Czechoslovak Political Prisoners - über das Projekt Political ...

On September 29, 1950 I came home from school in Pardubice. About 7 p.m. a guy came up
to me and said, “I would need to talk to you, we are interested in some things.” I lived in the
suburbs of Pardubice called Slezské in the outskirts and there was a small park about a hundred
meters from our house. He told me we would meet over there absolutely not knowing what
was going on. He told me, “I am from school and I would need some parts for radios and such
stuff.” I just replied that I don’t do things like that. I still didn’t have a clue what was going on
and when he saw that he wouldn’t get anything out of me he gave a sign and all of a sudden
there were some fifteen men saying, “We are arresting, we are arresting you,” and that was it.
Then they came home with me and searched my house. My parents were frightened as well as
my remaining three siblings. By 11 p.m. they transported me to the prison in Hradec Králové,
not saying a word to my parents, just mentioning that they would ask me a few questions and
that I would return the next day. I came back in five years.
What exactly did they look for during the house search?
They were searching for anything. I was just working on a radio. I wanted to make a radio
connected to an LP player because such stuff was not available on the market, but they
thought it was the construction of a radio transmitter. I sympathized with Americans and from
1946 I got a bulletin from the American Embassy. There weren’t any political things against
Communism, it was just a bulletin distributed by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. That was also
evidence and then we were sentenced for the Americanism. They were searching for anything
that they could sentence us for. At 11 o’clock they transported me to the prison and there
I waited for three days not knowing what was going on. They wrote some papers with me and
they let me be for three days.
Then they blinded my eyes and took me the Ulrichovo Square where the offices of the secret
police were. That was my first interrogation and it lasted from 10 a.m. until 1 a.m. They were
still trying to convince me to tell them something, but I kept saying, “I don’t know anything,
I don’t know about anything.” I wasn’t admitting anything so they ended it at night and they
took me back to the jail. On the second and third day it looked the same and on the third day
they just told me, “Hey, don’t be ridiculous, here are the reports. We locked up others and
they’ve already told us everything that you were doing.”
Did you know the people that were written up in the reports that they showed you?
I knew them because we did one silly thing since we agreed on establishing an official scouts
group. Unfortunately, another guy who wanted to escape across the border in 1949 joined
our group as well. They caught him and punished him with a half year of imprisonment for
attempting to cross the border. He was showing off that he had friends he could write to and
that we could come and get him out of prison. He was already somewhere by Jáchymov, somewhere
at Vykmanov on “C.” He probably told this to someone who was already cooperating
with the secret police. This person had to give out our names and so they came and arrested
us all. That was already after the bombing of the Communist’s building. That was the biggest
thing we did and the policemen called it, “Noisemaker.” They were wondering who did that
for about a year and half before this “good boy” told them.
What happened when they brought your colleague’s reports and showed you?
I just read the reports and I found out there was my compliant named Ctirad Andrýs and another
compliant Lubka Škaloud. “Oh, it’s good, there is three of us.” I thought to myself. They
practically threw out the things that weren’t deniable anymore. So I just told them I agreed,
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