Danuše Svatoňová

* 1929

  • "It was during the Heydrichiad. When they burned Lidice and chased the partisans, someone who was in the resistance was supposed to stay with us. And they found out, and it was during martial law. They just sentenced them without trials."

  • "I went to lock the garden and a car stopped, two gentlemen got out and asked me if my uncle was home. And I said, 'We don't have an uncle.' And he said, 'Well, the gentleman who lives with you.' And I said, 'Nobody lives with us.' 'Well, we're going to see your father.' So they went. Mummy was just breastfeeding Jana. When they came in, she and Daddy were talking in the next room, and Daddy took his coat and went. And I said, 'Daddy, where are you going?' And he said, 'Don't worry, I'll be back.' And he never came back. We didn't know he was dead for a long time, we only found out from the newspaper. At that time, all the executed people were in the newspapers."

  • "My father was executed here at the barracks in Tábor. They were loaded onto trucks and taken to Tábor at six o'clock in the evening. They said that the whole hospital had to draw the curtains to that side, to the barracks, and that they were shot there. Then they threw them on a car and took them to Budějovice to the cemetery. And there's a place in the cemetery in Budeěovice, a memorial, and it says that they threw them from the car into a pile before they took them to the crematorium. Then they took them to the crematorium. We don't have anything from Daddy, nothing! We got nothing at all..."

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    Soběslav, 23.05.2025

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He took his coat, told me he’d be back. And he never came back

Danuše Svatoňová in 2025
Danuše Svatoňová in 2025
photo: Memory of Nations

Danuše Svatoňová, née Nedělková, was born on 3 September 1929 in Soběslav. The family had their own small garden market, which they lovingly tended. During the war, during the Heydrichiad, her father, Jan Nedělka, provided accommodation for two nights for the wanted Rajmund Navrátil. The Gestapo found out, took him away, and then shot him on June 14, 1942, at the Tábor execution site. Together with him, several other people, they allegedly traced the whole cell chain at that time. Her mother, Štěpánka Nedělková, was faced with existential problems, in addition to taking care of her three daughters. Half of father’s fortune was forfeited to the Reich. After the communist takeover, they confiscated the entire garden market and they had to move out. Danuše Svatoňová trained as a florist and worked as a florist her whole life. She married in the early 1950s and had two sons. In 2025 she lived in Soběslav.