Jaroslav Vávra

* 1933

  • „Začátkem května si pamatuji, že přijeli vlasovci. Byl jsem s tátou na pískovně na procházce a viděli jsme od Rané přijíždět tanky, auto i koně. Šli jsme se podívat k silnici pod Červeňákem a vidíme německé vojáky. Zastavili v Dobroměřicích, tak jsme tam šli a podle řeči jsme pochopili, že částečně něco rozumíme. To mi bylo divné, němečtí vojáci a že jim rozumím. Měl jsem zkušenost, že kolem nás chodily na střelnici do Lenešic z Loun celé čety vojáků. Jednou začalo pršet a četa vlezla k nám domů schovat se před deštěm, a těm jsem nerozuměl. A těmhle ano, tak mi to bylo divné. Pak jsem se dozvěděl, že jsou to Rusové v německých uniformách. V lenešickém cukrovaru, v dubnu, květnu, pracovali Arménci a ti byli taky v německých uniformách. Říkali, že pak předali flinty někomu na obci. Ta doba byla taková divoká.“

  • „To bylo tenkrát už v pětačtyřicátém roce. Přímo pochod smrti jsem neviděl. Šli z Postoloprt krajem Lenešic a pak zase na Ranou. Jen tak krajem Lenešic prošli. Bydleli jsme vedle hřbitova, tak jsem jako kluk koukal u márnice přes zeď. Viděl jsem asi pět zastřelených vězňů. Ještě v těch štráfkatých mundúrech je tam pochovával hrobník. Viděl jsem, že ho chytil za kabát a nesl ho v jedné ruce. Pochoval jich tam asi pět. Údajně, jak jsem slyšel, se jeden zachránil. Skočil někde u silnice do škarpy. U Postoloprt jich měli zastřelit snad osmnáct. U Bohosudova je upomínková deska, že tudy ten pochod smrti šel.“

  • “When in the April 1945 the so-called death march also went through Lenešice. These were people who were locked up in a concentration camp, so they moved that camp from somewhere in Germany, and that camp went through Postoloprty, through Lenešice and turned up to Rana, and from there they got to Bohosudov. They passed through Lenešice here along Dlouhá Street, immediately turned around and immediately went across the track as on Rana. They only took a tip through Lenešice and then up again and came to Rana, and they were already in the Sudetes again, so they didn't stay long here, in Bohemia. I saw that here, supposedly here in Lenešice one of those prisoners escaped. He jumped into a ditch somewhere and crawled into the canal and so we saved his lives. Otherwise, I saw here, maybe five of those people were shot. So I saw, just because I was at that cemetery, so I was always curious, so I always looked over the wall, we were right away, I looked into the cemetery from the garden, so I saw how the gravedigger was burying them. He grabbed him by the ragged rags and carried the man in one hand.”

  • "We were simply assigned to the border area. It was the so-called Sudetenland that was taken, that territory, the Germans occupied the so-called Sudetenland. We were right on the border, Raná was already German, Břvany was already German, Sudetenland, Nečichy, what am I talking about, here Břvany, it was also Sudetenland, then here to Postoloprt, it was all Sudetenland, it was just that it didn't belong here anymore. We were Böhmen und Mähren, Bohemia and Moravia. So, that's how it was. And at that time, when it was being cleared out, these people who were like our people, Czech people, when they didn't want to so-called socialize, when they didn't want to sign the accessories to the Germans, they were deported to the so-called Bohemia. Therefore, the refugees were driven here, that was many people. Just as they are fleeing from Ukraine today, so back then they were fleeing from the border here to the Czech Republic. We still had very little of that space, but I remember that there was also a teacher there, and my dad sublet him too so that he would have a place to stay."

  • Full recordings
  • 1

    Lenešice, 16.11.2022

    (audio)
    duration: 01:14:43
    media recorded in project The Stories of Our Neigbours
  • 2

    Louny, 18.09.2023

    (audio)
    duration: 01:25:19
    media recorded in project Příběhy regionu - Ústecký kraj
Full recordings are available only for logged users.

It’s good to realize that you don’t have to have everything

Jaroslav Vávra (en)
Jaroslav Vávra (en)
photo: Archiv pamětníka

Jaroslav Vávra was born on February 7, 1933 in Louny, but lived his whole life in Lenešice, where his parents had a small farm. After the occupation of the Sudetenland by the German Empire, Lenešice found itself on the border of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, and the Vávras rented one room in their house to a teacher who was forced to flee from the Sudetenland. In April 1945, a death march passed through Lenešice. The Vávras lived right next to the cemetery, and Jaroslav Vávra watched the burial of the shot prisoners. He was also a witness to raids by depth divers and the liberation of Lenešice by the Red Army. He went to Sokol from the first grade, and after the war to the renewed Junák. After the municipal school, he completed a one-year learning course and learned to be a carpenter. In 1953, he joined the war in Vysoké Mýto in the anti-aircraft artillery. He served first in the kitchen and later transferred to the railway army, where he completed a diving course. He laid cables on newly built dams or helped remove underwater obstacles. After the war, he started working for a geological survey, after the Velvet Revolution, he worked in carpentry. He was a member of the tourist section in Louny for several decades. In 2022 he lived in Lenešice.