Slovakia, Autumn 1944 - p.1: SNP & Partisans
Again that urge to write, to rush before my memories start fading. To set down the details, without regard for grammar or style, wartime memories that are important to me but perhaps of no interest to anyone else.
This is my recollection about World War II, about certain experiences during the Slovak National Uprising (SNP) in late 1944.
Note: Clicking on the titles of pages 1, 14 and 15 will connect to external links.
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INTRODUCTION:
The SNP uprising started in my hometown Banska Bystrica on August 29, 1944. The same week one afternoon I went to the garrison in the southern suburb of Radvan to join the SNP army. These were not the heroics of a 17-year old. I was scared and felt I would be safer in a group of armed men and with a weapon of my own. The place was full of men changing into uniforms . In the garrison office I was told they did not sign up boys, they needed grown men. They gave me a small, black hand grenade and sent me on my way.
The next month, still in Banska Bystrica, I was accepted in a partisan recruiting office and on September 16 I arrived at a training camp or base in the tiny village of Jasenie. (Not to be confused with the village of Jaseno mentioned later in this narrative.) I slept on the floor in the corner of the village schoolhouse. During my two weeks in the camp I learned how to shoot from and take care of my rifle and to throw handgrenades. There was also familiarization with the CZ light machine gun and the Degtaryev antitank rifle whose recoil punched one in the shoulder.
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October 1, 1944 Sunday
I was allowed to leave Jasenie, walked the short distance to the railway stop in Predajná and took the train to my hometown. I felt a bit lightheaded after several hours of sentry duty the night before. In Banská Bystrica I wanted to show myself in my ill-fitting uniform to my father and young brother but mostly to my friends, boys and girls, and to former schoolmates. Some of them I saw that afternoon for the last time, they were killed during the months that followed. At the old pharmacy near the main square I was given two small packets, each with four rectangular tablets of Dextro-Energen, a glucose-dextrose rapid energy booster. I was told to save them for emergencies like extreme exhaustion. By the end of the of the month the tablets helped me to carry on and I owe it to the pharmacist, a family friend and survivor, to record his name : Hugo Burger.
I was back at the base when around 6 PM there was a roll call to line up with our arms, rucksacs and all personal belongings. There was no evening meal. Not everybody had arms. About forty of us, boys and men, with rifles and light machine guns and three unarmed girls, were loaded up on two open trucks and off we were to Bystrica. There on the main square both trucks stopped to refuel while most of us were singing partisan songs in the light drizzle. The benzín pumpa (gasoline pump) was painted yellow and had a Shell logo. Near it stood a small aircompressor in the shape of the rotund Michelin Man. There also stood my close, childhood friend Egon Fischer to whom I shouted to let my father know that we were being trucked to the front.
In the darkness we travelled northward and got off the trucks in the small town of Harmanec. I don't remember where or how we spent the night or whether I slept at all. I do remember the next unpleasant day.
Egon (Burschi) Fischer, his parents and many others were shot dead outside the town during the mass executions in December 1944 and January 1945.
October 2, 1944 Monday
Low clouds and rain all day long. Most of us were standing or sitting on our rucksacks through the day under the roof overhang of a long, single-storey building, getting splattered by the rain.
There was nothing to eat or drink. In late afternoon each of us received a loaf of dark and heavy army bread with the admonition that it will have to last us for a long time. Still later there appeared a Soviet soldier or partisan in summer uniform wearing a rainproof poncho. He was to be our guide through the mountains during the coming days.
In the evening our whole group was again trucked toward the north. We spent the night in a barn somewhere in the foothills of the Velká Fatra mountains.
This is my recollection about World War II, about certain experiences during the Slovak National Uprising (SNP) in late 1944.
Note: Clicking on the titles of pages 1, 14 and 15 will connect to external links.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
INTRODUCTION:
The SNP uprising started in my hometown Banska Bystrica on August 29, 1944. The same week one afternoon I went to the garrison in the southern suburb of Radvan to join the SNP army. These were not the heroics of a 17-year old. I was scared and felt I would be safer in a group of armed men and with a weapon of my own. The place was full of men changing into uniforms . In the garrison office I was told they did not sign up boys, they needed grown men. They gave me a small, black hand grenade and sent me on my way.
The next month, still in Banska Bystrica, I was accepted in a partisan recruiting office and on September 16 I arrived at a training camp or base in the tiny village of Jasenie. (Not to be confused with the village of Jaseno mentioned later in this narrative.) I slept on the floor in the corner of the village schoolhouse. During my two weeks in the camp I learned how to shoot from and take care of my rifle and to throw handgrenades. There was also familiarization with the CZ light machine gun and the Degtaryev antitank rifle whose recoil punched one in the shoulder.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
October 1, 1944 Sunday
I was allowed to leave Jasenie, walked the short distance to the railway stop in Predajná and took the train to my hometown. I felt a bit lightheaded after several hours of sentry duty the night before. In Banská Bystrica I wanted to show myself in my ill-fitting uniform to my father and young brother but mostly to my friends, boys and girls, and to former schoolmates. Some of them I saw that afternoon for the last time, they were killed during the months that followed. At the old pharmacy near the main square I was given two small packets, each with four rectangular tablets of Dextro-Energen, a glucose-dextrose rapid energy booster. I was told to save them for emergencies like extreme exhaustion. By the end of the of the month the tablets helped me to carry on and I owe it to the pharmacist, a family friend and survivor, to record his name : Hugo Burger.
I was back at the base when around 6 PM there was a roll call to line up with our arms, rucksacs and all personal belongings. There was no evening meal. Not everybody had arms. About forty of us, boys and men, with rifles and light machine guns and three unarmed girls, were loaded up on two open trucks and off we were to Bystrica. There on the main square both trucks stopped to refuel while most of us were singing partisan songs in the light drizzle. The benzín pumpa (gasoline pump) was painted yellow and had a Shell logo. Near it stood a small aircompressor in the shape of the rotund Michelin Man. There also stood my close, childhood friend Egon Fischer to whom I shouted to let my father know that we were being trucked to the front.
In the darkness we travelled northward and got off the trucks in the small town of Harmanec. I don't remember where or how we spent the night or whether I slept at all. I do remember the next unpleasant day.
Egon (Burschi) Fischer, his parents and many others were shot dead outside the town during the mass executions in December 1944 and January 1945.
October 2, 1944 Monday
Low clouds and rain all day long. Most of us were standing or sitting on our rucksacks through the day under the roof overhang of a long, single-storey building, getting splattered by the rain.
There was nothing to eat or drink. In late afternoon each of us received a loaf of dark and heavy army bread with the admonition that it will have to last us for a long time. Still later there appeared a Soviet soldier or partisan in summer uniform wearing a rainproof poncho. He was to be our guide through the mountains during the coming days.
In the evening our whole group was again trucked toward the north. We spent the night in a barn somewhere in the foothills of the Velká Fatra mountains.
posted by Observer at 6:26 PM
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