Two Diaries Revealing One Great Tragedy from the End of the First World War
The end of the First World War is approaching. Peace with Russia has already been signed, all that remains is to defeat the Italians. After four years of hardship and misery, everyone is eagerly awaiting the final victory. Among them is a Jewish family who fled the front from the easternmost part of Austria-Hungary and, via Ostrava and Brno, arrived in the Moravian town of Třebíč. What did the young Jewish girl note down in her diary? The year is 1925. At the police station in Třebíč, a local man is reporting a strange case. He is being interrogated by a young police sergeant. He also keeps a diary – and in the following weeks, he will only shake his head in disbelief at everything he writes in it.
If all the described events were not supplemented by a number of contemporary newspaper articles, the reader would probably think that this story was created by an author with a truly vivid imagination. “Such a horror couldn't have happened,” we would say to ourselves. But if our great-grandfathers and great-grandmothers could tell the tale, they would just quietly nod in agreement, confirming they knew of this unusual case, at least by hearsay. Indeed, more than 90 years ago, nothing else was talked about in all of Czechoslovakia.
However incredible it may seem, this novel is truly based on real events.
