"The people working in the field hurriedly lay down so the Germans wouldn't shoot them. They watched what was going on. They saw three young men and three soldiers walking out. They went into the forest. They saw the boys had to dig a grave. They put each of them up against a tree. They were still asking them questions apparently, but they didn't say anything. The two who were standing there shot the first one. They had to pick him up, drag him into the pit and stand by the two trees again. Again, nothing for a while, and again. Then they shot the second one. The last one had to drag him to the grave. Finally they shot him, but I don't know which one they shot when. I don't know the sequence. Nobody could have known. The soldiers grabbed the last one and threw him in the pit, raked some dirt over him and went away."
"Dad said, 'They're here, they're here.' I was happy the liberators were already there, so I took that in my hand, under my arm. I ran to the door to welcome them. Now I see a soldier has stopped at the door with a cocked...automatic rifle or whatever they had. My father's shouting, 'Lie down, lie down, hide, don't stand still, he'll shoot you!' I got behind the swinging door and lay there. I still didn't understand why he would shoot me. He left. When the tension got a bit relaxed, me and brother Josef went out. There was a shop in Riegerova street. The owner's name was Fousek, They sold stuff with long sleeves and trousers, and if it didn't fit there was a workshop in the yard with a window and there were tailors who would adjust it right away. We saw the window was broken. In the window there was a German helmet turned around. I only saw the helmet. My brother says, 'Oh, a helmet, I'll take it, I'll keep it.' He grabbed it, let go of his hand, and as he let go the helmet turned with a head inside it. There was the severed head of a German in it. That was quite an experience... That was a real experience. That was the Germans."
"[Brother Václav] was to go to... I should say that too. He was summoned to go to Germany." - "Forced labour?" - "Yes. Only he wasn't there. The Gestapo came. There was a Gestapo man in the yard and he asked, 'Where's your brother?' I said, 'He's in Germany.' He said, 'Where's your brother?' I said, 'In Germany.' He slapped me so hard on one side and on the other so I fell down. Nobody asked me any more questions. They kept asking around with our friends who came from the school. We said nothing. We didn't reveal anything. We didn't know. Because our parents were cautious in front of us and said, 'Don't talk to anybody, don't tell what's going on, don't tell what was talked about. You don't know anything."
Eliška Melounová, née Přasličková, was born as the youngest of five children to Martin and Františka Přasličkas on 16 October 1930. The family stayed in Olomouc. Eliška‘s father Martin was an officer. He crossed the entire Siberia during the Great War and joined the resistance at the beginning of World War II along with Eliška‘s brothers Vojtěch and Václav. The brothers used to guide guerrillas at night and hide them in the shelters of Salm‘s Palace in Olomouc‘s Horní square where the family lived. Her brothers disappeared a few months before the end of the war and Eliška did not know where they were. She found out only after the war that brother Václav had tried to join anti-fascist resistance in the Konice area but was detained by the Gestapo with other boys Rudolf Tichý and Josef Machač. They were shot days before the end of the war on 27 April 1945 in the forest between Březsko and Konice. A memorial commemorates the tragic event on site. In 1946, Eliška went to apprentice as a tailor. She worked in Maria Zolotareva‘s fashion salon in Olomouc. After the nationalisation in 1950, she worked at Oděvní tvorba Olomouc into which the salon was incorporated. She married in 1967 she married and her marriage remained childless. She spent the end of her life in a home for the elderly in Olomouc. She died on 23 March 2023.
Group photo of the final year students of the Komenium Primary School in Křížkovského Street in Olomouc; Eliška Melounová is second left in the top row
Group photo of the final year students of the Komenium Primary School in Křížkovského Street in Olomouc; Eliška Melounová is second left in the top row
