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Pardubitz - Königgrätz
Report No. 280
Maltreatment in the prisoner-of-war camp
Reported by: Josef Fuchs Report of July 4, 1946
I was released from Russian imprisonment on August 28, 1945 and
crossed the
Czech border on October 2 last year, passing through the Customs Office
of Wittau-Grottau as per regulations. I had been assured that I could immigrate
without hindrance. Nonetheless I was arrested in Grottau and then taken via
Reichenberg into the concentration camp on the Pardubitz airfield. Beatings were
the order of the day there for months on end. Anyone who so much as
straightened up for a moment at work was beaten with rifle butts, cudgels or
whips. I really have no idea how many times I myself was beaten there; it was at
least twice or three times every week. One Czech legionnaire was the terror of the
entire camp. One day in early April I and an old man were cutting wood, when
this legionnaire spoke to us in Czech. Since despite our best efforts we could not
understand what he wanted, he beat us so badly that the old man needed a doctor.
Thanks to the rebuke that the legionnaire now received from the doctor, he
maltreated the old man all over again by forcing him to pull a hand cart laden
with 300 kilos [660 pounds] of wood at a run from Pardubitz to the airfield,
beating him all the while with a cudgel so that he arrived at the airfield totally
exhausted. Two days later he beat me with a shovel handle to the point where I
had blood-suffused welts across my back.
On April 17, 1946 I was transferred to the concentration camp on the airfield of
Königgrätz. Similar beatings also took place there. While I was
working I was supervised by a guard who frequently bragged that he had shot 15
German soldiers and chopped off the hands of two. The worst beatings took place
there between May 5 and 9, 1946. I myself was beaten bloody on that occasion as
well. I was released on June 1, 1946, but even during my last days there I still
witnessed how an old man was beaten unconscious for being unable to pull a
wooden post out of the ground. I was not paid for any of my work the entire time.
Rations were very meager. The money that had been taken from us on our
imprisonment in Pardubitz was not returned to us. Even the few things we had
managed to retain through our imprisonment were taken away from us in
Pardubitz. The parcels which relatives sent us were always looted before we
received them.
Report No. 281
Abuse, treatment of prisoners-of-war
Reported by: Franz Bieberle Report of June 15, 1946 (Pardubitz)
On August 20, 1945 I was transported off to Moravian Ostrau for clearing
work, and in early September I and about 200 other men were sent on from
there to Pardubitz to do clearing work. On our arrival in Pardubitz we were
beaten up by guards with rifle butts, rubber truncheons and sticks, and herded
with constant beatings from the train station to the camp, a stretch of half an
hour. In the camp we were beaten daily before, during and after work for
months on end. Everyone was beaten, and many died of the consequences of
this abuse. Despite the hard work we had to do, our rations consisted only of
black coffee, watery soup and one slice of bread per day.
In early September a transport of
German prisoners-of-war who had been released from Russia arrived and was
taken to the concentration camp of Pardubitz. They too had to work in the
Fanto Works, an hour's distance from the camp. On September 15 an
explosive went off among
the prisoners-of-war during their march to work. The explosion resulted in 4
dead and 25 badly injured prisoners. The Czechs now claimed that
the prisoners had wanted to take this explosive into the Fanto Works in order
to detonate them. As punishment, the entire camp was placed under a mail,
parcel and visiting ban for six weeks around Christmas; therefore, thousands of
parcels and many envelopes with money that arrived for the camp inmates
around Christmas were not handed out. On Christmas Day we got no food at
all. The maltreatment in the camp around this time was even worse than
usual.
On January 21, the coldest day, all camp inmates from the military, the
gendarmerie etc. were herded out of their barracks at 8 o'clock in the evening,
most of them not fully dressed as
the move-out had to proceed very quickly. Then we had to stand lined up in the
square with our hands raised over our heads until 1 o'clock at night, while the
barracks were searched.
The barracks were unheated the entire winter long. Most inmates had only a
blanket. There were no washing facilities at all in the
camp. No-one dared report sick, since then he would only be maltreated all the
more. The people went to work literally until they dropped. Anyone who
collapsed from exhaustion during the march was beaten with rifle butts until
he continued. I spent nine months in this camp.
Parschnitz
Report No. 282
Treatment of Jews
Reported by: Dr. Rudolf Fernegg Report of June 21, 1951
The son and
former owner (now about 55 years old) of the factory of Josef Pfefferkorn at
Parschnitz had already lived in the United States for some time, but came back
after the collapse in 1945 in order to take over the factory, which was his before.
In the meantime he had acted as representative of this factory in the United
States. On his return home he was told that
neither re-possession of the factory nor the sale of the factory would be possible,
since the Czechs had refused to transfer
the purchase-money to America.
Pattersdorf
(District Deutschbrod)
Report No. 283
Conditions in the collection
camp
Reported by: Prof. Rudolf Pohl Report of September 6, 1946
I shared my
villa in Frauental No. 113 near Deutschbrod with
my 86-year-old aunt and foster mother, Johanna Niewelt, a retired teacher who
had taught in this town for more than 30 years. On June 23, 1945, during the days
of the revolution, this old lady was committed to the collection camp at
Pattersdorf, even though she was feeble and very sickly. The collection camp
consisted of a row of wooden barracks, where the women of the Labor Service
had used to be quartered. Attached to the barracks was a pig pen dating from the
same time, and that was the housing where my elderly aunt was put. She had to
lie there on the concrete floor with just some straw as bedding, with no care or
medical attention at all. Since she was no longer able to wash herself or even to
move around, the inevitable results were not long in coming: covered in filth and
lice, she lay helpless on her straw, which was soaked with her excrements. It was
not until September 6, 1945 that death released her from this inhuman treatment.
This outrage was perpetrated by the retired Czech staff captain J. Losenicky, of
Frauental (Pohled) near Deutschbrod, the Chairman of the
Národní výbor. During the occupation Losenicky had
cooperated closely with the National Socialists, and served as air raid
commandant. He ordered the arrest of the priest, dean and episcopal vicar August
Krpalek of the District Pfarrkirchen/Niederbayern, and had him brought before
the People's Tribunal in Deutschbrod, where, however, he was acquitted and had
to leave his homeland with only 50 kg of luggage. The leader of the Pattersdorf
collection camp was a certain Pavlicek, who carried out the orders of Hlavac, the
Chairman of the Národní výbor of Deutschbrod.
The truth of my statements can be corroborated by the German priest of
Schlappenz, Franz Fitz, who is now the curate in Berching, District Beilngries,
Upper Palatinate.
Hlavac ordered the imprisonment and dreadful maltreatment of not only German
women and innocent children but also of members of his own
people (the so-called collaborators). One of my former students, H., 17 years old,
daughter of a Czech engineer, was taken to a prison in Deutschbrod for having
attended a German school. In the prison she was raped 20 times in a single night,
and then
released - with a sexually transmitted disease.
Lieutenant Colonel of the Reserves R. J.
Heger's 18-year-old son, who was of mixed blood and had therefore been put to
forced labor by the Nazis, was a student at the German Commercial Academy in
Prague and was forced to leave the school in 1944. In May 1945 he was taken to
the prison in Pankratz, where he and his father were both horrifically maltreated.
His father the Lieutenant Colonel was beaten to death in that prison.
Georg Theml, age 20, formerly a student at the German Commercial Academy in
Prague, and an Austrian citizen, was also of mixed blood and had been sent to the
labor camp Bistritz; his mother, a Jewess, was imprisoned in Theresienstadt. In
May 1945 the Czechs imprisoned Theml in the Pankratz prison in Prague where
he too was inhumanly maltreated by the Czechs for fully two months.
Pisek - Brünn
Report No. 284
A German woman's ordeal
Reported by: Friedrich Sinzig Report of September 30, 1946
My wife Hildegard Sinzig, born on October 31, 1910, fled
from Pisek in May 1945 but the Americans turned her back [at the border] as
being a Czech citizen, and sent her
back to Brünn on a transport. Once expelled from Brünn, she and 12
other German women had to return home on foot, and all of them were picked up
by the authorities in Nezamyslic and put to work on an estate. After 6 weeks,
when the work was finished, she was transferred to the concentration camp in
Kojetein near Prerau. In this camp she was sent out each day to work somewhere.
Beginning in August the men and women were terribly maltreated in this camp
both before and after work. From 4 to 6 o'clock in the morning they had to do
exercises in the camp
yard - hopping and running up to the second story and back down. Three guards
were posted as supervisors and beat each person with a bullwhip as he or she ran
past. These blows were aimed randomly at the victim's head, face, shoulders,
back, lower back and legs. Once my wife received a blow to the face that was so
bad that she could not see for 14 days. My wife's Czech employer reported this
maltreatment to the gendarmerie, which ordered that the maltreatment in the
camp be stopped. The camp administration then informed the inmates that if
anything was ever reported again, they would be made to pay for it in other
ways.
When the prisoners returned to the camp in the evening after having worked all
day, they were tormented for hours just like they were in the morning. These
tortures took place on a daily basis, for months. In November my wife received
such a severe blow to the kidney area that she fell gravely ill, could not work any
more, and had to be admitted to the Kremsier hospital on November 26, 1945.
She was diagnosed with severe chronic inflammation of the kidneys, which failed
to improve. On my request I was permitted to bring my wife home to the
Jägerndorf hospital in March. There,
an x-ray found that both her kidneys had been severed and had begun to atrophy,
and that therefore her condition was terminal. On July 26, 1946, after much pain
and suffering, my wife succumbed to the consequences of the severe abuse she
had suffered in Kojetein. She had personally told me all about her ordeal. I can
take this statement on my oath and can also bring written documentation to prove
it.
Plan
Report No. 285
Maltreatment during inspection of identification
papers,
February 15, 1946
Reported by: Ignaz Böhm Report of June 6, 1946
On February 15 of
this year I left my
home in order to fetch sauerkraut from
my uncle who lived in the same street of Plan as I. On the way I was stopped
by two Czech soldiers who ordered me to produce my ID. I showed them my
citizenship paper, with my photograph and fingerprints. Two officers
examined the document. They gave it back to me, and I was allowed to go on.
Only a few minutes later, when I was on my way back home from my uncle's,
three Czech soldiers entered the house behind me. They again demanded to
see my ID. I showed them the same paper as before, and they arrested me. I
was led into the barracks, where several young Germans were already being
detained. Hardly had I entered the office before several Czech soldiers began
punching me, until I fell to the floor. Then I was kicked in the head, and then
they ordered me to get up. They asked repeatedly, "you German?", and with
every question they beat me some more. Then a member of the secret police
showed up in civilian dress, threw my ID paper torn up at my feet and
declared that it was a fake. I replied that the exact same ID paper had been
examined only a brief time before by two Czech officers, and acknowledged
as valid. At that, the sergeant who had led the beating ordered water brought
in so that I could wash up. In the meantime my boss, a Czech, called and had
me released. I am ready to take this statement on my oath.
Podmoky
(District Caslau)
Report No. 286
Mail withheld from agricultural slave
laborers
Reported by: Franz Seidel Report of July 15, 1946
My wife and I
had to do agricultural forced labor in Podmoky, Caslau District, since October 7,
1945, and we had to work there under the worst imaginable conditions. In light of
the hard labor, the rations were entirely insufficient. My wife's weight dropped by
66 pounds while we were there. Physical violence and crude invectives were
frequent. There were 12 of us Germans there, and 10 are still there today. I am 65
years old, and I had to carry 39 large feed bins 100 to 300 m each day. I was
barely able to carry the bins, but I was constantly urged to work faster. During the
time I was there, most of the mail intended for
me - including very important letters, some registered, from and to the Austrian
Consulate in
Prague - were withheld from me, which I can prove with the few letters I did later
receive in the concentration camp Stecken.
Pohorsch - Karwin
Report No. 287
Slave labor, maltreatment, death
Reported by: Ferdinand Münster Report of July 11, 1946
In Pohorsch in
May of 1945 all the men of the town were brutally beaten and
tortured in the town school by Czech partisans, daily for an entire month. Two
men were tortured to death. After having been tortured and beaten for a day, I
myself was released to go back home. In June a Czech administrator was
assigned to my farm, and in late August he arranged via the Employment Office
to have me shipped off to forced labor, as was done with all the men of the town
between the ages of 14 and 50. At the same time my wife was driven from our
home and robbed of all linen, shoes, clothing etc. I myself was sent to Karwin,
where I had to work in the Franz Mine until June 26 of this year, underground at
first and then
later above-ground at haulage level. Conditions in the camps there were
unbearable. Rations were totally inadequate, and there was no medical care
whatsoever. The most horrible maltreatment and tortures were the order of the
day, and continued until the very end. For example, after work two of us would
be called into the guard room and asked to report who had not worked hard
enough. If we refused to answer, we had to beat each other with rubber
truncheons. That went on until May and June 1946. At the time of my
resettlement [expulsion] I did not have the full weight allowance of luggage,
since my administrator had already robbed me of everything I owned. I reported
this in the resettlement [expulsion] camp, but my luggage was not supplemented
even though the camp leader had promised to order the administrator by
telephone to augment my luggage.
Documents on the Expulsion of the Sudeten Germans
Survivors speak out
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