Alena Jehnová

* 1938

  • "My first memory is that I had some childhood illness, I don't know if it was mumps or a kind of rash, and because I normally slept in the same room with my brother, they moved my bed into the kitchen, and I was sleeping in the kitchen. In those days everything had to be blacked out, you couldn't let the light out. Around four o'clock someone was ringing the bell repeatedly. My father ran to open the door and Mr. Měšťan came to us. I think Mr. Měšt'an was the director of the brewery, and he came to tell us that two people had been taken away by the Gestapo during the night. And because my father was the executive director, he came to tell my father to get rid of papers, because he had a lot of notes and things. Although my mother said afterwards that it was quite imprudent. It was dark everywhere, there was a blackout, and suddenly sparks were flying out of our chimney as all these papers were being burned. I remember that, and I would like to say first that Mr. Měšt'an was also arrested by the Gestapo at the end of the war, and because he was afraid of the torture which he wouldn´t be able to endure, he committed suicide." is that I had some childhood illness, I don't know if it was mumps or a kind of rash, and because I normally slept in the same room with my brother, they moved my bed into the kitchen, and I was sleeping in the kitchen. In those days everything had to be blacked out, you couldn't let the light out. Around four o'clock [a.m.] someone was ringing the bell repeatedly. My father ran to open the door and Mr. Měšťan came in. I think Mr. Měšt'an was the director of the brewery, and he came to tell us that two people had been taken away by the Gestapo during the night. And because my father was the executive director, he [Mr. Měšťan] came to tell my father to get rid of papers, because he had a lot of notes and things. Although my mum said afterwards that it was quite imprudent. It was dark everywhere, there was a blackout, and suddenly sparks were flying out of our chimney as all these papers were being burned. I remember it, and I would like to say first that Mr. Měšt'an was also arrested by the Gestapo at the end of the war, and because he was afraid of the torture which he wouldn´t be able to endure, he committed suicide."

  • "However, immediately in February my father was sent on forced leave, on waiting period. That's what it was called. And on 25 February there was the coup, and he was given the paper still in February, and I think that during the summer holiday he was told that they stopped paying him the salary. And when he started to inquire, they told him that there was no work for him even in the brickyard in Biskupice, or something like that. Really the local officials treated him very, very badly. And so my father first got some job in Hradiště and within ten days there was a report about the bourgeoisie and so on, so they immediately said that it was impossible, that he had to leave. He tried one more time and found a job in Zlín and he ended up the same way in ten days. Then, when we were a family of four with no income, we were selling things."

  • "At the same time that Brezhnev died, my daughter underwent a pretty serious surgery. In fact, when I got to the classroom and started teaching, I was able to forget, more or less, that my daughter was in the hospital, where I also signed a discharge "against medical advice". It was a spinal surgery. The moment the announcement started about the grandeur of Brezhnev, my thoughts immediately turned to her and I wasn't listening at all. I only realized that suddenly everyone stood up and there was silence, then it was over. So I stood up normally and continued teaching. After the next class, I got a written message to come to the headmaster's office. Actually, everybody was also supposed to stand up and hold a minute's silence for Brezhnev. Imagine that one of those pupils went to the headmaster to report that I had remained sitting behind the desk and that I had not stood up. So it looked pretty bad, that it wasn´t going to turn out a pleasant way. But I told him that I was waiting to teach one more class and I would rush to the hospital, that my daughter had had such a surgery. In fact, the headmaster had two boys, and so he said, 'I can understand a bit, but please don't let it happen again, so that there's no reason...' So I got away with it pretty well at the time."

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    Uherské Hradiště, 19.04.2018

    (audio)
    délka: 01:45:49
    nahrávka pořízena v rámci projektu Stories of the region - Central Moravia
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It was said in our references that our father was a bourgeoisie henchman and mother a daughter of a „kulak“

Jehnová Alena
Jehnová Alena
zdroj: Post Bellum

Alena Jehnová, née Zapletalová, was born on 24 January 1938 in Uherský Brod. During the World War II, her father, a police officer Josef Zapletal, joined the resistance. He worked as a correspondent in Defence of the Nation and cooperated with the paragroup Clay. Shortly after the onset of the communist regime he was dismissed from the National Security Corps. For a long time he could not find any employment and the family was selling off their belongings because they didn´t have enough savings. After a year, Josef Zapletal decided to take over his father-in-law‘s farm in Pohořelice, but it was confiscated by a cooperative farm during collectivization in 1951. Despite initial problems with admission to studies, the witness graduated from the Faculty of Science of Palacký University in Olomouc. After marrying Leo Jehne, the family moved to Ostrava and in 1969 to Prague. Alena Jehnová taught mathematics and physics at the grammar school in Vinohrady [Prague quarter, trans.], until her retirement. After the death of her husband, she returned to her birth house in Uherský Brod, where she was living at the time of the filming in 2018.