Jozef Vavrinec

"The soldiers had a red crosses the train-carriages and they were transferring soldiers to the front line. From there they would carry on, they were still deploying soldiers in 1944. Those Rats [fighter planes] were shooting at the train that was heading to the Nitra river, where there’s this big ditch. The train went through that ditch, you could see it, you could see the smoke coming from that ditch [...] The Germans dispersed into the forest, into the water, into the fields, they jumped out of the train. There were no wounded people, they were only transferring the healthy ones. We then continued, because another locomotive had arrived to get the train to the station faster. Back then, shooting was not allowed in the stations. So they went and I guess they came from the ramps [...] There was a brickyard under the forest, and from there the locomotive didn't go any further, only about 200 meters, which was about 300 meters after those ramps. The brickyard was shot to pieces because the Rats had shot at it. The water started to flow, even one of the engineers was shot."

"They were digging trenches in Hungary, it was called Gýmeš there and here in Slovakia it was called Fegymeš. Then he ran away from there, and several more got away, and he came to Hlohovec. My older 18-year-old cousin came and told my mother to send me to the forest with a cart - we had this wooden cart that we used to transport, for example stones, in or [...] My mom went to the store, bought more, in order to have enough [. ..] It was a long way to the store. She bought groceries with that cart. It had shafts, it was like a hay wagon, such a small cart... So my brother and I went. I was eight years old and would go with the cart into the forest, behind the cemetery, to bring my father some clothes. She covered them up, so you couldn't see what was in the cart. She just threw some things in it. So I went. I was ordered not to tell anyone. Anyone could have betrayed him and they would have taken him away, and maybe us, too.”