Franziska Mykura (1905 -1965)
Her account of becoming a Czech political refugee in autumn 1938. Read a commentary from Mykura Archive UK on this document.
The original (type-written) is on four small sheets of paper, undated and signed in her hand-writing in red at the top of page 1, ‘Frances Mykura’.
- Page 1 September 1938
- Page 2 October 1938
- Page 3 October 1938
- Page 4 December 1938
WHEN I WAS LIVING IN A SMALL CZECH VILLAGE
The last days of September 1938, we, the Anti-Nazis, had to leave the Sudetenland and had to go into the heart of the Czech speaking part of Czechoslovakia, to find there refuge for a time.
The small town, where I was living since my early childhood was already half deserted by the people. The population, which in the majority favoured the “Anschluss” on Hitler Germany, had fled in masses over the border. We, the Anti-Nazis knew, either there will be war in a few days and bitter fighting in our part of the country, or Hitler takes over and we never would see Sudetenland again.
The evening before the general evacuation, which our party organized for its members, I decided to leave on my own by night train, as I had to take besides my children my old mother with me. Our elder boy had been in exchange with a Czech boy a year ago in a very small village near Prag: to this village we could go. So we hurriedly packed suitcases, a roll of blankets and set off. A neighbour with her grandchild hang on to us as well. Czech soldiers were patrolling the streets, they let us pass.
So that was “Good by” to our town, I thought. “Good by” to the life we lived, to our small house and garden. How much would that mean to me in the years to come?
When we arrived in that village we were the first refugees there. For the first nights we slept on the bare floor of the local inn. Then my husband, who has helped with the evacuation, came too. We found two rooms to rent: later on my neighbour got a room as well.
Page 2
A young man, who spoke German well, was an inspired Communist, was our biggest helper. He got from the villagers the necessary furniture, some very old and stored in huts.
Then came the mobilization: Czechoslovakia called their men to arms. This small nation was willing to fight. The Czech trusted the pact they had with Russia, England and France, but the Munich pact gave the Sudetenland to Germany. Czechoslovakia was left standing alone. What was the use of the biggest demonstration Prag had ever seen? From that date the Czech government was broken. A new president was nominated, a man unknown to the nation, whose health broke down under the burden after some weeks.
Before the Nazis offizially took over Sudetenland, my husband had taken the risk to go back to our town to fetch some clothing and other much needed things for us. Some of his friends, who had decided to stay, did not know him any more. Luckily they did not do him any harm. He just catched the last train. After that a new border separated the country. The rest of Czechoslovakia became a very sad country. Many, many Anti-Fascists, who had fled to the heart of the country were sent bac. The Nazis triumphed and let their orgies out on all the people who had opposed them before. Jewish synagoges were burnt down. Our friends were put in concentration camps. My neighbour had to go back also and had to find another dwelling in a different town. Her two sons who were members of our “Home Guard” were sent to prison.
We were permitted to stay in the village as long as we were not asking for anything. To get this permit we had to go first to local councillor and from there we had to go the parish borough.
Page 3
My twelfe year old son had to make the interpreter all the time. That councillor, who was a farm worker lived with his family of eight in a One-roomed cottage near the gate of the big farm. The big house and the farm-yard were surrounded with high walls. The cottage was more like a hut. Later in England a farm-works cottage seemed a palace to me, compared to this hovel. I realized in that village that the Czech workers did not all work on farms, were much poorer and the living standards lower than in Sudetenland, although the unemployment figures were very high there.
But the village had enjoyable points as well. There was the village shop where one could get everything: from groceries to tools and paraffin; from shoe laces to boots and dresses, men clothing and underwear. At a nursery garden they had very good vegetables and the best plums. But for meat I had to go to the next bigger village. At the house where we lived, they had their meat supplied by tame rabbits; in huts in the yard, there were about thirty of them. The woman had to fetch daily grass for them, carrying it in a basket on her back. At mealtimes there was always a delicate smell in the house: the rabbit meat either rosted, fried or stewed. After a time, to my own surprise I got quite contend with life again. Our two boys went by train early in the morning to Prag, to a similar grammar school as at home. Cooking a meal for my family, cleaning the rooms, scrubbing the floors, doing the washing: it always gave me great satisfaction. But to stay in Czechoslovakia we could not. Nobody got a working permit and politically everything looked very bleak. Contd . . .
Page 4
At the beginning of December 1938 we had the opportunity to emigrate to England. Later on it would have been New Zealand or Canada perhaps.
As we could not take my old mother, she had to go to our home town back. I never did see her again. The first news we had after the war was that she died 1942 after four very lonely years.