Ludmila Plhoňová

* 1934

  • "It was also said that a guy came there on a bicycle, from Újezd, and said: 'Mr. Šotola, run away, because they are arresting you in Újezd and they have written on a piece of paper that you will be arrested too.' Well, somehow, he lingered. If he had run just a few steps into the forest, no one would have caught him. They were afraid to go into the forest, those Germans were afraid to go into the forest. They wouldn't have gone. Well, that Šotola had a friend there and he was that - I don't know if he was from Lysice, or if he was from Drnovice and his name was Čípek and he was a veterinarian. And he was just sleeping at Šotola´s place. There in that little house, the house where he lived, with the Hemzals. And he when he saw that they came for Šotola, he jumped out of the window into the yard, and there was manure under that window, because he saw that he would fall into the soft, and he ran. And the Germans were after him."

  • "He was running around like this, banging on all the doors that were still closed because it was early in the morning. Just opposite, then you'll take a picture of it, that house, so the door was open and the lady was in the yard. Mrs. Kovářová. And she took him, she threw him into a trough, threw hay on him, the cows were eating and he was in that trough. He was in that trough and under the hay. They left him there until evening, in the evening they loaded him on a wagon, threw straw and hay. They took him to the Montenegrin forests and there he survived."

  • "Back then, maybe you don't even know, that time was in the tension in the Caribbean, with Cuba. I don't know, I think the kids know it. Do they know it? They're going to learn about it, aha. And that we constantly listened to the Voice of America. People listened to it and of course the communists forbade it. Well, I don't know how I was once, it was 12 o'clock and I heard the radio in the village. And those communists were here at the municipal office and they accidentally played it, that America, but they didn't turn the broadcasting to the village. It came out loud in the open."

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    Lažany, 15.12.2021

    (audio)
    duration: 01:27:32
    media recorded in project The Stories of Our Neigbours
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I wouldn’t want you to have to experience of our generation

Ludmila Plhoňová in the age of 16
Ludmila Plhoňová in the age of 16
photo: Archiv pamětnice

Ludmila Plhoňová, née Kakáčová, was born on May 12, 1934 in Lažany. Father Josef worked in Zbrojovka in Brno, mother Ludmila took care of the household and farm animals, and both parents took care of the fields. From her childhood, Ludmila Plhoňová had numerous experiences connected with the war years. She remembered the arrest of gamekeeper Josef Šotola or the bombing of Kuřim. She went to elementary school in Černá Hora and Lipůvka, then graduated from a two-year school where she learned to work on a sewing machine. She started her first job at Zbrojovka Brno. She never joined the Communist Party. From her first marriage, which ended in divorce, she had a son and a daughter, the son later died tragically in a traffic accident. She had two daughters from her second marriage. After the birth of her second daughter, she started working in a cowshed. She was a long-time member of the volunteer association, where she played and later gave advice. She also practiced in Sokol and devoted herself to astronomy, reading and writing poetry for a long time. Her lifelong love was cats. In 2021, she lived in Lažany.