Jozef Šnirc

* 1934

  • "I remember one thing my mom was saying. In Prievidza, Ladislav Leday, a prominent official of the Hlinka Guard, he was a little lame, he was limping on one leg, but he was such an energetic guy. And my mom said a Jewish woman was there with a little child. Someone was holding her baby, she went out to the back of the truck and that the guy took the kid in a pillow and threw it on the truck. She grabbed him, fortunately, but he acted like the child was a piece of wood."

  • "In August 1944 the Slovak National Uprising broke out. I remember we ran to the square, and we saw civilians armed with rifles, occasionally a soldier. But I would always remember- there was one blacksmith in Prievidza, a strong man, who was also a partisan and I kept saying to myself: "If the Germans come, he'll kill them."

  • "And the teacher invented yet another punishment, and it was called "Our Father". So he put pencils between fingers of eight-year-old boys, and a Gypsy, who was much older and bigger than us, pressed our hands. That was "Our Father". The religious sister, who taught us catechism, somehow found out the teacher named the punishment this way. She was mad, why did the teacher call this "Our Father"? Couldn't he name it otherwise? "Our Father"!? It didn't bother her, someone asked an older gipsy to squeeze our fingers, she was offended by the name!"

  • Celé nahrávky
  • 1

    Prievidza, 30.03.2019

    (audio)
    délka: 01:15:27
    nahrávka pořízena v rámci projektu Príbehy 20. storočia
Celé nahrávky jsou k dispozici pouze pro přihlášené uživatele.

Even my child’s soul was relieved the war is over

Witness at the age of 8
Witness at the age of 8
zdroj: archív pamätníka

Jozef Šnirc comes from Prievidza, he was born on July 27, 1934. He spent his childhood during the war, experienced the bombing of Prievidza on Green Thursday in March 1945 and the liberation on April 4. In July 1946 he moved to Liberec, where his mother got a job in a textile factory. After completing his compulsory education, he returned to Prievidza. He began his apprenticeship in the Carpathians, where he was trained as a mechanical locksmith. After completing his apprenticeship, he joined the machine-tractor station (STS) in Prievidza, where he worked as a mechanic. In 1954 he joined the military basic service, which he completed in several places in Bohemia. After that, he joined the Technical Inspectorate in Prievidza. From 1961 to 1970 he worked as a mechanic in the Autoservice of the municipal services of the town of Prievidza. Since 1990 he has been at the birth of Aerospool, where he worked until 2005. Since August 1958, he is married to Jolana, nee Mokra, he is currently retired and lives in Prievidza.