director in Nejdek but lost this post after the August 1968 Warsaw Pact Invasion. The family considered emigrating, but in the end they did not leave because of their older son, who refused to go into exile because of his girlfriend. Until 1989 the witness was kept under State Security surveillance, mainly because of his Jewish origin; he refused the offer of cooperation with them. He worked in the Chodos company in Chodov near Karlovy Vary until 1989.