Support to the Slovak national rising and arrest of Vanda Biněvska
“About this time the Slovak national uprising broke out and that’s why they transferred them to Slovakia. At first they fought as regular soldiers on the side of the insurgents but then they adopted guerilla tactics because they were too few to succeed in regular warfare with the Nazis. So that’s why they had to cross this Chabanec mountain range. My sister (Vanda Biněvská, note of the editor) was a very brave fighter. Every time they needed a scout to go down into the villages in order to provide information and food, she was the first one to volunteer. She went on scouting missions regularly, brought information about the German units, their movements, food, whatever they needed. She went on these missions disguised as a civilian – that was the only possible way to do it as there were German soldiers everywhere. And on one of these missions the Germans caught her.”
“What partisan unit did she belong to?”
“Well, I don’t remember anymore. I thing the name of the unit was Stalin.”
“And when did she get caught?”
“In March. She was in great pain because of her Sciatica. She wanted to see a doctor and that’s how it happened. They caught her but didn’t know who she was as she was wearing civilian clothes. This was already at a time when they were on the defensive themselves because they could already see that the war would be over soon and they would have to retreat. It was already chaotic there and that’s probably why she was able to escape somehow. She was very lucky. And some woman, an employee or something of the like, helped her to escape.”
“And where was she being held?”
“In Banská Bystrice”
- born on 20 September 1929 in Umaň, Ukraine (her sister Valentina Biněvská was born on 27 September 1925)
- 1942 – the Biněvski-Morozovič family arrives in Buzuluk, the site of the formation of the first standalone Czechoslovak military unit under the command of Ludvík Svoboda
- She starts her military training as a private in Jefremovo on 29 January 1944
- became a radio operator in the first Czechoslovak radio battalion on 17 August 1944
- broadcasted with her radio-station unit during the Dukla battle in September – October 1944
- participated in the victory parade in Prague on 17 May 1945
- worked for the Ministry of National Defense and visited an evening school in May – November 1945
- went to Lviv to visit General A. P. Golubev in November/December 1945 but she was prevented from returning to Czechoslovakia by adverse circumstances
- lived in Lviv in 1945–1993 except for 1953–1955, when she lived in Vienna
- finally returned to the Czech Republic in 1993