Michal Kurucár

* 1934

  • “We had three Jewish families there. Then, when the people were deported into concentration camps, they had to leave too. Near to us a father with his daughter lived. The father never came back from Auschwitz. The daughter returned. I also remember an older doctor, who managed to return. He got married afterwards, lived somewhere in Želiezovce, and even had children. But I don´t know anything else.”

  • “Well, it happened that they were lodged in family houses. There was one farmer, who owned 6 dray horses. He lived near the main road and in the morning, when he woke up, he didn´t have any horse left in the barn. Simply, the Romanian soldiers stole all of his horses and wanted to run away with them. The farmer, when he found out, went to the commander and told him what had happened. Immediately he called up other soldiers and caught them near the dam. They even almost shot down the Romanians. I guess these were the Russians. So in the end, they returned all the horses they stole. They had to give them back to the farmer.”

  • “Suddenly I heard some noise; I woke up, what was going on. The light was on in our room and a policeman was standing over me with an automatic.” (Interviewer: “Did they shout at you?”) “Sure, they said: ‘Get dressed and you are going with us!’ So we put on what we had, took the tooth brush and a towel. Everything else remained there. Then they escorted us to the dining room. When we came there, I saw a table in the front and a machine gun opposing us. I just wondered what they wanted to do, whether they were about to shoot us or what...”

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    Martin, Turany, 04.09.2016

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Majority of activities the communists did was just a political camouflage

Michal Kurucar in army service (1957)
Michal Kurucar in army service (1957)
photo: z archívu pamätníka

Michal Kurucár was born on June 6, 1934 in Bojná. He comes from an agricultural and faithful Christian family. He witnessed crossing of the front and placement of Romanian and Soviet Army soldiers in their village. In Bojná he attended the elementary school and continued at the municipal school ran under the patronage of Brothers of the Christian Schools of St. Jean-Baptiste de La Salle. Later he was transferred to the municipal school in monastery of Brothers Consolers of Gethsemane. That´s where he lived to see the occupation of the monastery by armed forces during the “Barbarian Night” of April 13 - 14, 1950, followed by the forced deportation to concentration monasteries in Podolínec, Bajč, and Kostolná. Later on he was assigned to forced labour at building the former Priehrada mládeže (Youth Dam; today the Nosice Dam). After being released, he attended a wood-processing training for one year, and in 1955 he graduated at the Secondary Specialized School of Woodworking in Liptovský Hrádok. After the graduation he began working at the Drevina Company in Turany, where he stayed during his whole professional life. He got married in 1958. Since 1992 Michal Kurucár lives in retirement with his wife Anna Kurucárová, née Tuková.