Ludmila Terčová

"I was a little over eight years old. When the death marches, as we called them, always went there in the evening. My mother found out that they were mostly starving people, so she bought a loaf of bread - mostly the people next door also did this - and she always cut some a slice of bread, she gave it to those pitiful people. They were terribly pitiful people. If you could see - their striped lines hung on them, you could see sunken cheekbones and big eyes and pitiful people. Terribly pitiful. Hungry. You could see that they were tortured that they also kicked them. They also kicked one behind our garden, he was probably a Pole too, he was begging for a slice of bread, so they kicked him there. I only heard all this in my grandfather's shop, when people went to get haircuts and shaves, so there they talked about it. Otherwise, they didn't say anything like that in front of me, I was well taken care of and protected."

"I was a little over eight years old. When the death marches, as we called them, always went there in the evening. My mother found out that they were mostly starving people, so she bought a loaf of bread - mostly the people next door also did this - and she always cut some a slice of bread, she gave it to those pitiful people. They were terribly pitiful people. If you could see - their striped lines hung on them, you could see sunken cheekbones and big eyes and pitiful people. Terribly pitiful. Hungry. You could see that they were tortured that they also kicked them. They also kicked one behind our garden, he was probably a Pole too, he was begging for a slice of bread, so they kicked him there. I only heard all this in my grandfather's shop, when people went to get haircuts and shaves, so there they talked about it. Otherwise, they didn't say anything like that in front of me, I was well taken care of and protected."

"I have the experience of a lifetime. My mother was in front of the barracks, cutting bread, and the women from the concentration camp were walking by, and there was a hungry French woman, so she wanted a piece of the bread. My mother wanted to give it to her. At that moment, an SS man ran up, pointed a rifle at my mother, and shouted at her something. I don't know what it was. Next to him was a wolf cub, he had bared teeth. He was going to shoot like mom, because grandma was shouting: 'Hold back, don't give her anything!' It was such a scream, everything inside me revolted. Now I saw that SS man facing us, roaring, eyes wide, and that barrel. It left me with such a terrible feeling that to this day, when there is something bad going on in front of me, my stomach clenches."