Emil Šarközi

Emil Šarközi served in the army during the war. He enlisted in Trnava and served in Bratislava, from where he escaped and joined the [Slovak National] Uprising. He fought in Prievidza, Handlová, Skalka, and Banská Bystrica. After the town was occupied, he and others went to Staré Hory and Moštěnice, but were caught by German soldiers.

About five or six Romani people from the settlement, including Emil’s brothers, took part in the uprising, as well as many Romani people from elsewhere. Among the partisans were also Russians, Jews, Czechs, Italians, Romanians, Ukrainians and Slovaks. Emil said that ​“twenty-fourth Regiment”, to which he belonged, was commanded by Colonel [Ján] Golian [one of the two main commanders of the Slovak National Uprising]. He was a strict commander, who chose young men, but did not make any distinctions between nationalities. But the Russian commander was a ​“bastard”, who shot on the spot anyone who tried to escape. The food was mostly taken care of by Roma who were incapable of fighting, and they were taken there on mules; many of the Roma were musicians who played around the hotels, which is why they were not willing to take part in armed combat, according to Emil.

After being captured by the Germans, Emil was taken to Martin via Banská Bystrica, from where a transport took them to the German town of Görlitz. Later they were transferred to Waldenburg, and from there to Bavaria. After arriving in Germany, Emil Šarközi was supposed to go and work in the mines, but he was afraid to do so, because none of those who went there – two hundred men, he said – returned. So he pleaded toothache as an excuse, and even had a tooth extracted, but one of the Germans slapped him, calling him a ​“speculator”. He said that after the war he got even with that German.

On the first of May 1945, the Americans liberated the camp. The prisoners were emaciated after many months of starvation, so they were given literally everything they asked for (“I had never been as well off as when the Americans came.”). After three months they were taken back to Bratislava in jeeps.

He knew what had happened at home in the meantime: that his mother was alive, that his father had been in a camp in Dubnica nad Váhom with his brother Artur and his cousin, and that they had escaped from it. Being in a concentration camp, was a lucky misfortune Emil Šarközi said – because otherwise he might also have been burned alive. He was referring to the following incident that preceded it. He said that a Romani man had gone to the local judge, who hated the Romani and had become rich by stealing property from the deported Jewish inhabitants; the Romani man told him he was a partisan and that he was going to shoot him. In the end, he did not carry out the threat. After German soldiers came to Prievidza, the son of the Romani man showed the partisans where the machine guns were, and the partisans attacked the German soldiers in the town. The judge then blamed everything on the Roma. The Germans herded everyone who was at home into a house, doused it with petrol and set it alight. Thirty-two people died. Only one girl, an accordion player, was saved, but she was shot soon after.[1]

[1] This is the same girl as in the reminiscences of the witness’s brother Roman Šarközi, see his testimony in the database.

That judge was demoted after the war, but after some time he started working as a notary. Nothing happened to him.