Zofia Szostak - 1985
German Soldier
Um, now, you...the war had begun, and um, you said that German soldiers were already in, in the house you were staying in. How, how did you react to that? What did you do when you saw the uniforms?
First of all, I was, I was frightened. In a way, I should have been ready for this, you know, because I knew that our soldiers were moving back, and they were, they were coming, you know? But, uh, it was really shocking, you know, and uh, I guess we, we all kind of were under, under the shock, you know, for a long, long time, till finally for, after some time, we heard that a Underground was being, being organized, and we felt a little bit different. That was the first time.
How did you hear that? How did you hear about, about the Underground?
It was strange, you know, because my, my parents, probably they knew a little bit before, you know, 'cause they were carrying some, some kind of a papers, uh, you know, press, spreading here and spreading there, lots of other people were doing this. So they were maybe better informed. But the first, first news came to us through the village people coming, uh, coming to, to our town, and uh, with milk or butter and some...maybe some eggs, you know, they were selling or bartering maybe for, for some, some other, if somebody had something, you know, to, to give them, maybe a tablecloth or piece of china or crystal or maybe something like this. And they started saying about, about some men, armed men, you know, in woods, and, and things like this. And then, uh, after a little while--but this was much, much, much later, uh, my, my own boyfriend, you know, 'cause this was 1942 and I was already in love with somebody, and he joined Underground, and I got very much interested in it too, you know. But I had rather very hard time getting into this. Now it's not that they picked me out, in a very roundabout way, I found them, you know? And now, he, uh, my boyfriend, you know, at that time, he joined partisans, but in, in uh, near Jaczew, in ??? you know, he was from a little different part of Poland. And uh, when I managed to see him, he said that there are girls needed over there, you know, ask ??? you know, to help out wounded, you know, then he mentioned something that I would have to finish some kind of a Red Cross course, you know, things like this, prepare myself. So I started looking, and uh, you know, for ways to find out, to find out, you know? Where was it, this is how, this is how, because of this, I, I finally managed to get in contact with them and to my great surprise, I found out that in my own section, they were all my girl...my girl scouts, you know, from...
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