Czechoslovak Political Prisoners - über das Projekt Political ...

Never ending desire for freedom-escapes
The conditions in prisons and working camps were inhuman – lack of food, hard work, unhealthy
conditions, and the nonstop hassling. That is why some prisoners decided to do something
about it and they planned an escape. The escapes were done in various ways. Sometimes
it was individuals and sometimes it was organized in groups. Some escapes were done without
much thought and depended on the opportunity at hand. Others were planned with great
detail for a couple of months, for example the very popular dig for freedom in a camp called
Nikolaj. As for the unsuccessful ones those were lost because the very participants of the escape
were not careful and they revealed their plans to too many people. The prisoners always
appreciated the subordination of the successful groups to escape and also when there were
many people involved in the plan. Then they did not mind either toussing or repressions that
logically followed. Jožka Hošek wrote in his book, “All men stopped being tired and no one
was really mad at the group that escaped. On the contrary, the whole camp was kind of empowered
with happiness that the escape was successful.” Anyway there were many escapes
that were constructed and provoked by the headquarters of prisons or camps. In fact the biggest
escape in the history of the labor camps is the one when twenty prisoners escaped from
the mine “Kamenná” on November 29, 1952. At this escape of prisoners there were two mine
guards and there was also one master involved. The prisoners stole explosives and they used
this to make a tunnel from the mines, but soon after escape they were caught. In 1953 they
were tried again and their new sentences were around three years for prisoners and around
eighteen months for the civilian employees. At that time these sentences were really low.
The most tragic consequence was during the attempted escape of twelve prisoners from
mine number 14 near Slavkov. These were prisoners from camp XII and they escaped on October
15, 1951. Only four prisoners survived alive, Karel Kukal, was able to give us a testimony
in his book called, Ten Crosses. Two of these prisoners were sentenced to death and the third
one lost his memory after the inhuman beatings. Karel Kukal himself was sentenced to another
twenty-five years 33 . The dead bodies of the participants were taken back to the camp and this
left many bad memories for all prisoners who were eyewitnesses. The bodies of their friends
were thrown into the middle of the courtyard and those who were caught alive had to stand
next to them and the whole camp had to march along it when no one was allowed to pay their
respects. If someone did it, they were put into solitary confinement for a couple of days. Jožka
Jelínek describes this experience, “From that moment we had hardly any sense of forgiveness.
Even for priest, who had “love the enemy” in their job description, this commandment became
a life-long problem.”
The escape has another dimension though that is important to mention here. I remember one
interview with Alois Macek who was arrested as a nineteen-year-old and sentenced to sit for
12 years. In camp Mariánská his friends decided to escape and since they knew Mr. Macek had
a similar attitude they told him about their plans. Alois Macek refused to participate though
because they were planning on killing one of the guards on their way. The escape was ruined
and all of them were caught, than followed cruel interrogations and a search for other prisoners
who were aware of the plan and did not say a word. After sometime it was revealed that
Mr. Alois Macek knew about it. Later, a huge “Monster Process” was organized and many peo-
33 See more in the interview with Doctor Jan Pospíšil.
Czechoslovak Political Prisoners 23