Georg Schiedeck

* 1945

  • „Four weeks after my birth, my older brother found ammunition with other children, left from the soldiers who had thrown away everything escaping back home. And four weeks later he died in an accident. And a year later, in September, I was one and a half years old, we from the Waldeck and the Jauerniger land were in the second week of September 1946, the many German villagers over Niklasdorf in the ammunition storage Muna, that was an underground production from Hitler, were held to be deported by cattle trucks.“

  • "The journey then went past Altvater further to Prague, Pilsen and via Domažlice - Furth im Wald. In the Furth im Wald we were taken over by the Americans and the persons on the train were all covered by dust."

  • „Then we drove on to Regensburg. In Regensburg, the route went to Stadt am Hof. Then we drove with the small train to Woerth over Danube. There we were picked up by farmers from Obermittnach with a tractor and trailer or with horse carts or cow-, ox-carts. Then we came to Obermittnach in the last area of the Oberfalz, very neglected area in the village of Oberfalz, where the streets were all unsettled.”

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    Račí Údolí u Javorníka, Česká Republika, 25.09.2016

    (audio)
    duration: 58:09
    media recorded in project Memories for the Future
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Home lost, but not forgotten

Georg Schiedeck
Georg Schiedeck
photo: Archiv sběrače

Georg Schiedeck was born on 24th April, 1945 in Waldeck, today Zálesí near Javorník, in East Silesia. He spent only one and a half years in Czechoslovakia at that time. In September 1946, he and his family were gathered in MUNA (former ammunition camp) in Niklasdorf (today Mikulovice). From there he rode via Prague to Furth im Wald to the German border, where a refugee camp was located. There the displaced persons were further distributed and sent to various places in Bavaria. One of his brothers, however, unfortunately remained in Waldeck, because in the last days of the war he found weapons, which the soldiers had thrown away in the Jager Land at their home. As a 16-year-old child he died, when he wanted to play with these weapons. The father was a bricklayer and very active, so he soon built his own house in Bavaria and contributed significantly to the improvement of the residential situation. He also helped with the fast integration amongst the native Germans, which was not easy. In his new home, Georg Schiedeck studied, after an obligatory military service in Bundeswehr he worked as a hydraulic mechanic and finally he became self-employed with his own company. After the death of his father in 1969 his first journey back to the old home started. At the age of 55 years, in the so called third phase of his life, he intensified his trips to the Czech Republic so much that he even organized a bus trips for all who wanted to take part in such trips from Germany. Above all, these were the displaced persons or their descendants, who wanted to learn about their family and roots. A young generation is very important for him, which sees the story with different eyes and from a different perspective than the oldest generation of the displaced. He also participated in the development of the book “Disappeared Sudetenland” by the publishing house Antikomplex. With his circle of sponsors “Alte Heimat - neue Freunde” he tried to find the relations between the two regions, Jauerniger Land and the area around Regensburg, where many displaced persons from the Jauerniger land found their new home, also to upgrade to the official level. In October 2016 he organized an official visit of the mayors from the micro region Javornicko to Regensburg and Wörth on the Danube.