Werner Zimmermann

* 1935

  • “He was still inside the barn. The Russians came again looking for something. He thought they were looking for him. But I only know that from those who have been observing. Back then we were somewhere inside the house. I was only eleven years, not even eleven. In any case, there was my father. After that they said they did nothing to the man. They had seen he was not in the army, neither was a functionary, he was in the Czech army, so he had a military passport. We had no reprisals. Yes, there was my mother with four children. And then the Czech commissioners have come, mayor as one has said. And the militia especially, which was often a bit hard. You had to deliver everything: radios, whatever, jewellery. You had to deliver al that. The militia has always come from Freudenthal. There was a camp. There were then those, who had to do with the party, which came here. Obviously back then I do not know what was going on there. It was the word of mouth, what I heard. Stuff I did not experience myself."

  • “She did not know now yet – will anyone do anything? Until someone actually agreed to work as a grave digger. Jump on. We drove him to the cemetery with the truck. Wrapped in a carpet or whatever. There were three or two more killed by the Russians during the invasion. They were buried together. It was simple, just throw him in and more ground on top." "Were they all together in one grave?" "Yes, indeed. Just next to each other. These are just the experiences, which, as you get older, are really imprinted. They come back again. This has not been very easy for my mother. Well, just the kind of things. Nevertheless, I was up there now in the cemetery, but can never find exactly, where the place is now, because now it is all covered with grass.

  • We children were lying on top of the things that had been arranged there. There were forty people squeezed up together. Indeed up there. I did not know at all where we went. Via Prague... and then, just that. Just before the border, they threw the white N off the train. "" Yes? "" They all did. And the Americans practically organized it all, as Bavaria was already an American zone. There we were gotten rid of lice. That was the first thing the Americans did; to cover us with a powder all over. They first thought that loud and lousy people were coming, or something. Indeed the Americans had no idea, what kind of people were coming there. So what I often read now: the Czechs, this leadership. When I tell the Czechs, then I do not want to say it all, but the leadership, which of course has said how many there are, and of course everything has a bit trivialised."

  • But it was not nice. In hindsight, when I think back about it. Above all for my mother, as children or boys we really do not fight it so intensely. This time was nice. And because you can see today there are similar things, more or less. "Because people sometimes do not even know what was before and what is now." "Yes, and above all, these nationalistic hunters who stir up hatred should not exist, we never need such things."

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    Neumarkt in der Oberpfalz, 16.03.2017

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War is always bad for both parts

Werner Zimmermann
Werner Zimmermann
zdroj: Dominik Michálek, 2017

Werner was born on 27th September, 1935 in a hospital in Troppau (Opava). His father was a teacher, so the family often moved due to his job. At the end of war the family lived in Wildgrub (Václavov u Bruntál) at the school premises. He had three younger brothers. In winter 1944 experienced the hiding of the wretched Russian prisoners who were passing through the village. His life changed a lot on 5th May, 1945, because his father was shot by the Russian soldiers who were passing by. The father did not want to get into the militia; he did not want to carry a pistol to shoot at people. „I will not do that,“ he said, and on that day he ran away from the soldiers. The mother, who was left alone with the children, had to take care of the funeral with a household maid. The father was buried in the common grave along with two or three who had been killed by the Russians in Freudenthal (Bruntál). Werner also experienced the rage of the Russians, who wanted to get girls and women in the village and raped them. In September 1946 the family was taken to the station in Freudenthal (Bruntál) and they took a transport to Neumarkt in the Oberpfalz. „Right before the border they threw the white N out of the train ...they all did it.“ It was not so easy to study in Germany. He had already prepared his place at the gymnasium back at home. In his new homeland he first trained as a machine builder. Later in 1968 due to health problems he became a banker. He married Theresia in 1959. One year later his son was born. Although the family did not talk much about this time, Werner says: „These experiences are properly imprinted and when you get older they come back to you.“