Helena Grľáková

Helena Grľáková lived in her native village of Pohorelá in central Slovakia, where she also spent the war years. Members of the Hlinka Guard drove the Roma out of the village to a hill near the forest. The Roma had to build new dwellings for themselves.[1] Because of the proximity of the forest, the partisans came to them more than once asking for food and drink. Helena Grľáková recalled frequent gunfire. German soldiers repeatedly searched for partisans in their settlement. On one occasion they all had to line up while soldiers searched their houses and threatened them that if they found the slightest evidence of the presence of partisans, they would shoot them all. However, they found nothing and let them go. During one of the next raids, they fired into houses and bedding, and even at fleeing families. Helena Grľáková recalled that one little girl was shot and ​“the flesh was torn from her bottom.”[2] The Germans burned the settlement down [on 3 January 1945 (ed.)] and Helena Grľáková and her family had to hide in the woods. Roma from Spiš and partisans were hiding there with them. Helena Grľáková’s son was also with the partisans.

[1] Historian Ctibor Nečas states that they had 6 houses there. (ed.)

[2] Two of the children who were shot — an eight-year-old boy and his 10-year-old sister — died of their wounds.