S L O V E N I A N

P H O E N I X

by John Corsellis

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons AttributionAttribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.5 License.
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.5/
1

Dedicated to the heroes of this story

Prof. Bozidar Bajuk
Director Marko Bajuk
Sister Jane Balding BRCS
Major Paul Barre UNRRA
Dr Barton UNRRA
CW Baty
Dr Franc Blatnik
Florence Boester UNRRA
Joan Couper BRCS
Colonel Douglas Dodds-Parker MP
Lieutenant-Colonel Dufour
Prof. Kajetan Gantar
Colonel Hall
Father Janez Hladnik
Margaret Jaboor UNRRA
Monsignor Joze Jagodic
Joze & Marija Jancar
Dr Janez Janez
Major Jarvie UNRRA
Prof Jeglic
Franz & Mrs Kremzar
Joze Lekan
Dara Lieven UNRRA
Dr Valentin & Mrs Mersol
Miss Mitchell UNRRA
Dame Iris Murdoch UNRRA
Captain Nigel Nicolson OBE
David Pearson FAU
France Pernisek
John Selby-Bigge BRCS
John Strachan FAU
Dr Edward Vracko
Group Captain Ryder Young UNRRA

John Corsellis
2008, Cambridge: photograph by Matt Kirwan, UK Press Photographer

John Corsellis
1945, Austria: oil painting by refugee artist Frederik Jerina
photograph by Matt Kirwan, UK Press Photographer
7

S L O V E N I A N

P H O E N I X

by John Corsellis
INTRODUCTION
Today's million and three quarter Yugoslav refugees were not
the first from that country.
Already in 1945 thousands fled
the Communist take-over and escaped into Austria and Italy.
20,000 were committed Catholics and democrats from Slovenia,
then the northernmost province of Yugoslavia.
11,000 of them
were in uniform. They were sent back, forcibly repatriated, by
the British Army three weeks later and killed by the
Communists.
6,000 were civilians, who were also due to be sent back,
escaped the fate of their soldier relatives with a few hours to
spare.
This book describes their extraordinary courage: how
they recovered with astonishing speed from a devastating double
trauma, picked themselves up, dusted themselves down and got on
with living: how they created a community life of outstanding
quality, educationally, culturally and socially, in the camps
where they survived for the next three years; and how they
resisted rigorous and increasing pressure to accept "voluntary
repatriation", and eventually emigrated to North and South
America, mostly under a scheme they themselves initiated.
The story is remarkably well documented. Two diaries cover the
period: one written by a 38-year old social insurance clerk who
fled with his wife and two small children, the other written
from the contrasting view-point, of the people running the
camps - the British Army, the Red Cross and Quaker relief
workers,
and
UNRRA,
the
United
Nations
Relief
and
Rehabilitation Administration.
The latter diary is of
particular relevance for today because of its portrayal of, and
critical comments on, UNRRA.
This was of course the first
agency to operate in the name of the United Nations, and was
the precursor of the Office of the UN High Commissioner for
Refugees, which leads today's humanitarian effort for refugees
all over the world.
The first diarist was Franc Pernisek. I remember him well. He
was tall and lightly built with a thin face and a Harold
Macmillan moustache. He held himself stiff and upright with a
formal manner, took life very seriously and seldom smiled, but
when he did it was with a shy and engaging warmth.
He now
lives in retirement in Argentina, a widower with his daughter,
son and seven grand-children nearby.
I was the second diarist.

The refugees arrived in Viktring, in

8

southern Austria close to the Yugoslav border, on the 12th May

and I joined them a week later to assist the Canadian major and
British Red Cross sister who were already establishing order in
the primitive camp.
I was in khaki with an FAU/Red Cross
shoulder flash to indicate I was in the Friends' Ambulance Unit
and was working under the coordination of the British Red
Cross.
The FAU were young pacifists doing alternative service under
Quaker auspices in wartime.
On going abroad I had told my
widowed mother I would try to send her fuller and more frequent
letters if she would preserve them as a diary.
I wrote with
all the cocksureness of a 22-year old "expert" on refugee care,
who had already worked in three busy camps in Egypt and Italy
and spoke enough Italian, German, French and Serbo-Croat to
communicate direct with the refugees and avoid dependence on
interpreters.
I often used the letters to voice my fury at
what I considered the insensitivity of colleagues; but I
avoided subjects my mother might find too distressing and was
inhibited by the army censor reading over my shoulder.
My
youthful enthusiasm contrasts with the maturity and passion of
Pernisek's diary. I transferred from the FAU to UNRRA at the
end of 1945 and continued with the Slovenes until July 1947.
I draw heavily on both diaries and on a wealth of other primary
sources: the Red Cross sister's diary for the first three
weeks, the memoirs of the British Red Cross Assistant
Commissioner for Austria, reports, official correspondence and
memoranda and, most importantly, accounts from a whole series
of former refugees on how they escaped, lived in the camps and
finally emigrated. They tell their stories with such vividness
that I use their own words to let the reader see the same
events through a variety of eyes, some contemporary, others at
a distance of fifty years; and I myself perform three roles:
diarist, interviewer and commentator.
To start with a brief historical background is needed, to put
the story into perspective.
Slovenia is a country of fertile
plains, hills covered with vines and fruit trees, forests and
spectacular mountains: the size of Wales and not unlike the
Tyrol in appearance. Until the end of World War I it was part
of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
It then became the northern
province of the newly formed kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and
Slovenes, and since 1991 it is an independent country, member
of the United Nations and candidate for full membership of the
European Union.
Yugoslavia's first twenty-three years were overshadowed by
mistrust and hostility between Serb and Croat.
Then in April
1941 the Germans and Italians invaded, overran and dismembered
9

the country.
The young king and ministers escaped to London
and established a government-in-exile, while a Colonel Draza
Mihailovic of the Royal Yugoslav Army led armed resistance at
home. The Soviet Union was at the time allied to Germany, so
that the Yugoslav Communists denounced the Allies' fight
against the Germans as an imperialist war. Three months later
the Germans invaded Russia and the Yugoslav Communists executed
an about-turn, denounced the Germans and started their own
resistance movement.
The two resistances, Communist and
Royalist, were soon engaged in a bitter civil war.
Britain had to decide which side to support. The dilemma was
described by Professor Foot, army officer turned Oxford
historian1 . He wrote that Britain was committed by the Atlantic
Charter to the policy that, once Nazism had been broken, people
should be free to choose the form of government they wanted:
but at the same time was determined, if rival movements existed
in an occupied country, to back whichever showed the greater
promise of throwing the enemy out fast. At the time, he added,
it was far from clear that to take the second line might simply
be to substitute one tyranny with another; and also that wars
were not necessarily two-sided affairs, 'us' against 'them',
but were often polygonal, citing Spain after 1936 and the
German and Russian invasions of Poland in 1939. He continued:
Yugoslavia provides a still more intricate example of
a many-sided war: Croatia was set up as an
independent state, under the dictatorship of Ante
Pavelic and his Ustashe, who were inclined to
massacre anybody they could catch who was not both
Croat by race and Roman Catholic by religion...
The rest of Yugoslav territory was divided up between
four neighbour powers - Germany, Italy, Bulgaria and
Hungary.
Within it, and in Croatia as well, there
emerged two rival guerrilla organisations: Chetniks,
owing allegiance to the exiled king and his
government, and Partisans, run - under the cover that
it was a national army of liberation - by the
Comintern.
Chetniks and Partisans seldom cooperated, and might shoot each other up; neither had
much use for Italians or Germans, except for periods
of local understanding at times of crisis; neither
cared for Hungarians or Bulgars.
Britain's response was to attach liaison missions, first to the
Chetniks alone and later to both sides.
British military
1

. Foot, M.R.D. (1984), SOE, An outline history of the

Special Operations Executive 1940-46, (BBC, London) pp. 152-3.
10

intelligence in Cairo then reported to Winston Churchill in

London that it was the partisans who were showing most promise
of throwing the enemy out fast, and persuaded him that support
should be switched to them alone.
When Foot wrote his book in 1984 he considered Churchill's
decision right.
Recently released SOE files caused a former
SOE liaison officer with the Chetniks to challenge this.
Captain Michael Way Lees, another soldier turned historian,
maintained 2 that the report which led Churchill to make his
decision was neither truthful nor objective, but biassed,
selective and specially distorted in favour of the partisans so
as to blacken Mihailovic. He claimed it was in fact written by
a James Klugman who had made no secret of his membership of the
Communist Party at Cambridge before, and in London after, the
war, but in spite of this held in Cairo in 1943 the key and
confidential post of officer in charge of Special Operations
Executive (SOE) activities into the Balkans.
Professor Foot 3
had described him in his book as one of two known Communist
moles at SOE's headquarters in Cairo and Bari, adding that "he
acquired a post from which he could exert leverage".
A third historian Richard Lamb concluded, in the light of newly
opened archives, that Lees had established his case, 4 quoting
Churchill's comment of December 1945:
During the war I thought I could trust Tito ... now I
am aware I committed one of the biggest mistakes of
the war. 5
When war ended in May 1945 Tito controlled most of Yugoslavia
and the British Army started to occupy southern Austria.
A
separate section of the Army called Allied Military Government
or AMG, responsible for the civil administration of the
country, feared that disastrous epidemics of typhus or cholera
would occur if large numbers of displaced persons were allowed
to surge home uncontrolled, and set up a special DP or
Displaced Persons and Prisoners of War branch to control them.
AMG invited the British Red Cross Society to help, and the BRCS
invited the Friends Ambulance Unit or FAU to share the task;
and this was how I got involved.

. Lees, Michael (1990), The Rape of Serbia, (Harcourt Brace

Jovanovich, New York)
3
. Foot, op. cit., pp. 146 and 46.
4
.
Lamb,
Richard
(1991).
Churchill
As
War
Leader
(Bloomsbury, London), p. 254
5
. Sunday Telegraph, 29 July 1990, quoted in Churchill As
War Leader, p. 273
11

The story of the 6,000 Slovene civilians has an epic, heroic

quality. Franc Pernisek begins it by describing the situation
in Ljubljana, the capital of Slovenia, on the 4th May 1945.

12

P A R T

F L I G H T
C H A P T E R

4 - 12 May 1945

The German collapse in early May 1945

heralds for the rest of Europe the return
to peace, but Ljubljana remains a divided
city.
Many await enthusiastically their
liberation by Marshal Tito's partisans, but
others are appalled at the prospect of life
under a permanent communist tyranny, after
four
years
of
Italian
and
German
oppression.
Those who openly opposed communism prepare
to leave, and in this chapter Franc
Pernisek starts his diary with a report
that the partisans, and not the Allies,
will be liberating the country.
He
prepares to leave home with wife, daughter
aged ten and son aged five. They join the
column of fugitives, walk for two days,
secure a lift on a lorry up the mountain,
walk through the tunnel into Austria,
retrace their steps to avoid capture and
escape again, this time over a mountain
pass, and reach Viktring.
Marian Loboda, at the time a ten year old
schoolboy, complements the Pernisek diary
with his own account of family life under
German occupation and their flight into
Austria. Magdalena Simenc follows with her
memories of how she, then eight years old,
fled with her grandparents by ox-cart from
the hills north-east of Ljubljana.
The
Bajuks, father and son both teachers, then
tell
their
story,
and
Magda
Vracko
describes how her father the judge leads a
group of students over the mountains,
followed by the stories of two medical
students, Joze Jancar and Marija Hribar.
The last contributor is a member of the
anti-communist militia.
His unit also
escapes into Austria and is told to camp in
the field next the civilians.
13

Civitas sancti tui facta est

deserta: Sion deserta facta
est: Jerusalem desolata est.
Isaiah 64.10

A wild beast is most dangerous

when about to die
The Pernisek diary 6 :
Friday 4th May 1945
The German army is retreating;
it has relaxed combat readiness but the Gestapo
continues with its persecution and the prisons are
full of our people. A wild beast is most dangerous
when about to die.
Because the Slovenian National
Council
was
proclaimed
yesterday,
the
Gestapo
surrounded the People's Printing Press and people
have not been allowed to leave the building.
Liberation Front sympathisers in our block of flats
are happy and proud of approaching victory, and the
whole house is full of the smell of freshly made
pastries.
Their women have been baking all night
preparing for the arrival of the partisan army.
In our clean, white Ljubljana there is a strange
atmosphere.
The usually empty streets are full of
people, who gather in small groups and talk in
subdued voices.
Our people are very worried by the
disturbing news that the international communist
brigade which goes under the name of the Yugoslav
army has landed in Rijeka and is advancing towards
Trieste and Ljubljana. The partisans are coming down
from the mountains and the first refugees from Rakek
have arrived in Ljubljana.
The fateful 5th of May.
I went to work in the
morning.
Nobody was really working.
We're all
living in the expectation of important events.
A
British army arrived in Trieste: there it remained.
There won't be any help from that source. I went and
saw
some
well-informed
friends
who
said
the
7
domobranci had been told to retreat, and civilians
6

. Pernisek, Franc (1985). 'Pred stiridesetimi leti: Odlomki

iz dnevnika slovenskega begunca' [40 Years Ago: Excerpts from
the Diary of a Slovene Refugee], published serially in Duhovno
Zivljenje, Buenos Aires, May 1985 - February 1990.
7

. the
militia.,

National

Guard,

Homeguard
14

or

Slovene

anti-communist

catholic

at risk to escape to Carinthia because the partisans

controlled the road to Gorizia 8 . What we feared most
has happened. I hadn't considered flight because I'd
such confidence in the British and was convinced
they'd liberate us.
The hardest moment in my life faces me: to tell my
wife and children that if we want to stay alive we
have to leave home, all our possessions and our
homeland, and go abroad to an unknown future.
The
future will be terrible.
In resignation I pray God
to help me.
This morning I told my wife and children we must go
abroad, to Carinthia in Austria. Our hearts were torn
with sadness and fear.
I left it to my wife to
decide whether to stay at home with the children or
come with me, but she said, "wherever you go, we all
go. Whatever happens to us, we'll be together. If
you go on your own, we'll probably never see each
other again.
And if we have to die, we'll die
together".
It's three o'clock. They told me trains for refugees
would start leaving from two onwards.
Departure is
bitter.
We don't know if we're leaving home for a
few weeks or months or perhaps for ever. With
suitcases in my hands, a rucksack on my back,
children at my side, I'm standing in front of a small
statue of the Sacred Heart of Jesus over the entrance
of the house, and I pray to Him and His Mother,
"Jesus, guide and take care of us, stay with us,
help us, that the foreign yoke be not too heavy for
our shoulders".
Weeping bitterly, we cross the
threshold and leave home. Neighbours watch and show
no surprise.
Crowds of refugees wait at the station. The railway
staff are unfriendly. There's no train and they don't
know if one's on its way. From the station we went
towards Jezica, hoping to get to Crnuce and from
there a train for St. Vid and
Kranj. The German
guard wouldn't let us cross the bridge, so we went to
St. Vid where the same thing happened.
We turned
back and met some friends and retraced our steps to
Jezica and waited there till dark.

. town over the Italian frontier

15

Here the Perniseks joined the main body of refugees heading

north towards the Austrian border, the only route still open:
The bridge is open.
On the other side at Crnuce a
big crowd has already collected. A good friend lets
us put our luggage on his cart. What luck! We wait
until a column is formed.
It's dark but we can
recognise each other. They're all acquaintances, all
good people. Everyone keeps silence, our hearts full
of sorrow.
There are flashes and the roar of guns
from Ljubljana; every salvo increases our fears. We
want to move away as quickly as possible.
It's pitch dark, eleven at night. The column starts
to move.
First the people from Polje, then carts
from Ljubljana and after them the people from
Ljubljana walk three abreast: then those from Ig,
Smartno, Sticna and Dolenjska. Slowly we march along
the road to Trzin and Cerklje, our first destination.
Like a funeral, but this massive cortege has no
hearse. The procession is sunk in sorrow and prayer,
and even the beasts of burden are silent. Ljubljana
is left further and further behind and the sound of
the guns grows more and more distant.
Sunday 6th May.
We reach Menges at one in the
morning and rest a few hours, and after holy mass
push on towards Cerklje.
It's a lovely day,
unusually warm, and our road takes us through the
most beautiful parts of Gorenska. At Komenda we come
across the first signs of the partisans' savagery:
the Mejac homestead is burnt out and its silence
accuses the perpetrators of arson and murder.
How
mighty and proud it stood when I last saw it.
We reach Cerklje around ten next morning.
A
magnificent spring day, the bells ring out.
The
village is decked with flags, a band plays joyfully:
a free and united Slovenia is born! The people are
on their way to holy mass rejoicing.
The festive
mood is brutally interrupted by the arrival of a long
procession of exhausted and sorrowing refugees. The
bells stop ringing, the band falls silent.
People
stand thunder-struck and ask themselves what this all
means?
Our column was the first to reach the village and
stop in front of the church. We are asked: where do
we come from, why and where are we going? We answer
16

briefly. The church fills with locals and refugees.

At mass the priest explains the tragic reason for our
presence and asks the villagers to be hospitable:
it's probable that within hours or days they'll be in
the same plight.
People cry during mass.
Afterwards they invite us
into their homes and press food on us. After
refreshment they invite us to stay longer to rest.
Some decide to come with us. We try to convince them
to remain at home, not to act rashly, but to no
avail. Those who don't come say they'll follow
shortly.
Monday 7th May.
In the morning we start walking
towards Suha.
An uninterrupted flow of refugees
swells the column.
The countryside is magnificent,
the children are thrilled by its beauty and beg us to
stay as the communists won't come to such a splendid
place. Poor children!
At Suha they welcomed us kindly.
Each house took
someone under its roof, gave us food, mostly produced
by the local domobranci, and provided us with
comfortable accommodation.
In the afternoon we lay
down a little in a meadow and the children played by
a stream.
My wife thought over the situation and
cried. In the evening we gathered in the church and
sang the litany in honour of Our Lady. Our first May
devotions in exile.
The news spread over the whole
of Gorenjska like lightning: the people are fleeing
from the "liberators" coming down from the forests.
New streams of refugees come from all sides,
converging on the road to Kranj and Trzic.
Tuesday 8th May. I hurry to Trzic to find out what's
happening.
The people there are afraid; a third of
the domobranci troops and their general headquarters
are in Kranj and have been ordered to retreat.
Slovenian chetniks offered me a lorry to carry some
mothers and children to Ljubelj, told me where we
should wait and drove me there.
Wednesday 9th May. In the afternoon we learn Germany
has signed an unconditional surrender.
We're ready
to leave for Austria, but there's still a long way in
front of us. We don't know how far south the English
have occupied Carinthia, some say Villach or Klagenfurt, others that the partisans are in Carinthia on
the Austrian side of the Ljubelj pass.
We must
17

hurry.
The chetniks picked us up as promised and we loaded
the lorry in a hurry and were off. At Trzic we had
to wait four hours, and then went forward very slowly
as the road was blocked. Deafening explosions around
us sounded like the day of judgement, and soldiers
were throwing away weapons and ammunition into the
deep stream.
In a nearby rivulet there were great
heaps of abandoned weapons, ammunition boxes and
other military equipment.
At three we reached St. Ana near Ljubelj.
The
Germans were in a terrible hurry and pushed everyone
out of their way and we had to wait.
Slowly the
stream of fleeing soldiers and people became less and
we were able to drive through the tunnel into
Carinthia.
There were two ways of reaching Austria: by a tunnel through
the Karawanken mountains or a steep road over them, the 1,543
metre high Ljubelj or Loibl pass.
The 2 km long tunnel
was
being dug on Hitler's orders to give his panzer divisions
speedier access to the Adriatic. The giant civil engineering
firm Universale was using slave labour from the notorious
concentration camp of Mauthausen - French, Polish, Russian,
Belgian, Italian and Yugoslavs.
In May 1945 the tunnel was unfinished but passable, and was
indeed first used by the panzer divisions
in the opposite
direction to the one intended.
Today it carries tens of
thousands of German and Austrian tourists to the luxury ski
resort of Zelenica.
Andre Lacaze, in his memorable book The
Tunnel 9 , describes the sufferings of the slave workers, the
brutality of the SS and the obstinate refusal of the now
prosperous firm of Universale to pay any compensation to the
few surviving former slaves.
Pernisek continues with his account:
We reached the inn at Podrid and met with refugees
who were returning and reported there were partisans
at the Borovlje bridge who had captured some of our
people. Shattering news, the women and children were
crying, we were thunderstruck.
More and more
refugees returned with the same story.
As we knew
nothing about the next part of the road or the
distances, we returned to Ljubelj and St. Ana.
9

. Andre Lacaze, The Tunnel, Hamish Hamilton, London, 1980

18

Fortunately the road and the tunnel were free and we

returned by the same short route without difficulty.
We're at Ljubelj again, but where now?
We can't
return home, for there Communist rule, the mob and
death await us: we're overcome with horror and mortal
fear.
Fifty metres from the road stands a lovely
hunting lodge belonging to Baron Borna, and we go and
see it, taking the family with us.
It's completely
empty, but beds are made up in all the bedrooms. It
was the staff quarters for the nearby concentration
camp 10 who had had to leave in a hurry only a short
while ago. In the kitchen there were still unwashed
dishes, pots and pans.
We've beds and a roof over
our heads for tonight.
Ascension Day.
We spend it on
Thursday 10th May.
the balcony of the lodge in fear, sadness and prayer:
it's a beautiful sunny day, but there are no warm
rays in our souls. The church of St. Ana is closed,
so we're without mass.
More and more groups of
refugees
are
arriving,
mixed
together
with
detachments of retreating soldiers, and among them
the good people who welcomed us so kindly and gave us
hospitality a couple of days ago.
On the road to
Trzic they were attacked by partisan snipers shooting
from the houses or throwing hand grenades from the
nearby hills, and they had to leave behind their
carts with all their belongings, so that all they
possess now is the clothes they wear. They say there
are huge crowds of refugees and soldiers in front of
the tunnel. At the moment the road over Ljubelj pass
is open only for German soldiers who are hurriedly
retreating.
The first detachments of the Prince
Eugen division which occupied the Balkans have been
seen arriving. Tonight we're not alone, the lodge is
full of refugees, many of them priests.
Friday 11th May.
The morning sun gave our souls a
first ray of hope.
The domobranci of Rupnik's 11
shock-troop battalion are arriving up the hill, and
these lads will save us.
If anyone can, they will
drive the partisans away from Borovlje Bridge and
open the road.
We depend on them not only for our
hope but also for our very lives.
More domobranci
10

. a sub-camp of Mauthausen concentration camp.

.
Colonel Vuk Rupnik, son of the Chief of the
Administration for Ljubljana Province and former Mayor of
Ljubljana, General Leon Rupnik.
11

19

units arrive and we start to live again. By midday

couriers brought the news that our soldiers had
indeed chased the partisans from the bridge and the
road ahead was safe and clear. So the last battle of
World War II took place at the bridge, between
Rupnik's battalion of shock troops of the Slovenian
National Army and the extreme southern appendage of
the Soviet Red Army - the Slovenian partisans.
Dr. Mersol was with us at the hunting lodge and some
domobranci came to fetch him by order of the
Slovenian National Council because they needed a good
interpreter for a meeting with the English. With him
went our fellow lodger, Father Odilo - a sign that
"ours" had already made contact with the English
army.
Dr. Valentin Mersol will appear again. Son of a railway levelcrossing keeper, he had attended as the first Rockefeller
fellow from Slovenia the prestigious Johns Hopkins Medical
School in Baltimore and acquired there fluent English. He was
a specialist in infectious diseases and one of Yugoslavia's
leading doctors.
Short and unimpressive in appearance,
balding, with a round face and rimless glasses, he spoke
precisely and dealt with British officialdom with infinite
patience and a tentative smile. He was accompanied by his wife
and four children.
Mrs Mersol had a nervous manner but was
equally capable: daughter of a distinguished writer and
literary critic, she was a doctor of philosophy and spoke and
wrote six languages including English.
Father Odilo Hajnsek
was a well-known Franciscan friar who also spoke English.
The representatives of the Slovenian National Council, with Dr.
Mersol as interpreter, went to Klagenfurt and asked to see
Field Marshal Alexander or the general in command locally to
explain to him that the domobranci had indeed fought in selfdefence against the communist partisans, but never against the
British or Americans.
They didn't get beyond a staff captain
but were also received by the head of the Department for
Displaced Persons and Prisoners of War, Allied Military
Government, Carinthia, Major William Johnson, as Dr. Mersol
recorded:
We told him a great number of Slovenian civilians and
military had fled to Carinthia, because of communists
and the atrocities committed by them during the war,
and in their name we were asking to be put under the
British protection and given food and shelter and the
means to survive. Major Johnson told us the military
were of no concern of his, but Military Government
20

would gladly receive the civilian refugees and help

them.
They were to assemble at the field near
Viktring next to the military camp. He himself would
go there as soon as he could, or send another officer
to take charge of the civilian camp.
The same
morning we went to the British military command
headquarters to discuss the fate of the domobranci,
and were admitted by the adjutant Captain Hornby who
told us we could give the domobranci the "go ahead"
and the military command would receive them.
Meanwhile the main body of refugees were held up
Slovenian side of the frontier, as Pernisek recorded:

on

So the road is now open, but not the way through the
tunnel or over Ljubelj.
Young SS men with loaded
guns are standing around the mouth of the tunnel and
only letting their own troops through. In a way this
German retreat is something majestic: although beaten
and humiliated, they are retreating in the best order
and discipline.
We wait half-dead on the mound around the church,
ready for the order to go.
The sun scorches
fiercely.
Our souls are filled with darkness and
bitterness although everyone tries to bear his pain
bravely. No one swears or grumbles; one hears rather
words of acceptance of God's will and prayers for
God's help.
We are left totally to ourselves,
without any organised leadership.
We keep on waiting and waiting, but around eight in
the evening our convoy of carts is ready to move.
Our men look at the SS guards threateningly and
approach them nearer and nearer.
Some domobranci
arrive, take in the situation, take their guns from
their shoulders and make ready to fire. The Germans
see the seriousness of their situation and the
officer in charge orders the civilians to be let
through.
The convoy starts to move, escorted by
domobranci.
The road winds steeply uphill in
serpentine bends of varying severity.
The horses
whinny, the carts groan, all the men push the carts
to help the beasts which have difficulty climbing the
hill.
St. Ana now lies far below and the whole valley is
lit up by a huge conflagration: the concentration
camp at Ljubelj is on fire.
We are overcome by
horror at the sight of the dark red flames and their
21

the

blood colour reflection on the rocks. The higher we

go, the darker it is and the more frightening the
sight of the burning valley.
We hear repeated
explosions.
How we'd have suffered if we'd still
been at St. Ana's!
Andre Lacaze records the burning of the camp in his book, The
Tunnel, "it had been bombed and set on fire in the course of a
bloody battle between the partisans and SS .. for possession of
the tunnel and Route 333. Nothing was left of the camp."
Pernisek continues:
Around midnight we reach the pass, and the road goes
immediately steeply downhill on the Carinthian side.
We're in Austria.
We all have to hold the carts
back.
The children have been brave up to now.
My
five year old son Sinko is even now courageously
descending into Carinthia.
My daughter holds
chaplain Burja's hand and chats with him.
The deep darkness is lit up by flares which the
soldiers let off into the air, which have a fairylike effect in the already beautiful scenery around
us. The descent is somewhat less steep now and the
people start reciting the rosary.
The children are
dead tired and falling asleep; we don't dare put them
on the carts as the descent is too steep to risk it.
We carry them ourselves.
They are today our sweet,
though heavy, burden.
Dawn breaks, the first day of
Saturday, 12th May.
the "three wet saints", the feast of St. Pancras 12 .
The morning is grey and it's starting to rain.
We
13
are stuck on the road to Mali Ljubelj : the whole
area is jam-packed with German soldiers, Vlasov
troops 14 and refugees. We run into a German transport
detachment who are swearing and beating their horses
to make their way ahead of everybody.
They're well
fed but still they steal from the refugees the few
belongings they have, especially bicycles.
Our
people are trying to fend them off by brandishing
sticks.
We leave the carts and look for a spot where the
12

.
.
14
.
led by
13

The Slovene St. Swithin's Day.

little Ljubelj or Loibl
Members of the anti-communist "Russian Liberation Army"
ex-Soviet General Vlasov.
22

family can rest a little, while the drivers and the

transport animals are also resting. The soldiers sit
on the grass in groups, trying to get rid of the
fleas. We go further up, not wanting ourselves to be
infested at this early stage of our exile.
The road through Mali Ljubelj is less difficult, only
the last part is quite steep.
Everywhere on the
verge
there
are
heaps
of
abandoned
weapons,
ammunition, military equipment, cars and
animal
carcases causing a foul smell. By early afternoon we
surmount the last portion of the mountain pass and
start to descend towards Borovlje, advancing step by
step, so crowded is the narrow track. A German tank
detachment is close behind us.
In Borovlje we meet an English tank detachment and
the soldiers look at us with curiosity. They try to
be kind, but we cannot understand each other. After
a short rest we push on towards the bridge crossing
over in the direction of Klagenfurt.
The road is
wide and made of concrete and extremely hot from the
sun.
On the other side the English soldiers are
disarming everyone including our domobranci, who up
till now have been watching over us and protecting us
faithfully. God is kind; we're already a week on the
road and not even a few drops of rain have fallen.
At around nine in the evening we arrive and English
soldiers direct us to the plain of Vetrinje, which is
one huge camp.
German soldiers, Vlasov troops,
Croats, Serbs, Slovenes, soldiers and civilians,
military baggage, horses, all crammed together with
no room to spare. Our column is directed to a wheat
field.
Vetrinje, a new station on our Way of the Cross.
Here we are.
What next?
My wife looks at me
hopelessly, the children ask for food, it's a long
time since we last ate. Where will we sleep? What
shall I tell them? How can I console them? "We love
Jesus and he loves us. Now we're like Lord Jesus who
had nowhere to lay his head. Let us trust him." For
supper we had our bitter tears.
Exhausted, we
flopped down. After a walk of thirty hours we slept
well under the open sky and on the hard bare ground.
Pernisek gives the most detailed account of the escape into
exile.
Marian Loboda complements it.
He was of a different
generation, only 10 years old in 1941, and his family were not
23

town, but country, people.

He describes
Germans as he remembers it 50 years later:

life

under

On Palm Sunday in 1941, on the way to Mass in my

native village 12 km from Ljubljana, I saw black
planes with white crosses hover like falcons over
their prey and release bombs we could hear a long way
off.
The war had started for us, and a couple of
days later a column of German troops on motorcycles
appeared in our village, young lads in dark brown
uniforms, very friendly and cheerful, throwing sweets
and chocolates at us children.
A week later others
appeared, in green uniforms with shining black boots
and caps from which shone silver-plated skulls and
crossbones, who were more sullen and didn't smile.
My mother and I lived with an uncle, who was
secretary of the local municipality and director of
several catholic organisations in the village as well
as of the Slovene Popular Party. Despite his hatred
of
the
Germans
he
remained
as
administrative
secretary of the municipality, to continue helping
people.
I was attending fourth grade at primary school. When
classes which had been interrupted by the war started
up again, we were surprised by the arrival of a young
blond teacher who didn't understand a word of Slovene
and spoke to us in German. After a few weeks we were
understanding quite well, and one day I returned from
school singing at the top of my lungs a German song
we'd learnt that day - I think it was the march of
the SA. I can still feel the formidable box of the
ears which welcomed me home. My uncle then gave me a
long sermon on how the Germans were torturing and
killing our people, forbidding us to speak our own
language, banning our papers and books and every day
causing us all kinds of evils. I should be ashamed I
couldn't see all this and could sing that song with
such enthusiasm.
Today I think, what would have
happened to me if that man hadn't shown me what was
wrong in my behaviour.
They treated us children at
school very well and although we didn't learn much we
had a lot of football and physical training,
including the exercise I most enjoyed, throwing handgrenades. Fortunately my uncle and mother were busy
telling me repeatedly about the other face of the
Germans which I couldn't see for myself.
One Sunday afternoon when we children were playing at
the edge of the wood we were surprised by a man with
24

the

a big beard, a cap with a bright red five-pointed

star and an enormous rifle. He introduced himself as
a partisan and said they'd soon throw the Germans out
of the country. He then told us with threats we must
not tell anyone we'd seen him.
We couldn't
understand why they were so afraid of the Germans if
they were going to throw them out at once. We soon
became familiar with ever more frequent visits of
these armed men in the village, specially at night.
They came for food and clothing and, if anyone
refused, took them by force. Panic soon spread with
news of the first assassination of a peasant who'd
refused to give them the food he'd saved for his own
family.
A German soldier of Slovene origin from Carinthia was
engaged to a girl from my village.
One day two
partisans ambushed and killed him as he was returning
by bike to his quarters in the next village. Within
a week the Germans shot ten young Slovenes on the
same spot.
We were all outraged, both at the
Germans' brutality and at the lack of conscience of
the partisans, who knew of the reprisals the Germans
had already announced would take place should their
soldiers be attacked.
The so-called fight for
freedom had cost eleven innocent lives without anyone
being able to understand why.
One night in May 1943 we were woken by heavy blows on
the door.
My mother opened it and was met by guns
pointed at her.
They said they were from the
Liberation Front - partisans. They turned the house
upside down, stole what they could and tied my
uncle's wrists and took him away. He was never seen
again, but we learnt that they killed him after some
days of torture in the mountains not far from our
village. We never found where he was buried. Less
than a month after this terrible kidnapping a German
military truck with a police squad appeared in front
of the house early one morning and gave us half an
hour to prepare for departure.
My principal worry
was the twelve rabbits I had to leave behind.
The
officer leading the patrol, with tears in his eyes,
helped me cut some fodder and feed them before
climbing into the truck and setting off for the
concentration camp.
On hearing what had happened, the husband of an aunt
of mine who worked for the National Bank of Pensions
in the city of Kranj told his German chief. He then
25

learnt that the German police in our village had

received a denunciation that my uncle had joined the
rebels voluntarily, and this was why we'd been sent
to the concentration camp. After a couple of months
of enquiries the police decided the denunciation was
false and we were set free.
As we lacked the most
basic security at home and continued to be threatened
by the partisans we moved to the city of Kranj. Here
a detachment of the Slovene anticommunist guard, the
domobranci, employed my mother as cook.
Early in May 1945 we were told we'd probably have to
retreat into Austria for a fortnight in view of
pressure from the troops of the Russian Army, and
we'd then return with the Allies. On the 9th May we
set off for the Austrian frontier. We were among the
last to go. There were no partisans in sight, only
some pro-communist civilians who shouted curses at
us.
Just before reaching the frontier we were
attacked by mortar fire, several animals pulling the
carts were hit and killed and we had to leave behind
all our belongings and continue the retreat on foot.
I was lost in the confusion, went through the Ljubelj
tunnel holding the hand of one of the domobranci and
only met up with my mother again by chance.
On
reaching the bridge over the river Drava [Drau] in
Carinthia, a huge mountain of pistols and automatic
rifles caught my eye. I jumped to help myself, heard
a shout in English of "no!" and caught sight of an
English soldier who signalled to disarm me. He was a
youngster, shabby but with a friendly expression.
This was my first contact with the victorious allies.
The Simenc family, whose story follows, were also country
people. Magdalena was eight and had been living away from home
on her grandparents' farm for six years while her mother looked
after the younger children and the ailing other grandmother.
Her three uncles had all been conscripted, one by the Germans later severely wounded - and two by the partisans: one of whom
worked for them as a cook while the other, Uncle Miha, hated
what they were doing and moved across to the domobranci as soon
as he could. Two aunts were living and working at home but the
grandparents were hard pressed to keep the farm going and
Magdalena had to do her full share. Writing fifty years later
she describes how the family reacted on 8 May 1945 in Vrhe,
their remote farm up in the mountains north-east of Ljubljana:
I remember as if it happened yesterday, the sun was
shining after lunch when Uncle Miha came up from the
valley with the news, "you've got to go, all the
26

others are going.

They don't know where, but until
things settle down, probably two weeks".
Everyone
fixed their eyes on the ground as if there'd been a
death in the family.
If life wasn't safe in the
valley, how could it be up here, with the woods only
a stone's throw away and the nearest neighbour hardly
within hailing distance?
My 60 year old grandpa dragged the big rack-wagon out
to the front of the house and fixed two big nets to
both ends, with hay for the oxen, and in between the
women loaded bedding, clothes and provisions - mainly
provisions; I remember flour, a big sack of dried
fruit and a barrel of fat. I stood and watched and
went for a few of my own things: the others were
astonished an 8 year old understood the situation so
well and hadn't packed any "useless rubbish".
A yoke of well-fed, well-trained oxen were brought
from the stable, given water as before any job and
attached to the heavily laden cart.
Grandpa knelt,
crossed himself with the words, "let us go in God's
name" and cracked his whip. The oxen strained as if
set to ploughing. Grandma and my two aunts followed
in tears, and I with them.
Where the track curved
past the first clump of trees we paused to look back
-for grandma the last sight of the farm she'd worked
at for 35 years.
Grandpa went to say goodbye in a house in the next
village and by the time they'd comforted him his
footsteps had grown markedly unsure and he had to
ride on the cart for the rest of the day, while the
others walked to spare the animals.
At the next
cross-roads we took leave of the vet, one of our few
regular visitors at the farm.
More and more
acquaintances or strangers joined us on the way with
horse-drawn carts, handcarts, bicycles or just packs
on their backs. A larger group had already gathered
at the first major village where the roads from the
neighbouring valleys came together.
They were
asking, "you too? Where now? For how long?", and no
one knew the answer.
For our first night under the sky I slept in the hay
on the wagon.
So far I'd enjoyed the "outing" something really new; normally we never left the farm
apart from the Sunday walk to church, an occasional
wake and the yearly visit to the sewing woman. Next
morning we set off north and at every cross-road
27

there were more crowds who didn't know each other but
had the same destination: wherever life was safe.
Suddenly we were in the middle of a column of German
soldiers, cars, tanks and carts mixed up with
civilian refugees; the defeated army was in a hurry
and insisted on priority and we were forced off the
road. The soldiers looked in scorn at our oxen and
asked how far we were going with them. Grandpa still
spoke a little German, as an Austro-Hungarian soldier
of World War I. Now we could only move at night and
the further we went, the greater the throng of
refugees.
Suddenly I heard, "Daddy is coming!" He'd caught up
with us on his bicycle, a full rucksack on his back,
not far from Bernik, northwest of Ljubljana where the
airport is now.
We passed many sites of fires and
everywhere it smelt of burning, and we often had to
ask the houses that were still standing for water for
the beasts and ourselves.
Most had pity on us, but
some felt our flight was unnecessary.
The nearer the frontier the greater the crowds on the
road. At that time it was still not metalled, which
was fortunate as our beasts certainly couldn't have
managed asphalt as they were accustomed to stones and
mountain tracks. Pauses for rest were impossible as
everyone moved forward periodically and we wouldn't
have been able to rejoin the column. Then the whole
mass got stuck, with our wagon in the middle, and we
were terrified when we heard shots from behind and
from the hills.
People seized anything they could
carry from the wagons and rushed up the hill towards
the Karawanken, and I was told to hold on tight to a
member of the family.
So a lot of fully loaded
wagons were stranded on the southern side of Loibl
and later taken over by pursuing partisans or the
locals.
The valley grew narrower, the path steeper.
As we
approached the entrance to the tunnel, which had been
dug by Mauthausen concentration camp prisoners, a
munitions truck caught fire and exploded with a
deafening report which terrified everyone. At first
civilians weren't allowed through, and many decided
to take the track over the pass. A few turned back
and were captured by the partisans, and later sent to
prison or executed.
28

Eventually on Friday night, after a long wait, we

were allowed through the tunnel and this saved our
lives.
It was already dark when we entered the
black, black hole and followed the person in front as
best we could.
I held tight to father's bicycle.
The water which dripped from the filthy roof often
reached our knees, and in between we clambered over
rocks.
Children and grown-ups were crying on all
sides, terrified whether we'd ever get out alive,
because the 1,400 meter long tunnel could have been
mined, as the partisans were also active in
Carinthia.
We reached the other end at dawn and then, with no
time to dry ourselves or change clothes, we at once
started off downhill, always at the trot.
The
wounded and sick who came or were carried with us
were groaning and crying - we carried the dead too,
and they weren't buried till we reached Viktring.
Shots were heard from the valley.
Horses were
grazing in the meadows, and we passed many animal
corpses.
When we got to the bridge over the Drau we met our
first British who were disarming all who crossed, so
that guns, pistols and piles of ammunition lay by the
side of the road. I remember late that evening when
we were dead-beat a rider appeared out of the
darkness high on his horse and promised to arrange
transport if we waited. Some were for, some against,
but eventually all agreed not to part company with
the main group.
Those familiar with the area knew
Klagenfurt wasn't far off, and we now know the
decision probably saved our lives. Many who trusted
such strangers - probably partisans - disappeared
without trace. The whole journey of little more than
100 kilometres, which took us four days, can be done
today in an hour and a half. All I can remember of
arrival at Viktring is of someone spreading a blanket
on a pile of straw and my lying down.
Later I was
told I asked for water but fell asleep immediately.
Next day there was suddenly a cry of, "here's Uncle
Miha with the wagon!"
Impossible!
We refused to
belief it, till we actually saw him. He'd been with
the domobranci who were fighting a rearguard action
between the fleeing refugees and pursuing partisans,
and so had passed the wagon and beasts still waiting
by the side of the road.
The oxen followed like
never
before
and
together
they
overcame
all
29

difficulties.
It's difficult to
with metal-bound wooden wheels and
the old Loiblstrasse and over
gradients of up to 25%, continually
and only a hand-brake.

imagine, a wagon
a span of oxen on
the pass, with
up and down hill,

The tunnel was even more terrifying for the Bajuks - Bozidar
and Cilka and their four boys, the youngest only 18 months old,
and Bozidar's sister, his mother and 60 year old father. They
left home with one bicycle and two prams on the 6th May, the
day after the Perniseks.
Bozidar was a teacher of Latin and
Greek, his father "Director Marko" a headmaster and former
inspector of schools. They walked, got lifts on farm carts and
with a German army lorry-driver and finally improvised their
own transport by taking over an abandoned horse and cart.
Bozidar continues:
We reached the tunnel entrance.
Lord, what crowds
and chaos, what traffic!
Tanks, carts, cars,
lorries, people on horseback, columns of soldiers,
people on foot, civilian refugees, all swarming
forward, pushing their way towards the tunnel - the
soldiers, specially the Germans, screaming while the
refugees were silent, thoughtful, worried. We spent
all next day, the 11th, on the level ground in front
of the entrance, where there was pandemonium, people
growing more and more neurotic, the crowd thicker and
thicker. Every now and then they'd come and tell us
we'd soon be moving through, but it never happened.
Planes circled overhead and people grew panicky. On
top of mental trauma we suffered the most acute
physical discomfort. Starving and out in the intense
heat, our bodily strength was totally exhausted, and
I had to go up and down the hill for water and fodder
for the horse.
We lit a new fire and the women sat around on planks
of wood, sheltering under blankets with the children
on their laps. Soon we were all nerves again. Time
to be off - but only a few metres closer to the
entrance, and then more hours staring into the black
hole which grinned at us in the glow of the fire
opposite.
Columns of tanks, lorries, artillery and
men on foot passed us. Father baked a few potatoes.
We were terrified at the thought of another night in
the open and stood wearily in columns, exhausted,
hungry, sleepless, cold, waiting to move through the
tunnel which now loomed like some mythical monster,
pitch dark without any lights (someone had cut the
30

wires), puddles a foot deep, potholes, crowds and

files of people, little children - how will our cart
pass between this Scylla and Charybdis?
Our horse
became more and more unmanageable for lack of food
and bit everyone within reach.
An hour past midnight things at last started to move
and we pulled into the tunnel.
The darkness was
terrifying and we were surrounded by carts piled high
and half-starved horses.
The batteries I'd brought
let us down and I made paper cones to put round
candles. In this way the women would have some light
when every ten or twenty paces we came to a halt and
stood for ten minutes or more in mud, puddles and
darkness. Every so often columns on foot thrust past
or jammed against us, and heavily loaded refugees
brushed their wheels and prams against our clothing.
Columns of German tanks pushed through the mud and
forced their way between lines of Russian horsemen,
with dreadful oaths and yelling.
At times four
columns were fighting through simultaneously, amidst
the cries of the women and the children.
There were very few lights to show the fugitives the
way, and at any moment carts could stop and the deaf,
dark walls echo bewildered screams of women and
children who huddled close to the side from fear, to
get away from the horses whose masters shouted to
make them stop.
The tension became more and more
unbearable and resembled a precalculated, intentional
madhouse.
I pressed my lips tightly and prayed God
to give me strength to endure to the end this Way of
the Cross.
After three hours in the two kilometer
long tunnel, we at last saw a bright ray of morning
light and the shape of the exit, and breathed a sigh
of relief - rescue from an apocalyptic trial.
Outside it started to rain and the next worry was how
to get the cart down the steep hill without brakes.
We were shocked to learn that danger had followed
close on our heels all the way from Ljubljana, with
partisan attacks from all sides from Trzic to Ljubelj
and the last column of refugees forced to abandon
their possessions and flee for their lives.
Our horse became unmanageable and kicked, reared and
bit ever more furiously while the cart kept sliding
down the hill on one side or the other, towards the
precipitous edge or into the roadside ditch, so that
I had to lift it by the back spring every twenty
paces and straighten it to the middle of the road.
31

My arms were giving way and blisters bursting.

Messengers brought bad news and urged the columns to
hurry, with many more refugees and domobranci behind
and the bridge over the Drava staying open only till
nine. With a heavy heart and a lump in my throat I
couldn't hold back the tears: never mind I'd lost
everything, what hurt most was having to flee from my
own brothers, my own country - and because of my own
country.
Silent, as if aware of this fateful
decisive moment, in a slow funereal march we moved
into Austria across the bridge, while its wood beams
made a sorrowful rumbling noise.
Behind us misery,
death, hatred: in front uncertainty, but lit with
optimism and a determination to save ourselves and
live.
I went ahead by bike to see where we should go and
how much further it was. Animals were slowing down,
people wavering and turning off the road onto the
grass verge to spend the night.
I was afraid for
them and urged them to keep moving.
Mentally and
physically exhausted, we noticed lights at the top of
the hill but didn't know what they meant, and there
was no guide, nobody to give us directions.
I
stopped the column and went ahead; from the fires we
could hear shouting, yelling and singing.
Is this a military camp, are those refugees, is it
our camp?
Army vehicles with strong headlights
drove towards us, blinding me.
People came up and
showed us the way but we were faced with the worst
moments of the day.
In the darkness it was like
being blindfold and I was more feeling my way than
walking alongside the cart. I took the reins as my
father's eyes had given out, only distinguishing
faint dark outlines, which the far-off lights and
fires made even more mysterious. We guessed we were
passing a graveyard, houses, a church.
We came upon a monstrous red light on the tarmac
road, and the two British soldiers standing in front
realised we were Slovenes.
We turned off into the
camp and stopped when we heard familiar language.
Again bitter disappointment: from all sides only
shrill shouts, close to swearing, from our own people
who'd already settled - and we were now in their way.
I stopped and tried to calm myself. Never had I been
so close to a complete breakdown, shaking, dizzy as
if drunk.
I didn't realise I was exhausted and
32

hungry.
I got out matches, lit up the ground and
found we were in a field with very young corn.
We
made a simple camp, left little Andrej sleeping in
his pram, settled on the ground at one end of the
cart and tied the horse to the other end.
In contrast Majda Vracko, then 16, remembers the flight almost
like an extended school excursion.
It is her father whom I
remember vividly, Edvard Vracko, short, with a sharp nose and
three days' growth of beard - razor blades were in short supply
- highly articulate, energetic and aggressive. He was to play
a prominent and controversial role within the Slovenian
community. Majda recalls:
I lived in Ljubljana with my family, the oldest of
six children.
My father was a judge in the appeal
court and openly against communism, so when it looked
like the British were not going to come right away,
but after a week or two, everybody thought it best
that people who were outspokenly against should hide
away for the interregnum. My mother and father were
debating because she had had an operation in March
and was sick afterwards and so couldn't go: and my
two younger sisters were four and five years old.
That was difficult. But they thought it best for my
father to go, because you never know what people will
do.
Then I decided very bravely to go with my father, and
my mother said right away, "wonderful, go.
I'll
worry much less about him if he has at least somebody
with him."
So she packed a rucksack and put all
kinds of things in, and I took pyjamas out and a few
other things, saying, "Mother, why do you do that?
I'm not going to need that.
We're going to sleep
outside, probably close around here somewhere in some
woods, and then we'll come back." And the only thing
I took was food, and that was good because we really
didn't get any till we reached Vetrinje.
The Vrackos left Ljubljana a day after the Perniseks, on the
Sunday, delaying their departure still more to attend mass:
First it was just the two of us, then a friend
decided to go and she'd a friend, a boy who was
blind, and she asked if he could come, and on the way
five or six different people joined us.
Three were
law students who knew my father, one the son of a
judge who also knew him, and another was a friend who
was alone and said, "can I come with you?" and
33

brought someone else, so we were about twelve and we

stuck together and my father was the natural leader.
Father and I had bicycles, the rest were on foot, but
I never used mine except to carry my rucksack.
We left after ten o'clock mass, got to Kranj by
night-time and stayed there overnight and the next
day.
The following day we moved on.
My mother's
family come from there but their home had been burnt
down by the Germans: my grandmother was tied to a
tree and had to watch while their house was burning,
and they had a mill also which was burnt, and then
she was put into a concentration camp with some of my
uncles and aunts, so they were not back home. They
all returned later, but I didn't get to see any of
them.
Then we went to Trzic where my father's cousin lives.
She said, "my!
You're so young!
What are you
thinking?
You'll be on the road, you'll get dirty,
stay here. I've lots of room, I can hide you". She
had a daughter of my age and said, "you can wear her
clothes". I said, "no. I'm going with my father."
So we went on to Sveta Ana 15 a little below Ljubelj,
where all of a sudden they said, "civilians, stay
behind, the tunnel isn't open. Germans are guarding
it." We arrived on May 10th, which was a holy day of
obligation, and went to church at Sveta Ana and after
that found we couldn't go through so we stayed in
some barracks the German soldiers had left. There we
found some crumbs of hard bread and biscuits.
They were the barracks of the SS guards of Mauthausen sub-camp.
It was at the Yugoslav end of the tunnel. There was
also a small hunting lodge of one of the rich people,
and the people were all over there.
This was
Thursday, and we couldn't go through.
Friday we
tried, and then Saturday all of a sudden somebody
said it was opened, and we started again. But in the
meantime - it was really naive - I found a first-aid
kit and I was so proud, because it was a beautiful
leather case with all the little compartments with
aspirins and all kinds of things.
So I was very
happy and I don't even remember I was hungry though I
don't know what we ate. Somehow, something.
Saturday the tunnel opened but was flooded, the water
15

. St. Ana
34

up to my knees, and since that other friend of ours

was blind and it was dark it was very difficult. He
was holding my bicycle which was painted white.
We
made it, and then on the other side we were resting
for a little, walked down the hill and slept
somewhere outside.
There was nothing, not even any
hay.
When we crossed the Drava bridge a bunch of partisans
were laughing because some domobranci had to throw
their guns away. It was weird, they didn't talk or
anything - just ha! ha! ha!, which I thought very
strange.
We couldn't walk very fast because there
was a procession of people with horses and wagons,
people on foot with bicycles and small children. One
child was born on one of those wagons, right there.
Mostly I remember German officers on horses with
whips, whipping people so that they had room to go
faster, since the roads were completely clogged; and
that made me so mad I could just jump on one of them.
And there were dead horses and cows with swollen
stomachs.
When we came to Zikpolje there was an old shack where
they had some hay, and it was getting dark and father
said, "let's ask the people in the house nearby if we
could use that for sleeping" and they said yes; and
we all squeezed in and used whatever we had, clothing
to put under our heads, there were no pillows, nobody
got changed into anything, and our spirits were high
because the group was very interesting. There were a
few university students, one training to be a priest,
and we were debating about philosophy, Thomas Aquinas
and all such high subjects so we forgot how dreadful
it really was! The next day the woman said we could
use her water and we had to pump it, and we divided the girls were washing the shirts, the guys were
washing their socks, and they came out so hard that
when they were hanging they had the shape of their
shoes because they obviously didn't rinse them! That
was our first wash.
Then we thought we'd go on and on - we didn't know
that Vetrinje existed - and all of a sudden something
opened in front of us, and there were thousands of
people already there.
When we were waiting, we
didn't know some people left through the tunnel
before us, we thought we were the first to go
through. People went there even already on Saturday,
and we didn't get there until the next Saturday. My
35

father met School Director Bajuk and a few others

right away and they said, "come, go to the factory,
that's for young people and families", and we stayed
there.
The next account is from an engaged couple who got married a
few months later.
Joze Jancar and Marija Hribar were both
medical students and came from neighbouring villages in the
hills south-east of Ljubljana, she the daughter of a successful
farmer and he the son of the village organist: he was also area
leader of an organisation for young Catholic workers and so an
obvious target for the communists.
He had been held for
several months in Gonars, the notorious Italian concentration
camp for both catholic and communist Slovenes, where many died
of starvation. Forty years later they recall:
Joze:
The message was, anyone who doesn't want to
wait for the partisans should go to Klagenfurt.
There was panic, "who's going? Who's not going? How
will we go across? With whom? Who'll protect us?"
because we'd heard they were shooting already, there
were fights.
I went home on Sunday and to mass.
People were standing and asking me, "what do you
think we should do?" and I said, "look.
I can't
advise anybody.
I'll tell you what I'm doing, but
don't take any notice. I'm going."
I had to go or I'm finished. In Gonars I was told by
the partisans I was a marked man, so why should I
wait?
Then I went home where my sisters Mara and
Paula were. Father said, "what shall I do? I'll go
with you." and I said, "you were at home, have you
any enemies that would really harm you?" and he said
yes, but I said, "would they shoot you?"
"I don't
think so." My parents weren't involved in anything,
father did his job, mother did hers looking after the
children. I was very pleased they didn't go because
later I saw the tragedies - old people not able to do
their job, not able to learn the language and sitting
and waiting for the next day to come. It was tragic,
better they stayed at home even if they suffered.
Then mother said, "what about the girls?" and I said,
"I can't say anything, because I don't know where I'm
going, what'll happen to me." Mother was crying, and
then picked up a can of fat and gave it me, and I
threw something - trousers and something - in a bag,
and went with a bicycle to see Marija. They asked,
"what'll we do?"
I said to Marija, "I can't tell
you" and her mother was crying. "Don't go" or "Go",
36

everybody was in disarray and then Marija said, "yes,

I'm going with you." So there was to-ing and fro-ing
and messages, "the partisans were already in Ponova
Vas." God, what will happen? Then the decision was
made not to go to Ljubljana on the main road because
they were afraid they'll cut it, so we went in a big
circle over the little mountains behind there to
Ljubljana. Again people were meeting, talking.
"We" was myself and my two sisters. My third sister
stayed at home.
I was the eldest.
Ana had always
stayed at home while the other two had been in
Ljubljana.
They went because I went, they weren't
threatened.
They knew what the communists were
doing, witnessed it, read it, were told.
One wrong
step, and atrocities were in the direct experience of
the community. We'd made no plans as we were told,
"don't do anything because the Eighth Army is coming
and you'll be all right." Then suddenly a message at
the last moment, the Eighth Army is not coming. So
it was just grab and go, the decision was split
second. The two girls got a hitch into Grosuplje on
a farm cart and I went to Marija's house by bike.
Marija: And do you know, next day was my birthday,
to which Joze and his sisters were coming! And there
he appeared on the doorstep and, "we have to go." I
said, "what do you mean?"
"the Russians are in
Belgrade and the partisans around, and the English
aren't coming to our part of Slovenia. You want to
go, or not to go?"
I didn't know, just in five
minutes you had to decide.
So anyway I said, "all
right, we'll go." We only thought we were going for
a fortnight to Austria, and never thought it'd be for
the rest of our lives.
At that time there were living at home my father,
mother, youngest sister who was 8, another sister who
was 18 and a brother France, who was 13. Tone was in
Ljubljana in the civilian police. Earlier he was in
a concentration camp in Perugia: something happened,
somebody was killed, Italian, I don't know, anyway
the Italians came to the village. Our house was the
first one, so they brought all the men from the whole
village into our garden and took them all away, my
brother aged 20 included, and he was in the
concentration camp until the capitulation of Italy,
and with him went about forty or fifty from around
there.
I remember we were sending parcels every
month or two and we got news reasonably regularly.
37

Then the partisans came one night and plundered, took

everything from the house, clothes - even my little
sister's muff and a little fur collar to go with her
coat I bought her for Christmas - and the food and
everything. That was their normal way, how they got
their stuff. I had another brother who was also in
concentration camp, in Gonars. He was about 18. We
were six children, three boys and three girls.
Not far from us, next to my uncle's was a little
house - I don't even know who they were - four adult
people and four children, all killed one night by the
partisans.
What was the reason?
I mean if they'd
committed I don't know what crime, they didn't
deserve, all those people, to be killed.
Joze: In Gonars I was warned the partisans had tried
to kill me. One walked past and said, "you're very
lucky to be here today" and I asked why and he said:
Because we were waiting for you in a maize
field, four of us, and had orders from the
commander of the unit to take you and
polish you off, and also, if we could, the
priest who was with you. You were walking
up and down before the 10 o'clock mass, and
coming very near us.
We couldn't decide,
should we grab you or not, and then someone
said, 'watch it, Italians are coming.'
A
patrol was coming along to church.
And that saved me - as close as that, a matter of
metres. People still don't understand what communism
was about, how it was propagated and how 97% of
Slovenes were anti-communists and catholics and 3%
communists before the war. These incidents show why
you were frightened and take the weapon, whoever
gives it you.
And also you see how the communists
... how you can control a nation with fear.
Marija:
We arrived at Ljubljana, and do you know
where we landed? In the slaughter-house! There was
a big courtyard and we slept there, Mara, Paula, Joze
and me.
Then we started going towards Kranj and
Trzic on someone's cart.
Suddenly towards Trzic we
came to a standstill because they couldn't all go
through the tunnel.
I think it was Germans going
through and Cossacks.
Then suddenly they began
shooting behind, saying partisans were down there.
38

Anyway we started going quickly then, really rushed,

we were so frightened we just pushed through.
I'm
sure other things were going through, carts and
lorries, but we were on the side. I remember a horse
walking near me, and it was about a foot of water. I
told you about my lovely new suede sandals, that's
all I was worrying about, that they'd be ruined!
Joze:
Some people had torches, but we were holding
on to whatever we could get hold of, and I was
falling asleep.
I never experienced it before,
walking, and water was dripping from the tunnel, we
were wet but this didn't matter. We were walking in
complete darkness and it was pretty crowded with
people pushing behind us. The tunnel seemed unending
and people were shouting in all languages, it was
frightening, but anyway we said they couldn't
overtake us so we were more or less safe, there
inside.
On the other side it was already dusk, we
were looking for somewhere to sleep. We went into a
farm house and slept in a little room there, and the
next thing I went out to check and somebody came
along and said, "watch it!
There are partisans in
it."
They were asleep, so I said, "I'll keep an
eye", and fell asleep too!
The only casualty - my
bicycle in the morning was gone.
Marija: We went all morning, we were tiring quite a
bit, and in the early afternoon met the first English
soldiers.
This was, when I look back, one of the
great disappointments of my life.
We were so
pleased, "oh good, we're safe now" but then they were
stealing the watches.
That was like when you find
out that Father Christmas isn't any more! They just
asked, "what time?" they weren't rough or anything.
Joze: We were among the first to arrive at Viktring.
So far as food was concerned, we had something everybody was sharing a bit of everything. Then, the
third day, Mersol was looking for me, I was looking
for Mersol and found him.
He said we had to do
something, "for the people now there's nobody.
If
anyone is sick, who's looking after them?
Alright,
we must find a room somewhere."
And he started to
organise a sickbay with Marija and Mara 16 , and when Dr
Janez came back, he threw away his uniform and came
with us, and he was delousing people, using DDT. We
all had lice, Marija had, I had. It was unbelievable
16

. Joze Jancar's sister.

39

how well Mersol organised the thing, before anybody,

you know he had some medicines with him and we
were organising first aid if somebody got hurt.
We
occupied the school, and this was our sickbay, and we
started. And people were coming right away.
The Jancars were among the first to reach Viktring, Uros
Roessmann among the last. In 1945 his family was living in a
village four kilometres due east of Ljubljana. His father was
chief bookkeeper in a nearby paper mill and a member of the
local village administration, and left for Austria with his
wife and two daughters.
All three sons were with the
domobranci. One died fighting the partisans in September 1943
but the others escaped with their units into Austria.
Uros,
then aged 20, was with the rearguard covering the retreat of
the soldiers and civilians through the Loibltunnel:
Viktring was very impressive - a huge collection of
wagons and people parked all over a very large field
- probably 20,000 or 25,000 people, just the
Slovenians - and the next field full of German army;
within a day or two they moved them on. I was eager
to find and join the family. When I got to them they
had already the fire going and Mother was cooking
something and I was very glad to eat again. It was
probably the 13th or 14th May.
Everybody tried to
get organised; we had that wagon, but nothing to
cover it, and when it rained there were six of us
trying to fit under it and of course it didn't go, so
we were all wet! Everybody tried to get some shelter
together.
Some got into the woods and peeled the
bark
off
the
trees
and
then
made
tent-like
structures. Others had some material from the German
army and used that as tenting, or just blankets were
strung up. Of course they leaked pretty bad when the
rain started.
So far as food was concerned, some people brought
their own supplies.
The group that came from our
village, from Polje, had a common store. They loaded
a wagon with some flour and beans, and for four or
five days there was enough, so that they cooked sort
of a common soup so that everybody got something.
After that ran out everyone had to depend on their
own sources, but by then there was some sort of
supply. My family were with a village group - maybe
a hundred people, several families and five, six
wagons.
So they all pulled them together in one
place, and the encampment lasted until the end of
June, six weeks.
Particularly in the group our
40

family was in, they had a common organisation and

everybody looked out for everybody else; that went on
quite well, so that nobody was really hurting too
bad.
My sister's child got severe diarrhoea and was taken
to a hospital in Klagenfurt for three days, and my
sister went and stayed with her.
I don't remember
who brought her back and took her over, I think a
British ambulance. Our father got in touch with the
Austrian owner of the large monastery next the camp
and he said, why don't you move into a corridor
inside the monastery?
So we picked up our stuff,
gave the wagon to somebody and moved with all the
belongings into a passage behind a stairway, so we
were out of the weather after about two weeks in the
field.
And the stairway behind which we settled led to an
officers' mess for the British troops, and the cooks
noticed of course these strange people there, and all
of a sudden there was a large tin of marmalade and
some tea and powdered milk, and they were really nice
and helpful. First they gave us food and then felt
they could use some help with the dish-washing, so my
brother and I were employed as dish-washers for a
while, and they provided us with food and all kinds
of help. The British NCOs in the kitchen were nice
people and very kindly and helpful; we had a very
good relationship with them.
They knew there was
storage in the same building for furniture that the
Germans had prepared for the bombed-out people, and
they dragged out some mattresses and we actually got
upholstered chairs and had a fairly nice apartment in
the end of the corridor.
There was a master sergeant of the British unit, a
Guards' brigade, who was very unhappy and told the
people there to throw us out, saying it's against the
regulations.
But the people who worked in the
kitchen said, "he's a master sergeant, he's a monkey,
he sleeps in a tree and we don't obey him".
So we
were sort of privileged.
So the Perniseks, Simences, Bajuks, Vrackos, Jancars and
Roessmanns arrived safely, with 6,000 fellow Slovenes.
The
camp made a strong impression on visitors.
For the
intelligence officer with the British Brigade of Guards,

41

Captain Nigel Nicolson 17 , it was "a sight one had not seen since
the early films of the Gold Rush", for the British Red Cross
nurse, Jane Balding 18 "like some fantastic film" and for two
Friends' Ambulance Unit officials from London HQ 19 :
A quite astonishing camp. .. A fantastic shanty-town
built of bark, branches and every conceivable
material.
It resembled nothing so much as Epsom
Downs on Derby Day and presented a frightening
picture of dirt and disease from the outside. Inside
however, the camp was remarkably well-kept by the
refugees themselves, most of whom seemed to be
engaged industriously in building, cooking, laundry
or some similar occupation.
I was more prosaic in the letter-diary 20 I sent my mother:
The camp is on the edge of a wide plain and consists
of a large field surrounded on three sides by small
streams and further large fields and then rapidly
climbing pine-covered hills on one side, the latter
developing into quite respectable mountains. On one
side also is a large and attractive monastery planned
round three courtyards, and beyond that up a hill a
textile factory which during the war was turned into
an aero-engine parts factory and is now occupied by
some 600 of the refugees - mainly women and children.
Most live in the open in the field, using for shelter
what material they can find - some have tents made
from sacking, gas capes, overcoats and blankets, some
have shacks made of wood and bark, some live in their
carts with material stretched over the top.

17

. Nicolson, Nigel, in report written shortly afterwards,

quoted in Tolstoy, Nikolai (1986), The Minister and the
Massacres (London, Century Hutchinson), p. 147.
18
. Balding, Jane from unpublished diary quoted in The
Minister and the Massacres, p. 289.
19
. FAU Archives, Friends House Library, London.
20
. Corsellis, John, letter-diaries to his mother, in
author's possession.
42

C H A P T E R

13 - 27 May 1945

Three aid workers describe the emergency camp at

Viktring.
Major Paul Barre, who was sent by the
Displaced
Persons
Branch
of
Allied
Military
Government to take charge, and the two relief workers
sent by NGO (non-governmental organisation) aid
agencies to help him: the British Red Cross nurse
Jane Balding and the Friends Ambulance Unit (Quaker)
worker, myself. Joze Jancar, the 19-year old Gloria
Bratina and Franc Pernisek then describe camp life,
the Chief of Staff what the domobranci were doing,
Marko Bajuk the speedy opening up of the schools, and
Franc Pernisek the spiritual support the refugees
derived from masses and devotions in the nearby
church.
A rumour spreads that the British are sending the
domobranci, not to Italy for their own greater safety
as promised, but to Yugoslavia and death.
The
Balding and Pernisek diaries recall the terror that
ensued, as do the schoolboy Marian Loboda, the two
girls Majda Vracko and Marija Plevnik and the local
Austrian parish priest, Pfarrer Josef Mussger.
The engineering student Ivan Kukovica and the 16 year
old convent school girl Pavci Macek finally describe
what happened to the 11,000 domobranci and 600
civilians who were sent back.

43

Go down to Viktring, there's a

mob of people, we don't know
what they're doing, who they
are. Find out and let us know.
When Major Johnson, head of Allied Military Government
Displaced Persons Branch for Carinthia, told spokesmen for the
Slovene civilian refugees in his office in Klagenfurt on
Saturday the 12th May that he would send an officer to take
charge of their camp at Viktring, he was in fact desperately
short of staff. So it was the more fortunate that he sent them
Major Paul Barre, a 38-year-old Canadian from the Royal
Montreal Regiment who had substantial previous experience of
civil affairs administration as Allied Military Government
Provincial Officer in the Italian city of Ferrara and who
possessed just the right qualities for handling the crisis he
was soon to face: humanity, patience, courage and decisiveness.
Johnson briefed him with the words at the top of this page and
Barre was in Viktring on the Monday.
He has described 21 the
methods he used - essentially a "refugee-centred" approach.
Regrettably few AMG and UNRRA officers did this.
Most made
little effort to respond to the wishes of the refugees:
When

we got to Viktring we found thousands of these

Yugoslavs, mainly Slovenes. My job was to ascertain
their arrival, why and the circumstances. It's very
simple, they were chased out. They realised if they
stayed they'd either have to accept communism or
suffer the consequences, and felt they'd rather
abandon their property and leave with the clothes
they were wearing and a few possessions they could
carry and their wagons, horse, cow, sheep and
whatever, and march into Austria.
You can imagine
the mental conditions these people went through,
going into the unknown.
We found them establishing
themselves on the ground as best they could.
Tethered to their wagons were their animals, and they
slept under the wagon, and that was the only
protection they ever had. What little food they had
they shared among themselves.

I felt it'd be better and easier to administer this thing

by getting all the people from Hampstead, we'd say,
grouped together, and all the people from Snowdon
grouped elsewhere, each group representing their
locality at home. They'd know each other fairly well
21

. Barre, Paul H., recorded interview 11034/3/1, Imperial

War Museum London Department of Sound Records, p 1.
44

and get along with, protect one another. And then we

got them to organise a council of their own group,
and each group elected a president or secretary, a
headman, and this headman would then report to our
committee - the top people among the Yugoslavs or
Slovenes I could find there.
And there was a Dr
Valentin Mersol who spoke perfectly good English and
who had studied medicine in the USA, through whom I
could administer or help administer the camp. It was
obviously impossible for me to visit every family and
listen to everyone's sorrows and demands, so we had
to organise a chain of command like the army does.
That worked out very well.
In time we were able to improve their lot by adding a
reasonably
good
supply
of
rations:
we
found
stationery and an old typewriter, an old radio they'd
listen to at night from the BBC, translate into their
language, type out and post wherever they could: so
that next morning the people could read the events of
the night before and keep up.
The weather was
terrible, it rained most of the time and we were
living in puddles.
There was a stream running
through the camp, and this was the only water
available. You can imagine how anxious I was, but I
got our engineers to establish water-purifying
equipment.
I was able to get one small piece of soap per person per
month for all purposes - those little cakes of soap
you get in a small motel - and you can imagine it was
very difficult. However in fairness to these people
let me say they are very religious, mostly Roman
Catholics, and on Sundays they all turned out in
their best attire: the women had frocks and the men
dark suits, a white shirt and tie. Where they kept
these, pressed and clean, I don't know, it's a bloody
miracle really.
To show you the character of the
people, with John Corsellis we started up some
schools. We found they had nuns and teachers. The
children didn't learn very much grammar but at least
it kept them occupied. Then we had a number of expolice people and they wanted to do something, so
they asked could they be armed.
That the Slovenes should feel insecure was understandable, with
armed partisan bands ranging around Klagenfurt. The Red Cross
nurse Jane Balding, who was posted to the camp on 23 May,
writes:
45

18 May Tito's boys running wild causing trouble

19 May
Partisans very noisy in evening
sounds of
shooting up
Incident in square this a.m.
a bit
sticky
20 May
Tito's boys parading all over town in afternoon
all very warlike
cleared out later
23 May
armed British guards all round as Tito's men
threaten to massacre them all
But Major Barre considered the British guards sufficient and
was not prepared to arm the camp police:
Even if they had no ammunition I didn't want anyone to
carry arms in the civilian camp, but we broke a
branch of a tree and said, here's your night stick if
you care to have something.
However the Slovenes
among themselves were so well-disciplined we never
had to have recourse to punishment or trial or that
sort of thing.
Throughout my stay we never had
trouble.
We had twelve or fourteen women who gave birth, and only
one baby died. We found they had very few qualified
doctors with the exception of Dr Mersol, but I was
able finally to acquire thermometers and rubber
gloves and pills and bandages and whatever they
required.
There was a building we turned into a
clinic, and the morning sick parade was probably
attended by twenty-five people out of thousands, so
their state of health was very, very good in spite of
the arduous conditions under which they were living.
I had two very charming British Red Cross people, Florence
Phillips and Jane Balding. They did a wonderful job.
I never gave them direct orders, I welcomed them and
said, "well, you know what to do, go ahead. If you
need anything let me know". I never dictated, I was
there to help them, "please run your own show".
I
did that to give them confidence, both to the
civilians or the Red Cross people or anyone else that
worked in the camp - each was responsible for their
behaviour, their administration, their work.
I was there to help at a higher level if they met with
difficulties or opposition: let me know and I'd
straighten things out.
They never came back, so I
presumed everything went well, and the fact there was
no strike, no disagreement, it was all one big
family, I think proved my theory in operating this
particular camp was justified: they were so busy
46

looking after themselves they didn't get into trouble

or disagreements, and if they had something they went
to see Mersol, and Mersol came to see me, and I dealt
with Mersol and no one else. Not that I didn't want
to deal with anyone else but if I showed favouritism
on one, then I'd have to do it for others and the
whole authority, the line of communication, would
have crumbled away. I was using my army experience,
which proved to be very good indeed.
I didn't administer the camp with a stick in my hand. I
wanted - that may have been a weakness on my part -to
give them the feeling they were running their own
camp: I was there to help if they needed it, I wasn't
there to direct them, and I felt that would be
perhaps a means of giving encouragement and selfreliance in view of all the misery they'd gone
through.
Shortly after I got there I realised they couldn't live
with their horses and other animals tethered to their
wagons, and we established horse lines; and these
animals require constant food, small quantities but
at very regular intervals, and they were just being
starved. So by having horse lines it was easier to
feed them, and also in time we had to butcher them to
feed the people. So they were sent to Klagenfurt at
the abattoir and slaughtered properly and butchered
and the meat came back.
I well remember the day I
made the pronouncement even Dr Mersol looked at me
and I could read on his face, "here's the last straw.
We've been robbed of everything by the Germans, by
our own people, and now this Canadian is robbing us
of our horses". I wasn't robbing them, I was really
putting them away to one side, and I simply said,
"look, you can go and pat your horse every day if you
want to".
It was for their own health and protection, but I can well
imagine their reaction. Because you must always put
yourself in their position, how difficult it must be
to accept that anyone was trying to do something to
help rather than steal things from them.
For that
had been their experience ever since they left their
home towns and villages; everyone was always taking
something away.
I placed myself in their position,
how would I feel? And obviously the one man I could
see in a foreign uniform is the man that is
responsible for this.
Who else can I blame, see,
talk to, except that one person in uniform?
The
47

others are beyond them, Corps and the government at

Westminster! They can't go there to complain, they
come to me.
I'm the nearest boy they can whip if
they wish.
John Corsellis came, not necessarily every day, and did
what he could to organise, in their own fashion, the
various things they did. I didn't have much contact
except seeing him now and again.
I knew he was a
Quaker, and I think they are pacifists; that's an
uphill struggle, a pacifist in war-time.
However I
grant him all the dues he deserves because of this
wonderful work he did, he and all the others like
him.
Dr Mersol's role at Viktring was very important vis-a-vis
his own people because they all looked up to him, to
contact me or whoever was responsible, to present
their demands for assistance.
Mostly it was food,
and when the climax came it was a question of not
having to be sent back.
So they went through him,
and that gave him the authority and I hope helped
him,
because
they
in
turn
would
follow
his
directions.
We had a very good relationship and there was a trust
there, he was very helpful and I did all I could to
help and support him.
I never, in all the weeks I
was with these people, had difficulties with him, and
no individual caused any trouble in the camp. There
was never any question of holding a trial or having a
meeting to reprimand anyone. Everyone minded his own
business and they went along as best they could. But
it was my principle - let them run their camp, and I
was there to help them. I was not trying to dictate
their way of life, because I was smart enough to
realise I didn't know how they lived, what kind of
life they led, I never met these people before in my
life. So what else could I do?
"You know what to do, go ahead", Barre had told Jane Balding.
The breathless telegraphese of her diary depicts a relief
worker's job better than any more measured summary:
Wednesday 23 May
Went out to new camp at Viktring
Amazing sight
6,000 odd men, women & children
encamped in open on one side & 11,000 soldiers on
other
All fugitives from Tito tanks, and armed
British guards all round as Tito's mob threaten to
massacre them all
Like some fantastic film
48

Inspected MI [Medical Inspection] room & office, all

very well organised.
At nearby factory which houses most of children & mothers,
took small baby to civilian hospital in Klagenfurt,
full of SS & Gestapo staff (cannot be locked up till
replacements are found)
Had to get British officer
to settle their hash & make them take baby
Chased
round all afternoon trying to lay on milk for camp
Am to have own car & driver.
Thursday 24 May
Awful night
Tanks roaring past, armed
guards chasing armed escapees round hotel
Pelted
with rain all night, was afraid I'd find camp washed
out
Not too bad
Went with Major Barre, grand
sort, Canadian CC [camp commandant]
to Dellach on
lake to see three measles children in hospital
Found other baby there
Very different to civil
hospital, all very charming & kind to children
Beautiful run from camp
Rained again after lunch
Went with Major on scrounge,
raided Nazi offices for school paper etc., went to
neighbouring camp & begged linen for MI room
Mary
22
Tanner
says head of armed forces coming to my camp
tomorrow, maybe Alexander but think it's McCreery
Toothache, bed
Friday 25 May
Had General Sir Richard McCreery 23 in
morning
Only time he got out of his car was to walk
through mud to shake hands with me
Great thrill
Newspaper bloke chased me afterwards
Saw school in
action in open
Stopped raining for hour or so
Back to lunch
Afternoon off to have tooth out
Very nice army dentist lad
Nasty abscess
Have to
have two stopped some time soon
Came back to bed
Got up for dinner
Bed straight afterwards, read
till 11
My own letter-diary complements Barre and Balding.
I wrote
with all the self-confidence of a 22-year old, suggesting Barre
"might do better" and making sweeping criticisms of Balding.
She was just as critical of me, no doubt with greater
justification.
There was a strong personality clash.
I had
had enough of masterful hospital sisters after a year as ward
orderly in wartime hospitals in England, and she could not
stand immature, bumptious and disrespectful conscientious
22
23

. British Red Cross supervisor for Carinthia

. Commander, British 8th Army
49

objectors!
Recently I spoke with a refugee who after fifty
years still remembered her devoted work and kindness with the
greatest affection and gratitude.
My diary entry on Viktring
started:
When I arrived they all had their horses inside the camp,
and as there were over 400 you can imagine what the
ground was like. They of course always got the best
accommodation: some had even roofs made of boards.
When it was dry things weren't too bad, but this
district is particularly liable to sudden storms with
heavy rain, and then the place was liable to become a
sea of mud. We've now got them out of the camp, in
long lines in the shade of an avenue of trees just
along a stream: they are very impressive - all
organised and done entirely by the Slovenes after we
had suggested it rather strongly: they cut and
carried the wood from the local woods and for the
first 200 horses used wire instead of nails24 .
The British workers number four: two Red Cross women, a
Canadian Major i/c and myself.
One Red Cross woman
is a parson's sister and a mixture of North Country
and Irish, has a biggish heart but is pretty
impossible in every other way - very full of herself
and how she does things, with a nurses's outlook etc,
etc, but the other is Scotch, has imagination and
ability and should be easy to work with.
The Red Cross Assistant Commissioner described her in
memoirs as "an excellent girl, Scotch and exuberant".
continued:

his
I

The Major is a charming and self-effacing man who is very

patient with the refugees, does his best for them and
certainly does not try to "manage" his staff.
The
great snag is he started on the job alone here and
still approaches it from the point of view of a
liaison officer between the army and the Slovene
committee which runs the camp; he has no previous
experience of camp administration and isn't much
interested, and does nothing to coordinate the work
of his staff.
It is extraordinarily difficult to
work as part of a machine that has no steering wheel
or driver. Also he imagines the Slovenes are a good
bit more efficient than in fact they are. The job is
very good for me: not only must I go tactfully
because I am more often than not dealing with men
24

. until I obtained nails for them from the Royal Engineers

50

much older than myself, but also all the workers are
unpaid so that one has to be very careful how much
pressure one puts on to avoid them simply downing
tools!
It occurs to me that I have hardly mentioned the end of
the European war. I think many people in Italy were
more moved by the Italian armistice, which was a
close and immediate thing to them, than by the
general
surrender.
Probably
the
general
international political position is more depressing
out here than at home, so many of the frightful
problems are posed to us so vividly here: the future
of the Chetniks, the Germans from Yugoslavia, the
Russians who fought for the Germans, of Austria and
of Germany, of Poland, of Trieste, of the stateless
persons.
The last four lines referred in a veiled way to the forcible
repatriations.
I avoided mentioning them in so many words,
from a reluctance to distress my mother and fear of the censor.
As

to my personal future, I haven't worked out my

demobilisation group but I guess I am somewhere in
the 50s, which will mean that unless Japan collapses
unexpectedly I will have some time to wait and
meanwhile there is certainly a job worth doing out
here, which is giving me excellent experience and
should end me up with a reasonable command of three
languages, Italian, German and French.
I would
certainly like to be home but there are many
thousands of service men who have been away far
longer than me, and are now queuing up for the return
boat.

Why should working with refugees in Austria "end me up with a

reasonable command of Italian and French" as well as German?
French was spoken by most of the older Yugoslav and Russian
intelligentsia, and for Italian I had a special use because it
was my most fluent foreign language after six months work with
Italian refugees.
When I arrived at Viktring and asked Major
Barre how I could best help, he referred me to Dr Mersol and he
suggested hygiene. He said I would need an interpreter and he
had just the right man, a medical student two years older than
me who had organisational experience and while interned in the
Italian concentration camp at Gonars had learnt the language;
and that was how I got to know Joze Jancar.
He has already
recounted his flight into Austria. A little taller than I was,
just as thin and with striking red hair, he continued to
interpret for me after we had finished hygiene and moved on to
51

education, and later played a key role in the opening of the

camp for university students in Graz.
Here he recounts his
memories of Viktring:
Mersol said, "look, let's hope he'll be able to do
something.
He seems young and energetic".
He was
expecting someone with more authority, a major or
something, for six thousand people, and was a bit
sceptical, and then he realised when we started to
march around - and, my God, you were walking fast!
And really it was a great success because Mersol was
often saying, "it's unbelievable how much you two
did".
I was exhausted after you all day!
It was
sunny and very hot, and you came early and left late.
And you brought 10,000 tablets, or pinched somewhere,
sulphonamide. I remember you brought this to Mersol
and everybody was cured with whatever disease they
had, because this was the only thing.
Chemotherapy, the treatment of diseases by chemical compounds
such as sulphonamide with specific bactericidal effects, and
DDT powder for the control of typhus-carrying lice were
spectacularly effective in maintaining a high standard of
health in camps where conditions were often primitive.
After the accounts of those who ran the camp - commandant,
nurse, relief worker and interpreter - it is time for the
refugees themselves.
First Gloria Bratina, then aged 19, who
arrived with her parents and eight brothers and sisters.
Her
comments on the forcible repatriations, diet, health and
hygiene are of particular interest as she later qualified as a
doctor:
We

built ourselves a little tent - there were some

blankets we picked up - very fast because of course
we were sporty people, gimnazija [grammar school]
students. We managed to organise ourselves quickly,
cut some branches for a structure, my dad was very
good at it. There was a place where you had to pick
up your bread and so on, and meat when they were
killing the mules or horses; and we cooked soup and
sometimes went downtown to get onions and lettuce.
We were very cold at nights, especially when the
rainy time started.
There were about two weeks of
heavy rain and mud. It was quite difficult. Our two
brothers with the domobranci arrived one or two weeks
later.
They were not sent back.
No.
We were
strong; they wanted to go, and we just didn't allow
them.
We heard already that they were sending them
back, and we said no. They were quite depressed and
52

didn't know what to do. They said, well, all right,

probably there is nothing going to happen, and if it
happens ...
And we said no.
We tried to get them
some clothes.
They were staying with their unit.
You know how naive they were: they thought, well,
O.K., they are going to Italy just like everybody
else. They were young too. We just said no, we put
the pressure on, this was the family. Then they left
their units and came into the civilian camp and took
off their uniforms. We were begging around for some
clothes.
There

was a lot of depression there for the whole

community and we went to church a lot, we prayed like
anything.
Some of us fell ill.
I believe it was
salmonella; no wonder, it wasn't proper water, but we
recovered pretty soon.
It was surprising there
wasn't an epidemic. It was very good they came with
the DDT, the British Red Cross, it was wonderful. I
encouraged the people around - some of them were
trying to escape it.
I said, this is the only
solution - all those little insects coming around:
the fear of typhus.

Franc Pernisek gives his account of camp life:

Monday 14th May.
A fine morning, the sun shines strongly.
With darkness it becomes cold and at night very cold.
Thank
God the weather has been very, very kind.
People start to
construct emergency dwellings: awnings are a good shelter to
keep off heat, wind and rain, and some have cut branches as
cover or a big blanket serves as a temporary tent.
Some are
making huts from fir tree bark.
We've exchanged our lovely,
comfortable homes for this gipsy life.
The camp is totally disorganised with civilians, soldiers,
livestock all mixed up and a most unpleasant smell
everywhere.
There are crowds of people queuing for
drinking water at every well: some have already run
dry and others put out of action by the locals on
purpose.
The greatest difficulties are experienced
from not being able to satisfy basic human needs.
There are no latrines yet, but English soldiers are
already digging long, deep pits with huge machines.
Lieutenant-Colonel Ivan Drcar, chief-of-staff of the domobranci
in the military camp, was keeping his own diary:
14 to 20 May.
There is total confusion and disorder in
the camp, and Army units are mixed up with civilians
53

and
the
out
any

their families, wagons and horses. We're taking

most pressing steps to maintain hygiene and carry
policing duties. It's hard to keep order without
sanctions. The heat is unbearable. ...

It was made known to the [Slovene] National Committee that

the British considered us as prisoners-of-war if we
remained in uniform, but whoever changed into
civilian clothes would be considered a civilian.
I
kept this latter option in front of me because our
situation was uncertain, and then impeded the influx
of civilians into the army and didn't agree with the
Legion 25 mobilizing its members.
I'm trying to set up an intelligence section because it's
imperative we find out what the British are planning
to do with us ... and what happened to the group of
chetniks who left before we did. Less and less news
is arriving.
Krenner is away during the afternoons
because he drives by auto each day to visit his wife
in Krumpendorf 26 .
Colonel Drcar recorded elsewhere that the British had dropped
an obvious hint it would be better if the soldiers changed into
civilian clothes and that Dr. Bajlec, a member of the Slovene
National Committee, had told him on 21 May that the British had
indicated they would consider all those in uniform as
prisoners-of-war, and those in civilian clothes as refugees.
General Krenner refused to accept the need for a intelligence
section and would not allow Colonel Drcar to set one up, but
continued to press ahead with recruitment so as to increase the
number of troops he had serving under him.
Nobody liked or
trusted him.
Dr. Mersol's youngest son, then a 11-year-old,
recalls:
Next to us was the camp of the anti-communist fighters. I
remember Dad being absolutely furious because they
were trying to recruit more troops among the young.
He and Krenner got into a major fight.
Dad never
yelled at anybody, but this time he let him have it
and I was surprised the language he knew, because he
was absolutely furious.
Krenner was appalling, he
would call everybody else a liar.
Marko Sfiligoi, then an ordinary soldier aged 19, also recalls:

25

. Slovenska Legija, the underground resistance

established by the Slovene People's Party in May 1941.
26
. village 15 km from Viktring on lake Woerthersee.
54

force

I was with the main domobranci HQ in Ljubljana and knew

all the top officers (including Vuk Rupnik) and the
top politicians because they were continuously coming
there.
I was also at Vetrinje, and knew all the
events with Krenner - we didn't like him. He was a
nasty guy.
Pernisek's diary continues:
Monday 14th May.
Today we received the first official
English visit. The Canadian Major Barre came, who'd
been appointed commandant of the camp by the English
military authorities. This gentleman is very caring
and understanding and very calm. 27 For supper we got
warm gruel.
The new commandant is an early riser.
Tuesday 15th May.
It was nearly eight when he came with his assistants
and started putting some order into the camp.
He
made a round accompanied by Dr Mersol and ordered
that all the soldiers should leave the civilian camp
and go to the military camp, and that all horses
should be moved into the pastureland near the forest,
explaining that the civilian and military horses
would be used to feed the refugees.
He said we
should organise a work team and set up a camp
committee with whom he would meet for consultations
each morning.
He told us we would stay here some time longer and would
have to feed ourselves for a few more days until the
Military Government organised provisioning, which is
the most pressing need in Austria at the moment. For
many people, especially families with children, this
is quite a problem; even the few provisions they were
able to bring with them got lost in the confusion of
flight or were stolen. Only limitless confidence in
God's providence allays their fear for the future.
By evening the English soldiers brought some dry food
from their own stores.
Major Barre's first visit took place two days after the arrival
of the main body of refugees. He asked them to set up a camp
committee but they had already established one which they
called the "National Committee for Slovenia" and which passed
its first two decrees, both on education, on 16 and 18 May, as

27

. Dr Mersol described him as "a very conscientious and for

the Slovenian refugees very meritorious officer".
55

the "annual report for the school-years 1945/46" 28 recorded:

The National Committee for Slovenia with decree 1 issued
the charter of constitution for the new secondary
school and with decree 2 appointed Director Bajuk
chief of culture, charging him to organise all the
schooling among the Slovene refugees in Carinthia elementary,
higher
elementary,
professional
and
secondary schools.
And so we began working.
There
were enough teachers for both the elementary and the
complete
secondary
school,
and
so
we
began
immediately in the most simple way, in the open and
in the corridors.
But from these simple beginnings
our work developed fast. The Lord had blessed it.
Director Bajuk has already appeared in this narrative, as the
60 year old grandfather who accompanied his son, daughter-inlaw and four grandchildren through the terrors of the tunnel.
Everyone mentions his phenomenal energy.
He had been
headmaster of the principal classical secondary school in
Ljubljana and also a school inspector. I described him at the
time as a cross between Lenin and Sir Thomas Beecham in
appearance and dynamism.
He was also a gifted composer and
arranger of songs for, and conductor of, the camp choir.
It
was he who wrote the school annual report.
He gave more
details later in his memoirs:
I began to worry about what would happen to our pupils ..
and made plans for a temporary school, having looked
through the list of secondary school teachers and
found that ones for almost all subjects were
available.
I raised the matter with Dr. Basaj,
deputy chairman of the National Council, who was at
once very keen, especially after seeing Dr. Mersol's
enthusiasm. So right away I invited all teachers and
pupils to meet at the central camp office and enough
turned up for us to decide to start lessons
immediately, which led to decree No 1.
But we had
enormous difficulties - no classrooms, books, writing
paper, pencils. We cleaned out an abandoned building
with an adjoining barn for classrooms and used what
we could lay our hands on for chairs, a few planks of
wood for desks, while the English camp commandant
Major Barre, who was very kind to us, got us a
blackboard.
Professor Sever from Jezica and our
Bozidar helped a lot with cleaning up and sorting
things out, and the girls from Jezica did all the
heavy and dirty work.
28

. Duplicated copy in the possession of the author.

56

There were no books.

I borrowed a few Latin and Greek
texts from the Jesuit monastery, Bozidar copied them
for our pupils on his knees and on wooden crates, and
we found single books among the pupils, at secondhand dealers and from individuals in Klagenfurt.
With great difficulty we got paper and a few pencils
from the camp office and bought some in Klagenfurt.
Teachers had to prepare scripts for all subjects,
write down lessons and texts, compose mathematical
problems, etc.
All this required enormous work,
specially difficult because the teachers were living
in tents.
Colonel Baty's report rightly described
the whole achievement as heroic.
As I had also been given provisional responsibility for
the whole of education I called together all the
elementary school teachers and pupils. Six Salesians
also came to the meeting, and I put Cigan in charge
of out-of-school youth activities and Mihelic of
singing, and the others helped in the schools.
The elementary school was running within a week - Jane Balding
"saw school in action in open" on the 25th May - and lessons
for the 148 secondary school pupils started in mid-June.
Colonel Baty inspected the secondary school in August and his
report is reproduced under that date. Pernisek continues:
Our morning devotions, the
Ember Saturday 19th May 29 .
30
smarnice , are just beautiful.
From seven in the
morning the church is full to the last small corner.
A different priest delivers a sermon each day,
followed by sung mass with organ accompaniment.
People are very composed and all receive holy
communion, while the singing is most beautiful and
from the heart. Holy communion is distributed by two
priests at all masses, and these are being said from
five till ten-thirty.
The confessionals are also
permanently besieged.
Wherever one looks round the church one sees tears in
people's eyes. We are all suffering under the cross
we put on our own shoulders.
We took it up
willingly; let us carry it following Christ, who
29

. the Saturday before Whitsunday, a day of fasting and

prayer.
30
.
a popular Slovene church service comprising an
exposition of the Blessed Sacrament, sermon, rosary, litanies
of Loreto and benediction.
57

suffers with us. We only ask that we understand in

the right way the suffering of these times and that
God does not try us beyond our strength, so that we
do not fall under the weight of the cross. Jesus, be
you our Simon of Cyrene when our strength ebbs away!
Afternoon and evening services are also beautiful.
Smarnice for all - a sung holy rosary and sung
litanies of Our Lady - are offered at six in front of
a large framed canvas painting of Marija Pomagaj 31 .
The domobranci have their own smarnice at eight, the
special attraction being the mighty male choir.
Sunday 20th May.
Today is Pentecost.
Three Montenegrin
chetniks came to the camp.
15,000 left Montenegro
but only these three reached here: all the others
died on the journey, many of typhus fever, or were
killed by the ustashe or the partisans.
The
partisans captured them near Kamnik, disarmed them
and took them away together with their women and
children somewhere north of Kamnik where they killed
them with machine guns.
Some 300 Montenegrins were
killed that way, all who reached Slovenia.
Tuesday 22nd May.
Today we received bread for the first
time - stale army rations but the children eat it
with relish.
Today we realise what a great
inestimable boon it is when we're so hungry. A few
weeks
ago
I
read
a
book
"L'eroica
felicita
32
and couldn't understand or imagine their
giaponese"
simple and unostentatious life style.
I understand
now when I see how easily man can live simply. I can
rest well, sleeping on a palliasse or on the bare
hard ground.
A lot of makeshift cooking places are springing up in the
camp: two bricks, some twigs and branches between
them, empty tin cans or a washing bowl on them and
the food is cooking.
A royal dish, if a morsel of
meat and fat has been added.
We now find despised
horsemeat very tasty, and of this there's enough.
Our horses grow fewer every day, as the army has
driven them all off except for the few needed for the
transport of supplies.
The camp presents a unique sight in the evening. Mighty
Mount Kosuta sparkles in the setting sun like a giant
31
32

. Mary Help Us.

. the heroic happiness of the Japanese
58

emerald, while smaller mountains and hills are

wrapped in a mysterious bluish hue set off by the
magnificent green of the pine trees.
Fairy-like
white wisps of mist float above the larger and
smaller lakes. Daylight dims fast, the day ebbs away
and the camp becomes a single huge bonfire.
One
blaze after another lights up the surroundings
fabulously and smoke rises skywards like a thin
transparent veil.
From the fires come a cheerful
chatter of voices and the joyful sound of the
patriotic songs of the domobranci accompanied by
accordions. Now and again horses' neighs pierce the
air.
Eventually the camp falls silent with God's
sublime peace above it.
I walk around the camp between eleven and twelve. Silence
and peace reign.
One hears people's snoring in a
light drone. The tents assume a silver colour in the
moonlight and the stars twinkle happily.
Here and
there some older refugee sits in front of his tent
and gazes at the sky, searching for his own star.
Only the coughing of the elderly and the ominous
hooting of the owls disturb this heavenly peace.
Ill-omened owls!
From early childhood I hate your
sinister hooting.
I'm trembling and my soul is
filled with an inexplicable fear. I can't shake off
the impression that these hoots presage horror and
death.
I'm suffocated by this feeling and try to
escape it.
Thursday 24th May.
The feast of our Maria Pomagaj of
Brezje, our national day. Today the English started
to carry away the Serbian volunteers and the
Mihailovic chetniks: heavy rain made the removal very
sad, the soldiers gloomy and subdued. The whole camp
is one muddy lake.
Engineer Tavcar gives a second account of camp life in his
diary:
16th

May.
Troops, battalions and regiments
formed in the army section of the camp.

are

being

18th May.
The food situation for us refugees is getting
worse.
Many are starving, especially those from
Dolenjska.
22nd & 23rd May. Life continues much the same every day.
We have weddings and births and church services.
School has started, with around 400 school-age
59

children taught by refugee teachers.

Today I was
planning to go to Klagenfurt by bike, but the English
wouldn't let anyone out of the camp. In the morning
some 10,000 English soldiers arrived from somewhere,
driving in their tanks along the roads headed East.
24th May. Life is getting dull, we've lost our sense of
time. We sleep under carts and bark sheds, cook what
we've left in barrels.
They say the English will
start giving us bread in two days. It's been raining
all day long, which has a very bad effect on us since
we're crouching under the carts. Sanitary conditions
are getting worse, with one more calamity - lice.
Rumours start begin to circulate that the men are not being
sent for their safety down to Italy as promised, but back to
Yugoslavia. The Red Cross nurse, Jane Balding, writes:
Friday 26 May
heck of a night
sore throat
result of
injection
earache
jaw ache
full of misery
went to camp
awful tales of returned refugees being
murdered in tunnels
main question seems to be do
they return to be murdered or stay here & starve or
die of pneumonia if they are not under cover soon
incessant pelting spring rains
camp one huge swamp
spent afternoon packing up to leave hotel for billet
moved after tea am in house alone
nice little room
with balcony
others all in next house
mine to be
mess
me to be messing officer!
had dinner at
hotel
decided to stay night!
all very pleasant
sat in bar talking shop to Major Barre
mostly
childbirth!!
Sunday 27 May
spent morning running round camp &
chatting to British guard
huge church service in
open for refugees
priest in all his finery
most
picturesque
spent whole afternoon till 6.30 going
round country with Major B. & Major Sturgis looking
for home for our 17,000
decide we must build
hutments.
Pernisek writes:
Sunday 27th May. Today the first contingent of domobranci
leave the camp.
The order for departure arrived
without warning last night.
We celebrate the first
mass of the young priest Fr Vinko Zakelj in the
parish church of Our Lady of Victories, but there's
no festive spirit, the mood sad rather than cheerful.
Marian Loboda, a schoolboy at the time, who earlier described
60

life under German occupation now gives his account of Vetrinje:

The

days we stayed in Vetrinje were for a youth of

fourteen full of adventure.
By good fortune the
climate was fairly kind and I don't remember
suffering from bad weather. What I did feel after a
couple of days was hunger.
Once my mother got hold
of a piece of mule meat and we started a fire, found
an empty food can and began to cook it.
I know I
collected a mountain of firewood and the meat was
still tough.
In the end we ate it because hunger
overcomes everything. We liked the English soldiers
who mounted guard round our encampment and looked on
them as our protectors.
There were warning notices
that partisans were prowling around and reports of
kidnappings and assassinations of people who'd
strayed from the encampment.
Apart from that we
children had a good time, and everyday made fresh
discoveries.
Teachers tried to get us together for
games and lessons and to protect us from the many
dangers we ourselves ignored.

One

morning towards the end of May I watched the

domobranci climb onto the trucks and leave to the
accompaniment of songs and cheers.
They said they
were going to Italy and we'd soon be following them.
I didn't take much notice, perhaps because the
soldiers from our Kranj detachment were detailed to
go last.
A couple of days later I went into the
little church belonging to the convent of Vetrinje,
moved by curiosity at the uncontrollable weeping I
heard. There were a lot of women and some men in the
church, all praying aloud between tears and sobs.
They were the mothers, sisters, wives and betrothed,
fathers, brothers and friends of the domobranci,
who'd left for Italy in the English trucks a day or
two earlier.

The

first to escape had arrived and told what had

happened.
The English had treacherously sent the
domobranci to the Yugoslav frontier and handed them
over, disarmed and deceived, to their mortal enemies,
Tito's partisans.
No one was under the slightest
illusion as to what would happen to them. Everything
collapsed completely, first of all our faith in the
men we'd always believed to be "gentlemen". The blow
was so great that people lost the most basic of
instincts of struggle to save their lives.
Young
men, previously true heroes, seemed to be without the
slightest will to do anything to save themselves.
61

All that remained for us was God's mercy and prayer.

Majda Vracko has already related her flight from Ljubljana with
her father the judge, and here she describes their arrival at
Viktring.
Not yet 17 herself, she looked for her brother
Marian who had just turned 16 and was with the domobranci:
The second day I looked for him: he was nowhere.
The
third day Dr Puc told me he thinks he's in the sickbay, and I went there and sure enough he was. I met
with him every day until he moved and was in the
middle of the field somewhere: they had their own
tents and I was visiting him there. All the people
we knew were slowly finding each other, friends with
whom we were going over Ljubelj, also school friends,
family friends. I knew a lot of people I didn't even
know were there! And Marko Bajuk, the director of my
school, the classical gimnazija of Ljubljana, made me
feel very good when he said, "don't worry, we won't
waste an hour, we'll start the school right now."
And he started it, we were meeting outside on the
grass of that monastery in one corner. And when we
were there in 1989 we went to visit that corner, and
it's still there.
We were meeting very regularly,
and each day there was another new professor that
came from somewhere, so that we had quite a good
selection.
It was very pleasant because there were so many people to
talk to, and food wasn't too bad; I think we were
hungry but didn't realise it. I remember once I went
to church and all of a sudden I'm on the ground and
lots of people are standing round me, and I said,
what happened? And they said, you fainted. I said,
how could I faint? I'm not sick. And somebody said,
you're hungry.
And I said, is that what hunger
means?
Because I'm hungry for the first time ever.
I think it was not knowing we were hungry and having
friends around that helped.
In the morning we
started with going to church, which was a beautiful
old monastery. Masses were going on from six o'clock
until noon.
There were many, many priests, and
masses at all the altars, so you didn't even have to
go at a certain time, you just went and were able to
participate in one or other service. Every day.
And

then came Monday when they started to send the

soldiers, as we thought, to Italy.
We were quite
happy they were able to go because they said, "we're
going to make way for you".
At first they said
62

civilians shouldn't go because we don't know how

rough it's going to be, and even so a few went 33 . So
they went Monday, Tuesday ... Wednesday they started
to say something's wrong.
But on the Tuesday Dr Puc comes to the factory and is
looking around and says, "I'd like to speak with Miss
Vracko.
Where is Miss Vracko?"
I didn't know him
then and thought he was a priest because he had a
dark blue suit and a white shirt, and I said, "I'm
Majda Vracko" and he said, "I've very bad news for
you.
Your father had high fever, he was delirious
and we had to send him to Klagenfurt hospital." My
God, what is this? And then Dr Mersol comes. Since
I knew him, he knew I'd feel better if he talked to
me and he said, "I think it's typhoid, but he had
very high fever and was completely delirious."
Fortunately with English help they could transport
him to the hospital.
So all of a sudden I was alone. I went to see my brother
and he wasn't in his tent any more, and I didn't know
whether he'd left.
I didn't find him, but I met
somebody else and he said, "no, no, no, his unit is
still here."
So I didn't worry yet.
Wednesday
somebody said, "they're returning them back to Tito."
I said, "it can't be."
And then I heard from
somebody else, "I think they are returning them." So
I went to ask Max Jan, one of the university students
who knew my father. I said, "would you say this was
true?" and he said, "Miss Vracko, are you also one of
those who believe that communistic propaganda? They
want to make us afraid, to make us doubt.
Don't
believe it".
So I was very calm.
And that was
Wednesday.
Next day Majda did believe.
It took me longer as I was
dividing my days between Viktring and a camp in Klagenfurt. I
had established cordial relations with my Italian-speaking
interpreter, and the other refugees were warmly appreciative of
what we were doing, but after a few days their attitude towards
me changed mysteriously and they became cold, withdrawn,
mistrustful and almost hostile. I found the atmosphere deeply
uncomfortable and was mystified, as Joze Jancar recalls:
You won't remember, but I remember.
I asked, "John, why
didn't you tell me?" and you said, "I didn't know"
and I said, "John, is that the truth?" and you said,
33

. in fact, a total of 600

63

"it's the truth. I didn't know". I asked because,

you see, nobody trusted you and they were suspicious
of me, that I was knowing things because we were,
they saw us, always together. I remember distinctly
I asked you and you were very upset. But people did
not believe - before they were very friendly to you but it took a long time, and then they came back.
To return to Majda Vracko:
Thursday more and more people were saying they are
returning them, so I was determined to go down to get
my brother. I got there but all I found - my brother
was very fond as a little boy of radios, any kind of
mechanical things, and I still saw some parts of his
radio he was showing me a few days before. So I knew
this was his tent, and he wasn't there any more. And
I spoke with another friend and he said, "yes, I saw
him, he was going on to the camion, as they called
those huge trucks, and I said 'Marian, don't you know
where you're going?' and he said, 'I don't believe
that. It's just a bunch of lies.' And he got on."
And then somebody else remembered seeing him later on
in Klagenfurt, and said the same to him. But at that
time they were all very resigned and said, "if this
happened to the rest of them, why not to us? I'm not
going to run away. This is the way it is." So that
was the last we heard of him.
My father was still in the hospital and I really didn't
know what was going on, and I somehow don't even
remember the next few days because I too fell sick.
I don't know whether I'd fever or not, I just
remember I wasn't even hungry, I was dreaming about
cherries that grew at home, I'd some sort of flu.
And one day I was sitting there on the floor in the
factory and I see my father come through the door,
ashen white, with beard not shaven, and all he said
was, "where is Marian?" and I said, "he left, I
couldn't find him."
He collapsed.
In the hospital
he found that they were returning them, and he left
without telling anybody, in his hospital gown, I
don't know how he found shoes, and he walked from
Klagenfurt all the way to Vetrinje, sick as he was,
to find out.
So of course they returned him there
and I was afraid he'd have another collapse.
And another thing. My friend who was with me, really my
best friend, whose fiance was the blind domobranec,
found his brother. The fiance was returned with his
64

brother because the brother felt, I can get better

care for him than he can get here with the civilians.
And she got bloody diarrhoea, so that she was really
almost dead .. and I was the one that was supposed to
be helping!
I didn't have diarrhoea, but I was
otherwise sort of distant. As soon as my father came
back and I knew that he knew - when this horrible
thing was off my chest - it started to get better.
I knew about the order that the civilians were to be sent
back next day: Mersol told us, drew us all together,
and we were praying all afternoon that they would
make the right decision. I remember that. To me the
worst thing was when my brother was returned and I
couldn't keep him there, and then my father expected
that I would, and I couldn't. And if I'd known more
I'd have taken him away before then, but I didn't,
and I thought I was doing the best thing letting him
be where he was.
There was great rejoicing when Mersol said the order had
been changed. Because first when he came, I'd never
seen him so down. As a physician he always knew how
to show faith and either didn't tell you it's the
worst or was giving hope: but at that time he was
really like he had already put on the cross himself.
Marija Plevnik was just 17 at the time, a few months older than
Majda Vracko, and had two brothers with the domobranci, one
sent back and the other not.
She recalls how they, and the
refugees in the civilian camp, reacted:
I

had an older brother who was sent back with the

domobranci. I still remember when he came to see me
and said, "well you're going to follow us.
We're
going to Italy, and then we'll be all together
there".
And then a few days later rumours started
that it isn't true, and soldiers escaped: "they are
sending the whole groups back to Yugoslavia". It was
just unbelievable.
It took a few days before we
believed it.
The first days they said, "oh, some
people are causing panic in the camp. It's not true.
They are definitely going to Italy".
Then, when Dr
Janez jumped out and was hiding in the field and came
back, when he started to report what actually is
going on, then they believed him.

And when people learned what happened - it's something

that will stay with me for the rest of my life there was a little church in Viktring, and people
65

would go there and they were just crying out loud

from their anguish, despair, disappointment, sorrow.
They put everything out from them and just cried,
cried, cried. It was unforgettable, it was non-stop,
people praying, kneeling, crying out loud, "God help
us. Look what's happening to us. We need your help.
You are the only one that can save us now".
It

was in a sense very healthy, a relief, good

psychologically that they were able to externalise
their grief, to express it, that they got it out of
their systems, and all the disappointment that
everyone experienced or went through.
There was a
big group of us who shared that.
And at the same
time we feared what would happen with us, because
there were rumours that we would follow, that they
would send us.

The priest of "the little church at Viktring", Pfarrer Josef

Mussger, recorded in his "Memorabilia book Viktring" the
succession of outsiders who at that time stayed a few days in
the parish and then moved on: Italian partisan prisoners-ofwar, so starved they stretched their fingers through the wire
to reach nettles and grass but were denied even that; their
Ukrainian police guards, columns of Hungarian oxen, defeated
German armies exhausted and without hope, Hungarian refugees,
the British, endless processions of cars and trucks, German
POWs, SS mountain artillery who stationed their guns in the
churchyard, and finally:
most wretched of all, the Yugoslav refugees, an endless
procession on 6, 7, 8 May, with their pitiful
belongings, camping out in the fields and woods. One
after another knock on my door seeking somewhere to
sleep: mostly priests, finally totalling 18, with 39
other civilians, squeezed into every possible corner.
The church was crammed full, with 600 - 1,000 people daily
attending 40 celebrations of Mass. After a couple of
weeks the domobranci were handed back by the English
to Tito-Yugoslavia and thousands were shot.
Before
that a number were married here.
How they sang in
the church!
Magnificent hymns, Slovene, fervent,
then much weeping because so many were sent back.
The parish register lists 21 Slovene marriages, 6 baptisms and
3 deaths. Marija Plevnik continues:
What did we do at Viktring? There was a little creek by
the camp, and we'd go along there to wash ourselves
66

and we'd go for walks around there. We were mostly

walking, going to church and going along to that
little creek.
And then I recall someone that comes
from the same place as I do, a professor, he was once
in Russia and he said, "keep in mind that we are
refugees now.
Russian refugees have been out of
their country for such a long time. The same thing
could happen to us", and we were shocked. How can he
say that?
How can he tell us?
We still had hopes
that something will happen, a miracle, and we will go
back. We didn't live with reality, we were in shock.
That was Professor Sever 34 .
I think he's still alive in
Cleveland.
He taught Slovenian language in the
gimnazija.
So he warned us and I guess we didn't
want to hear the truth.
We were very hungry.
I
remember getting corned beef in the can from the
English and something like grain wafers.
Isn't it
funny I remember that?
They're like crackers, only
they're sweet. Then we'd go to a certain place where
they were giving out food, soup with horse-meat,
maybe a few macaroni, a few potatoes.
I came to Viktring with my brother. My two brothers were
in the domobranci.
It was the older one that
encouraged me to go: "you'd better go; you don't know
what the communists are doing. It's only for a week,
and then we'll come back". So I left home with him.
We were four in the family, one sister and my mother
and father stayed home.
I was seventeen and my
sister was six years younger, eleven years old. One
brother was a year younger and the other two years
older. And he was sent back on a Tuesday, just the
older one.
The younger was supposed to go on the Thursday, when we
really knew what's happening; and then he was able to
get some civilian clothes. He changed and was hiding
some place in one of the tents and so escaped and
moved across to the civilian camp; and we were kind
of terrified because we saw some English soldiers
walking up and down the camp looking for anyone that
had a uniform, that they would force them to go back.
Up to now individuals have described how, confused and
bewildered, they gradually realised the domobranci were being
34

. the Professor Sever who "helped a lot with the cleaning

up and sorting things out" before the secondary school could
start, see p 00.
67

sent to Yugoslavia. But not only the domobranci: 600 civilians

asked to go with them, thinking they and their children would
be better off in Palmanova camp in Italy, where there was more
food. And the British allowed them to go, although they knew
it was not to Palmanova as they thought, but to be handed over
to the partisans, the very people they had just fled in terror.
Ivan Kukovica, a 26 year old engineering student at the time,
has recorded what happened to his family of eleven - father and
mother aged 47 and 45 and four brothers and four sisters aged 8
to 25. He explains why they left home in the first place:
Why did we feel we had to flee? My father was an ordinary
worker in a paper factory. In Slovenia we had three
workers' unions, communist, socialist and catholic.
He was president of the catholic union and the
communists hated him. He was a visible man there in
the factory and we got threatening letters and were
twice attacked by the partisans at night.
Beside
that Edvard Kardelj, later on vice-president with
Tito, was a neighbour of ours maybe 500m away from
our house. So our family was visibly anti-communist.
But not only anti-communists were fleeing the
country, all kinds of people were, peasants.
We left Ljubljana on the 8th May and it took us five days
to get to Vetrinje.
My parents and all nine of us
walked. We had a little wagon on two wheels, loaded
to the brim.
When we came to Ljubelj there were
partisans, so the people ran back down to the other
side of the hill and we abandoned the wagon with all
we had right there, because we couldn't run back with
it up the hill. So we came with nothing.
We

lost one child: on the way out of Ljubljana he

separated from us and wasn't in the group when we
came to Vetrinje.
He went with a group of his
friends through Austria and then down to Italy.
He
must have been fifteen.
At Spittal I found out he
was in Italy and went to get him and brought him back
to Austria. He wasn't sixteen yet, so Miss Jaboor 35
had an order to send him back, because somebody
learnt that he was an "unaccompanied" child. She was
looking for him but he was living with me in Graz.
She couldn't find him or maybe didn't want to find
him. I think she suspected he was with me, because
who else? There were no other relatives. I hid him
35

. director of the special camp for refugee students run by

UNRRA in Graz
68

successfully in the camp but he didn't get rations,

we had to share.
Ivan left "for Palmanova" a day before the rest of the family
to find suitable accommodation in advance for his father who
was still recovering from an operation.
He continues his
account:
It's an extraordinary story, miraculous so-to-say, how I
escaped from the train.
When we were pushed into
those cattle trucks I was lucky to get into a wagon
that had a shrapnel hole by the door. With my knife
I enlarged it so much that I was able to take my hand
out and open it. There were about 90 people in the
wagon. I found only two I knew, colleagues from high
school, and we decided, yes, we go.
So after we
opened the door we simply jumped out - we'd been
going to high school by train and daring each other
who can jump before it stops, so we knew how to do
it! We were out in no time and started to go back.
It was difficult to get into Austria because the
partisans were patrolling, and three times we almost
met death because we bumped into them: they didn't
see us, we saw them.
We went at night and during the next two days to Austria.
We were afraid of English people simply because they
were patrolling the streets, and I said, "if they get
me I'll be sent back again". So I was avoiding them
- and the partisans because they were still there in
Austria. Once we asked at a farmhouse for some food
and they gave us bread and milk, and at the same time
I saw a small 14 year-old girl running up the hill:
then I asked them, where are the partisans, and they
said, "oh they're up there, up in the hill" and I
asked, "do they come down to the house?", and they
said, "oh yes, they come down twice, three times a
day". So I said to my two colleagues, let's get out
of here. At that point we separated, saying if they
capture one, they're not going to get all three. So
the others went different ways, and I straight to
Vetrinje, but I was too late.
At Vetrinje we were only eight children, and of the eight,
all were returned.
Two sisters, two brothers and
both parents were killed.
I escaped, and the other
three eventually came out.
Ivan's mother and two older sisters shared the fate of most of
the women: repeated rape and then murder.
The two brothers
disappeared and were presumed killed at Teharje and the father
69

died after some days in prison from injuries received during

torture. The younger daughters and son aged 14, 12 and 8 were
sent to an orphanage where they were harshly treated but
eventually allowed to join an older married half-brother living
elsewhere in Slovenia.
Ivan eventually got to Canada and
married a fellow Slovene refugee, and significantly they went
on to have nine children of their own, and in due course
fourteen grandchildren.
Ivan gives the end of their story in
chapter 00.
The next account comes from another civilian who was sent back
and survived.
She wrote it only two years later, with the
memory still vivid and detailed.
I reproduce it in full, as
she gives some description of what happened not only to the 600
civilians but also to the 11,000 soldiers who were repatriated.
Pavci Macek was 16 years old in 1945.
She had led a very
sheltered childhood as the youngest of four sisters, attending
a convent school with her 18 year old sister Polonca and living
in a home run by nuns. She and her architect husband gave me
lunch in Buenos Aires in 1995, when she confirmed what she had
written earlier and added a detail or two so terrible she had
suppressed them in her original account. She began:
I was very young, living in the sky, very romantic and so
terribly, terribly childish!
I was still playing
with dolls, not like girls today.
Her father was a prosperous timber exporter and flour mill
owner from Logatec, a town south-west of Ljubljana.
A year
earlier a drunken companion had told him, pointing to the big
lime tree they were sitting under, "remember you and your
family will one day hang here". So he escaped immediately the
war ended with his wife and two elder daughters, but without
the two younger girls who had no time to join them from their
convent school in Ljubljana.
The parents and two older girls
reached Klagenfurt before the camp opened at Viktring, and got
places on a British army convoy which really was taking
refugees down to Italy. By the time Pavci and Polonca reached
Viktring their parents had already left, and, when the Logatec
domobranci were told at the end of May they were being sent to
Italy, they naturally offered to reunite them with their
parents. Pavci continued:
We got up and hurried to mass on Monday 28 May and when
our domobranci told us they were off to Italy at
midday and we with them, we were somehow astonished
and upset.
The troops folded their tents, packed
their knapsacks and marched off after lunch singing
to the rallying point. Twenty trucks were brought up
at three o'clock and we climbed in, sitting on our
70

knapsacks and leaning against each other. Our route

wound along beautiful roads past cornfields, dark
green woods, streams, handsome churches, attractive
houses with blood-red carnations and verdant rosemary
cascading from their windows. Every time we passed a
shrine in the fields I crossed myself without
thinking. Police cyclists darted between the trucks.
The officer in charge of the Logatec contingent spread a
map out and examined the countryside through which we
were driving and suddenly cried: "we're not being
driven to Italy. We've been betrayed!" We all fell
silent, stunned.
The bolder ones answered: "don't
try to frighten us!
Perhaps they've chosen a
different route!"
That was the end of peace; we
hardly spoke, but were overcome by a nightmare of
anxiety.
After some hours the column stopped.
We jumped to the
ground and brushed the dust from our faces and
clothes. In a marshy meadow at the end of the road
the English started searching our knapsacks and
pockets and taking cameras, knives, fountain pens anything valuable.
I looked at them terrified,
almost hating them. Then they told us to form fours
and march across the marsh. My shoes were soaked but
I'd no time to think about this. An English soldier
with rifle and bayonet led and we continued along the
road and then turned right and were already in front
of Bleiburg station.
I caught sight of caps with
five-pointed red stars and heard shouts and muffled
growls.
The English had betrayed us and handed us over to the
partisans, the communists!
I stared backward with
astonishment.
It seemed impossible our troops were
still here.
Was I dreaming?
I can't describe the
horror, grief and disgust they showed. I felt I was
looking into the dark eyes of a mortally wounded deer
my father once shot. Although they were not crying,
it seemed as if tears were flowing down their cheeks.
They crammed us into filthy, suffocating cattle wagons and
it flashed through my mind: "but we're not animals!"
Then they closed the doors and we found ourselves in
almost complete darkness.
My eyes soon grew
accustomed to it and distinguished individual faces.
The train moved. After a long and painful silence a
powerfully built older man groaned: "I've been in
many fights and faced many dangers, but to fall now
71

into the hands of the enemy in such a shameful and

deceitful way, unworthy of a decent fighter!"
We tore up our identity cards and photographs and all the
keepsakes dear to us, reminding us of home and loved
ones.
Someone removed a bolt from the latticed
window and a shaft of light flashed into the wagon.
In one corner a young lieutenant held a photo,
hesitated, was about to tear it up, then quickly
wrote a message on it, turned and said, "my dear,
would you do me a favour, possibly a last one?
As
you're a child they won't do anything to you. When
you get back home, give this picture to my fiancee".
Tears choked me but I nodded agreement, took the
picture and guarded it as a holy relic.
No one tried to escape.
We all sat dejected, depressed,
absorbed in our thoughts, shocked, hypnotised,
paralysed.
The train stopped and partisans climbed
in, shouting and cursing, and took any valuables we
still had, including clothing and shoes.
So far as
my sister and myself were concerned, I think we had a
special angel who guarded us because nobody touched
us; there was also a woman with a baby she was
breast-feeding, and I don't remember them touching
her.
At two-thirty that night we disembarked and
went under a strong guard of Russians and Mongolians
to some school or barracks outside Slovenj Gradec. I
was terrified when I heard an unknown language and
saw dark figures with tommy-guns and machine-guns at
the end of the path.
Once in the building they put us in separate rooms domobranci and male and women civilians - and set
guards at the doors. We had to take it in turns to
go to the lavatory and the washroom so as not to meet
up with the others.
Eventually my sister and I
succeeded in escaping along the passage past the
guards and after a long search found the Logatec
domobranci.
We were happy we were all still alive
and offered them everything we had to eat, but they
would only accept cigarettes. They were still brave,
putting their trust in God. We went back.
We were held there three days. A couple of times we were
given a strange-looking soup and something like
coffee.
Short and thick-set partisan women came,
looked at us as if we were wild animals in cages and
took any shoes or mountaineering boots that caught
their fancy.
Every day some domobranci were driven
72

off from the building.

We watched through the
windows, a woman catching sight of her husband, a
child her father, a girl her boy. They heard cries
and smothered weeping. Partisans threatened to shoot
at once if they saw us again at the windows.
On the third day we left with the rest of the domobranci,
after Slovene partisans had taken us over from the
Serbs. We waited in line in a passage and listened
to footsteps and screaming. Domobranci were running
down the stairs with partisans chasing and mocking
and striking them with belts and guns so that they
stumbled, fell, picked themselves up and again rushed
on.
It was terrible and my sister burst into
convulsive sobs, but the girls quietened her, "don't
cry! We mustn't show it hurts or let them enjoy our
suffering".
We controlled ourselves and passed our
mockers calmly and proudly when they jeered at us.
We waited a long time at the station, wretched and
miserable hunched on knapsacks and cases, and they
again interrogated us, jeered and took photos.
It
was dark when we mounted the wagons.
We got down from the wagons at Mislinje, where the railway
ended, and marched up the valley in thick darkness.
I slipped and fell on the damp grass. A fire burnt
at the edge and cast ghastly shadows on the meadow.
I thought we were going to die there.
In the
darkness someone shrieked the command, "on the road!"
and we ran uphill, but another partisan chased us
back. We huddled together like lost sheep terrified
by wolves.
Along the road they drove near us some
domobranci who were rushing past and we had to
follow.
The guards' command sounded harshly, "In
ranks of eight!"
We got ourselves in order somehow
as the road narrowed.
I unexpectedly slid over the edge of the road and just
saved myself from falling, but had to stop and caused
confusion in the rank. A guard cursed and fumed. My
legs trembled from tiredness and terror, as if filled
with lead, so that I simply couldn't move. I cried
to my sister, "I'm finished!" - "you must continue,
you can't stop here or they'll kill you!
Give me
your bundle!
Keep going, you can do it!"
This
spurred me on, I clenched my teeth and forced myself
forward.
The straps of my rucksack were cutting my
shoulders but I wasn't sweating and didn't want to
give in. The moon shone through the clouds and lit
up a ruined bridge. I stumbled on the sharp stones,
73

almost fell and saw dark stains on the ground: "what

is this? Blood?" Oh horror, it really was the blood
of our wretched sufferers.
We were so tired that
while we were walking I slept, just slept a little.
At three in the morning we reached a railway station
and found we'd walked eighteen kilometres. That was
the most terrible night for me. Soon I was relieved
to climb into a wagon, put my head on my rucksack and
instantly fell asleep.
We were woken by shrieks and frenzied beatings on the
doors.
They were opened and the sun poured in
harshly, blinding us.
Only cries and shooting - a
day of judgment. My sister whispered in my ear, "do
your act of contrition, our end has come!"
We were
made to stand on one side of the road, the domobranci
on the other, while partisans on handsome, fiery
horses, with bloodthirsty grins on their faces chased
our lads back and forth.
They beat them over the
heads and ordered them to undo and throw away their
belts and lie on the ground, and walked their horses
over them. Then they had them get up again and run
forward, all the time flogging them.
When a sick
soldier was too slow, they drew their revolvers,
aimed and shot him.
We reached Teharje, an hour from Celje, that evening after
been made to run forward, go back, stop and go
forward again.
We were worn down by our rucksacks
and staggered.
We started throwing away in the
ditches food, boots, clothes and then whole rucksacks
and suitcases. Some partisans noticed and took pity
and sent some of the worst injured lads to help us.
A fellow villager, his forehead streaked with strands
of hair glued down by sweat and clotted blood, came
to my aid. Parched, cracked lips begged for water.
We reached the brow of the hill - wire fences, guards and
barracks with pine trees and spruces on all sides and
a second hill beyond, with a view opening onto broad
fields to the north, but only barracks to the south.
We entered the camp and were received by harsh stones
underfoot
and
hostile,
rough-mannered,
spiteful
faces. For the last time we were plundered for gold,
watches, purses, money and documents; they said we
wouldn't
be
needing
them
any
more
and
took
everything.
They locked us in the barracks; in the
room where my sister and I were put there were wooden
bunk beds, a table and a broken-down wardrobe.
The
lads were crammed into a space between two barracks
74

fenced off with a high wire mesh.

Everything had
been taken from them and some were down to their
bathing drawers or underpants.
The first day we were given no food at all, the next
afternoon a little bitter beetroot soup, which even
pigs would have rejected.
I craved for potato
peelings. The sixth day they gave us a small, thin
piece of ration bread.
How delighted we were with
this!
Now and then we succeeded in throwing some
morsel or cigarette to the lads, even when we
ourselves were starving, and a couple of times were
able to give our ration to someone who ate it up
eagerly.
In spite of the hunger I felt I couldn't
eat and was continually weeping.
We were only allowed a few minutes at a fixed time in the
lavatory and the wash-room, so there was often an
intolerable stench in our room. We lay on the floor
as the bugs weren't so bad there; there were lice
also, and we itched and it hurt like hell. Every day
the military came, questioning and promising some
people they'd be going home soon and then sneering
and mocking at us, the domobranci and the bishop 36 .
We often had to go for interrogation, and again
questions, gibes, scolding, threats. The weaker soon
broke down.
When we got up we were faint from
weakness.
A partisan from Stajerska, whose father
we'd called by name, brought us bread from time to
time; and the partisan in charge of the wash-room
once or twice gave my sister bread. How grateful we
were!
It was terrible when they took the children under fourteen
away from their mothers, to send to the boarding
school at Celje, saying they were innocent. The
mothers wept and begged, and the children even more,
especially the smaller ones. It would have melted a
stone, but not those people.
That was nothing to
what the domobranci suffered. There was no pity for
them.
They sat for three weeks on the hard stone
with the sun burning them mercilessly during the day.
At night, poorly dressed and without other covering,
they were stiff with cold. They got up and lay down
only in response to commands. A terrible punishment
followed if a guard noticed someone talking with us.
I don't know how they survived. God alone supported
36

. Gregorij Rozman, Bishop of

leader of the anti-communist Slovenes
75

Ljubljana

and

spiritual

them with his mercy.

They came at night suddenly, shouting and with a list of
names, "the name we call, come here."
They didn't
call my sister and me, so we remained there. Another
day they said, "those with a brother or fiance or
father in the domobranci, come here" and I said to my
sister, "I'll go because it's so terrible here", but
she said, "we stay here, just be quiet."
So we
remained, while all those civilians were murdered
too.
They already started taking them away after a few days.
They twice drove off about eighty women.
One said,
"thank God they left you behind." Earlier ten of the
lads escaped during the night. They killed three of
them at once and others later, but two succeeded in
reaching Monigo camp37 .
The partisans were furious
and took it out on the rest of the domobranci,
beating them up and continually inventing new forms
of torture. We saw all this through the window and
wept.
Afterwards the windows had to be kept closed
and we didn't dare stand near them.
I heard late
into the night the cries of lads who'd gone mad,
probably because they'd been beaten up so badly.
On

Saturday 7th July they discharged the surviving

civilians from the camp after six weeks of suffering,
saying we'd been punished and so they were sending us
home, where a people's court would try us for all our
offences and our treachery. I didn't believe we were
going home and thought they were taking us to prison
in Ljubljana, and so the journey was painful and
hard.

Our train halted outside Ljubljana station.

During the
brief stop the Pozarj girls from Most and the two of
us got down from the open wagon cautiously and,
because there didn't seem to be any military guards
around, step by step crossed the railway lines.
We
reached the first gardens and houses quickly and then
started running as fast as we could. We were feeble
and half-starved, but fear and the hope of escape
gave us strength and energy.
Out of breath, we
reached the home of our fellow-sufferers and fell
asleep at once.
Next morning we bid the girls and their kind parents
farewell and boarded a tram to Krek Domestic Science
37

. in north-east Italy
76

School, where we'd lived with the School Sisters

during the war.
There were soldiers with rifles and
red stars in their caps all round the building!
Where now?
Not Logatec, because our family was no
longer there; then to our favourite aunt in the
suburb Bezigrad. In spite of the danger and her fear
she gave us a warm welcome and deloused us, and we
stayed a few weeks while still weak from fever and
our wanderings.
I was terrified every time a car
made a noise in front of the building.
Our aunt got in touch with our parents in Treviso camp in
Italy through a friend of our father in Trieste. Then
we obtained a doctor's certificate that I needed to
visit the seaside for convalescence and that as a
minor I needed my sister to escort me. With this we
got legal travel documents and left by train.
We
altered our appearance as we had to travel through
Logatec, and we saw father's saw-mill and flour-mill
from the train. Our oldest sister was waiting for us
in Trieste, and on the 11th August we joyfully hugged
our dear ones and friends from Logatec in Monigo camp
near Treviso.
It was four days after the repatriations started before
Pernisek fully accepted that the British had been deceiving
them:
Monday 28th May. We can't believe it, nobody can believe
it. The English are handing over Serbian and Slovene
domobranci to Tito's partisans at Podrozca station.
Not to Italy: to Yugoslavia, into the hands of the
communists they've sent them.

77

C H A P T E R

28 May - 4 June 1945

Captain Nigel Nicolson of the Brigade of Guards

describes how the forcible repatriations were carried
out, followed by the Balding and Pernisek diaries.
The surgeon Dr Janez realises what is happening and
escapes to warn the commander of the domobranci,
General Krenner.
The latter tragically refuses to
listen to this and a series of earlier warnings. The
Balding and Pernisek diaries recall the civilians'
horror when they gradually realise their menfolk have
been betrayed.
They describe how the army commands
that the civilians must also be sent back, and how Dr
Mersol and Major Barre resist the command.
Documents from Quaker and British Red Cross archives
record the protests made by the FAU and Red Cross
relief workers. Their leaders David Pearson and John
Selby-Bigge
submit
them
to
a
succession
of
sympathetic staff officers at Army HQ in Udine, until
the Army Commander himself sees Selby-Bigge and
finally cancels the repatriation order.

78

So the Macek sisters and Majda Vracko's brother were sent back
with ten thousand of their fellow Slovenes because they trusted
the British, while Gloria Bratina's brothers escaped because
their families preferred to trust their own suspicions.
What has the Army made of the episode?
It speaks with two
voices: one of officialdom, the other of decency and integrity.
General Sir William Jackson speaks for officialdom in the 1988
official history of the Mediterranean campaigns.
He writes,
"the outcome was entirely satisfactory to the Allied side".
Nigel
Nicolson,
distinguished
author,
publisher,
former
Conservative
MP
and
wartime
Grenadier
Guards
officer,
represents decency and integrity. He protested unsuccessfully
in 1945.
He also protested direct to General Jackson because
he was so shocked by his "cynical observation", but "failed to
elicit a word of pity or remorse."
He then wrote in a
newspaper article:
These were three weeks that should live in infamy. It was
one of the most disgraceful operations British
soldiers have ever been ordered to undertake.
The
editors [of the official history] should feel
ashamed. They say it was a political decision and no
business of theirs to pass judgement.
Politicians
have maintained it was primarily the concern of the
military.
It was the responsibility of both.
This brutal act was
committed
knowing
its
probable
consequences.
Compassion was overridden. For a momentary advantage
(but what?) and a desire to placate Stalin and Tito,
a major betrayal was deliberately organised.
The
passing of nearly half a century should not excuse us
from investigating who was responsible, and why. 38
Captain Nicolson, if anyone, was entitled to challenge the
official response because it was he, as brigade intelligence
officer of the 1st Guards Brigade of 5th Corps of 8th Army, who
had to transmit the orders to the troops and coordinate their
execution. The facts were concealed from the public for forty
years and it was not until 1986 that they were exhaustively
documented by Count Nikolai Tolstoy in his brilliant but
controversial book "The Minister and the Massacres", after his
earlier highly praised and uncontroversial "Victims of Yalta"
which dealt only with the forcible repatriation of the
Cossacks.
In the autumn of 1989 the forcible repatriations were the
38

. Independent Magazine, 22 April 1989

79

subject of a forty-day libel action in the High Court in

London, Aldington v Watts and Tolstoy, which was fully reported
in the serious press and on television so that the general
public became aware for the first time of what had been done in
their name.
In court the fact that the repatriations and
subsequent massacres took place was accepted and not disputed.
Lord Aldington, chief-of-staff to 5th Corps in 1945, won the
action because the jury was not satisfied he was personally
responsible in the sense Tolstoy alleged.
Nicolson commented
that a libel trial was too crude a method of writing - or
rewriting - history and the Government should institute its own
enquiry.
Nicolson was not alone in condemning the repatriations.
Captain Tony Crosland of the Royal Welch Fusiliers, later
British Foreign Secretary and leading Labour Party theorist,
wrote at the time in his diary entry for 18 May 1945:
The problem of the anti-Tito Croats and Slovenes is almost
causing a civil war within the British Army. We have
on our hands at the moment some 50,000 of them. When
we accepted their surrender, they certainly assumed
that they would not be returned by us to Yugoslavia.
It was then decided as a matter of higher policy that
they were to be handed back to Tito. ..
The unarmed lot were shepherded into trains and told they
were going to Italy; they crowded on in the best of
spirits, and were driven off under a British guard to
the entrance of a tunnel at the frontier: there the
guard left them and the train drove off into the
tunnel. Among officers here, there is a great revolt
and resentment against the deception and dishonesty
involved. 39
and in a private letter at the time he described it as
The most nauseating and cold-blooded act of war I have
ever taken part in.40
His widow and biographer added:
Twelve or thirteen years later, he was induced by someone
he loved, who knew nothing about the war, to tell her
what he minded most.
He spoke of [three episodes,
the third of which was] the train of cheerful,
39

. Crosland Susan (1982), Tony Crosland (Jonathan Cape,

London), pp. 38-9
40
. ibid, p.39
80

unsuspecting men going into the tunnel ... He didn't

go into detail. He really didn't want to talk about
it. 41
Tolstoy quotes the War Diary for 19 May 1945 of Colonel Robin
Rose Price of the Third Welsh Guards:
Lovely day.
Evacuation of Croats begin.
Order of most
sinister duplicity received i.e. to send Croats to
their foes i.e. Tits to Yugoslavia under the
impression they were to go to Italy. Tit guards on
trains hidden in guards van. 42
He also quotes an eyewitness to the repatriation from Viktring
of the thousand chetniks under the command of LieutenantColonel Tatalovic:
As

his men scrambled aboard, twenty-five to a lorry,

Colonel Tatalovic approached the British officer in
charge.

"Major, where are we going?" he asked.

"To join your army in Italy," came the reply.
"Word of honour?" persisted Tatalovic.
"Word of honour!" replied the Englishman breezily. 43
Nicolson himself wrote at the time in an official and semipublic document, a "Summary Report on Operations of First
Guards Brigade in May 1945":
The only point on which they were unanimous was in their
fear that we should return them to Tito, and this was
unfortunately exactly what we intended to do.
They
were not told of our intentions till they saw for
themselves the Tito guards boarding their train. We
allowed them to remain at Viktring in blissful
ignorance and under only nominal guard, for the huge
size of the camp ruled out the question of any
attempt to wire them in or keep them under the
constant supervision of our patrols. 44
and, more outspokenly, in his Sitrep (Situation Report) for the
18th May:

41

. ibid. p.41
. Tolstoy, op. cit., p.133
43
. ibid., p.156.
Information to Tolstoy from
M.S.Stankovic, then serving with Colonel Tatalovic's staff
44
. Quoted by Tolstoy, op. cit, p. 147
42

81

Mr

The whole business is most unsavoury, and British troops

have the utmost distaste in carrying out their
orders. 45
Forty-five years later, interviewed by a historian of the
British Imperial War Museum, he explained that his primary
responsibility was to disseminate information - to find out and
inform rear headquarters what was occurring at the front and
transmit orders received from Corps HQ.
The Guards got their
orders to return the Yugoslavs on the 16th May, and on the 19th
delivered the first batches to the railway stations of
Rosenbach and Maria Elend:
The whole operation lasted from 19 to 31 May: every day
train-loads of these Yugoslavs would depart for
Yugoslavia, and the Welsh Guards was the battalion
stationed at or near these two railway stations, and
they formed a staging camp; and I was constantly at
the railway stations and at the main camps watching
and reporting about the whole of this process.
We
received specific orders from our division that they
weren't to be told where they were going; and, as
naturally they were very anxious that they shouldn't
be sent back to Yugoslavia and suspected us, we were
told a little later, only a few days later, that we
were to tell them definitely they were going back to
Italy, in the case of the Serbs to join their
friends, other chetniks, at Palmanova in north-east
Italy.
This lie, which we told with the greatest reluctance, was
ordered from above, and of course if they'd learnt
the truth that they were going back to Yugoslavia
where they didn't expect to survive, none of them
would have consented to mount the railway trucks.
But as they trusted us that we were telling the truth
there wasn't much trouble about loading them on.
It's one of the most disgraceful operations that British
troops have ever been asked to undertake, and we felt
that at the time and many of us expressed it at the
time.
I expressed it in writing in a public
document, and was reprimanded for doing so: but the
evidence from people, officers who were engaged upon
this dastardly act, is overwhelming.
But our
feelings about it, which were of course reported to
higher headquarters, had no effect upon the operation
which was continued until all these people had been
45

. ibid., p. 133
82

sent back to Yugoslavia, as we knew almost for

certain at the beginning meant to their death.
And
if there was any doubt in our mind about it, we were
confirmed in that supposition by the escape of two or
three men who'd been loaded onto the trucks and got
over the frontier, seen what was happening on their
arrival and escaped and came back to warn their
fellow countrymen and the British officers what was
happening.
We sent these people to the higher headquarters, right up
to the general, General Keightley, commanding 5th
Corps, but either he didn't believe them or else he
thought that the necessity to carry out the orders he
was given from further up was dominant. ... There was
some justification for returning the Croats to Tito
because they'd been fighting all through the war in
alliance with Germany. In fact they could have been
called traitors to their state.
But the same thing
didn't apply to the Serbs and the Slovenes, and
particularly the chetniks who were engaged in a civil
war against communism inside the major war of Germany
against Yugoslavia.
It was a very confused
situation, and at the time of course we didn't
completely understand it.
There were women and children and old men and sometimes
babies who were in these convoys which we organised.
But in the Viktring camp we'd managed to separate
most of the women and children from their menfolk and
put them in a separate part of the camp. There were
6,000 of them, and we were ordered to send them too.
...
But at the very last moment owing to the
intervention of a very bold man with the military
authorities higher up those 6,000 were in fact saved,
and the order was countermanded at the last moment.
They weren't carriages, they were cattle-trucks, and there
were sixty men piled into each of them.
It was
rather like the evacuation to the concentration camps
in Germany, and they were locked in. ... It was
absolutely horrifying to watch.
And that is why I
say now, and felt at the time, that it was such a
disgraceful operation, that British troops should
never have been asked to undertake.
And we couldn't understand the reason why we were ordered
to do this, since it could have been perfectly easy
to ship all these people - there were only 70,000 of
them, and that was a drop in the ocean of the
83

millions who were swarming through Europe - we could

have shipped them back to Eisenhower's divisions in
Western Austria or even into Germany where they could
have accommodated them quite easily.
They were very well-behaved .. : they were happy to have
escaped into Austria under British protection. Very
soon they were organising even schools for the
children, and they were running horse races.
.. It
was like a sort of a Gold Rush camp, and with
concerts and festivals and a great deal of religious
celebration because there were many priests among
them.
They just were resting after their arduous
journey over the mountains, and although they didn't
know what was their ultimate destination they felt
secure.
We grew to like them very much, and they
were all so jolly and gay and grateful, and helpful
to us; and we had no trouble with them. .. I was
constantly in the camp. 46
Nicolson added that his views on the repatriations were widely
shared:
I was simply reflecting what was the current talk in the
officers' mess, but it wasn't confined to the
officers. The Welsh Guards who had the major task of
forcing these people into the trains - they were at
one point almost on the verge of mutiny. They were
saying to their officers, "is this what we fought the
war for?" And when one company of the Welsh Guards
was relieved by another, a sergeant in the first
company who'd been through this just for one day
said, "well, I'm very glad we haven't got to do it
again because I couldn't answer for what the men
would do if we were ordered to do this a second
time". So they rotated them the companies: it was as
bad as - the feeling was running as high as that.47
There has been independent confirmation for all Nicolson's
statements except the particularly shocking one, that the order
to lie came "from above". But now even this has been confirmed
- by from the most unexpected of sources.
Lieutenant-Colonel
Hocevar, the partisan army commander who negotiated the
handovers with "a senior British officer" on the 15th May, the
day before the Guards received their orders, has described the
negotiations in some detail, adding that:
46

. Imperial War Museum, 10968/2/1, pp.1-5 and 10968/2/2,

pp.12-13
47
. ibid, 10968/2/2, p.15
84

They told us they would entrain the quislings in Viktring,

while informing them they were being transported to
Italy.
Franc Pernisek continued in his diary:
Monday, 28th May.
We cannot believe it.
Nobody can
believe it. The English are handing over Serbian and
Slovene domobranci to Tito's partisans at Podrozca
station. They are sending them, not to Italy, but to
Yugoslavia into the hands of the communists.
The
first Serbian officer to escape from Jesenice across
the Karawanken and back to Vetrinje reported this
last night.
His name is Vujicic, his rank
lieutenant.
He arrived back on the 26th May before
the first transport of domobranci and went to General
Krenner and reported that the English soldiers were
sending the Serbian soldiers and others to Yugoslavia
to torture and death. General Krenner didn't believe
him.
We were convinced the English didn't commit
such crimes.
The Balding diary:
Monday 28 May
camp thinning out
chetniks (troops)
being taken off to POW cage
did round in morning
saw to school equipment with help of ORs [other
ranks]
Austrian kids in monastery (bombed out)
becoming menace to Yugo school
must clamp down on
them
went to Nazi HQ in afternoon in search of
writing paper
all in open ready to be burnt
building to be used as Red Cross store
rescued
quite a lot
also odd jars for hospital
Major B &
Connolly FAU called after dinner
searched house for
Nazi propaganda
found masses of books
son of
house says he was called up at 15 & Nazi shot men
behind this house in woods!
Tuesday 29 May
got baby clothes from Monica
NBG [no
bloody good] on the whole hung around at hotel for
Major B re camp furniture
went to hospital for
cough mixture
on to camp to MI Room
some flowers
another refugee man disappeared from camp
most
sinister
looked at furniture before lunch
picture
of me & General M in 8th Army News
went to Villach
after lunch to trace wife of refugee
no luck
saw
other BRCs
glad I'm at Klagenfurt
picked up ORs
on return journey & MPs [military police] picked us
up for speeding
had lovely bath
'acking corf
85

The Pernisek diary:

Tuesday 29th May. A glorious sunny day. The lads of the
3rd Regiment are leaving; they are happy and their
songs echo all around the camp. The English load the
last truck. Slowly the convoy moves out, truck after
truck leave the plain of Vetrinje. Accordions sound
cheerfully. The roar of the motors doesn't drown the
happy songs and cheering of the domobranci. A sea of
white handkerchiefs wave goodbye to the lads. Girls
and women are crying; their eyes follow the column
until it disappears. Farther off one can still hear
the singing and the accordions. Gradually the sounds
die, sinking into the distance.
Wednesday 30th May.
The lads from Kranj are mustering
The girls are crying
What are they going to do?
The song of Rupnik's commando battalion echoes around the
camp.
With them there are also going a lot of
civilians - people from Cerknica. The English don't
discourage or stop any civilians from going with the
soldiers.
But after each transport it is said with
increasing certainty that the destination "Italy" is
only an English trick, while in fact the anticommunist fighters are being handed over to the
Yugoslav communists at the Austrian border posts at
Podrozca and Pliberk.
But today it has become perfectly clear to all of us that
the English have been deceiving us in an appalling
manner.
The domobranci doctor Dr Janez, one of the
soldiers the English handed over to the communists
and only narrowly escaped, returned to Klagenfurt.
Towards evening some Serbs also turned up in the camp and
stated that they escaped from the transports which
the English handed over to Tito's men at Podrozca and
Pliberk.
The domobranci were treated in the same
way, as they heard from local people. The lads swear
that everything they say is the truth.
The news
spread immediately among the people and they were
overcome with panic.
Everywhere one sees griefstricken, despairing faces, and in the tents there is
loud lamentation.
A dreadful night awaits those domobranci who are detailed
86

for next day's transport.

Their commanding officer
paraded them and told them the English were handing
over the domobranci to the Yugoslav communists, and
it was up to them to decide what they wanted to do.
Some walked away, others declared:
If God demands this sacrifice of us, we will follow
our brothers and comrades even if it means death. We
also are ready to die for truth.
Marija Plevnik agrees with Pernisek that it was only when Dr.
Janez escaped and returned to Viktring and "started to report
what actually is going on, then they believed him".
Pernisek
described him as a domobranci doctor but he was in fact a
civilian surgeon and had refused to join any military or
political organisation.
His chauffeur had driven him to
Viktring in a Red Cross car loaded with medicines and
instruments, and two weeks later the two of them went with a
contingent of domobranci whom the British delivered to Bleiburg
railway station and handed over to the partisans. The two of
them saw what was happening in time and escaped by jumping
behind a station building and hiding in an adjoining rye field;
the driver was caught and put on the train but the doctor lay
undetected in the rye. During the six long hours he hid there
he remembered it was the anniversary of his qualification as a
doctor and to contemplate that by rights he should now be on
the way to his death with the others, and by any normal
calculations should be dead. He vowed that if he survived he
would dedicate his life to missionary service for the sick and
needy worldwide.
He fulfilled his vow and twenty-five years
later he spent Christmas day - the one day in the year when his
mission hospital in Taiwan was not doing any surgery - to put
on paper an account of how he got back to Viktring:48
When night fell I made up my mind to cross the rye field
and the road we'd been driven along and climb the
hill beyond.
I knelt and parted the rye cautiously
and silently and after waiting two hours looked down
the white road.
I saw there was no one and ran
across the road and up the hill 100 metres beyond.
There I waited for dawn, and around six crossed the
hill and approached the plain, avoiding people.
On
the way I met a woman with children who told me I was
in Austria and the railway station was Bleiberg, and
how to get to Klagenfurt.
Following her directions I reached Klagenfurt on foot at
48

. Tone Ciglar, Dr. Janez Janez, Utrinek Bozje Dobrote,

Ljubljana, 1993), pp. 15-16
87

midday the following day, the 30th May.

our people that the English were
domobranci over to the partisans.

There I told
handing the

My driver reached Vetrinj five days after me. Just after

I jumped into the rye a partisan woman came up and
asked him what he was doing and where the doctor was.
He said I'd already got on the train and she led him
to it, and it was only by a hair's breadth she missed
seeing me.
Around midnight he somehow managed to
smash the cattle truck window near Dravograd and hurl
himself off the train onto a bridge, injuring his
leg.
He was hidden by farmers for three days and
then succeeded in crossing the frontier to Viktring. 49
When Dr Janez returned on Wednesday, 30th May, General Krenner
finally accepted that the British were handing his troops over
to the partisans.
The way the General and the civilians of the Slovene National
Council rejected instance after instance of reliable evidence
that the men were being handed over has the quality of a Greek
tragedy.
So many young lives were lost that could have been
saved that the sequence of events needs to be examined in
detail, and this can be done best in the form of a diary: 50
On Thursday 24 May 1,000 Serbian chetniks commanded by Colonel
Tatalovic, the domobranci military supply unit and a few Serb,
Croat and Slovene civilians were the first to be sent back from
Rosenbach. A domobranec witnessed the handover after changing
into civilian clothes, and told his colleagues.
On Friday 25 May a Carinthian Slovene living in Rosenbach
travelled to Viktring specially to warn Krenner of what was
happening.
Krenner had him locked up for the night for
"spreading alarmist reports and stirring up animosities between
Serbs and Slovenes and within the domobranci".
On Saturday 26 May a Serb officer, Lieut. Vujicic, together
with two fellow chetniks, who escaped from the partisans at
Jesenice, twice reported their brutal treatment.
Krenner
threatened to lock them up for spreading panic.
49

. Tone Ciglar, Dr Janez Janez - Utrinek Bozje Dobrote

(Ljubljana, 1993)
50
. The account that follows is based on: Matica Mrtvih:
Specific Data on Slovenians who were murdered by the criminal
Liberation Front 1941-1945 (Cleveland, Ohio, 1968), iv, pp.7-9;
Vetrinjska tragedija, (Cleveland, Ohio, 1960), pp. 26-38;
Vladimir Kozina, Slovenia, the land of my joy and my sorrow,
(Cleveland, Ohio, 1980) pp. 228-232; Nikolaj Tolstoj, Ministar
i pokolji, (Zagreb, 1991), pp. 140-169.
88

On Sunday 27 May Colonel Drcar, Krenner's own chief-of-staff,

wrote in his diary:
Early in the morning at 7 o'clock the usually reserved
[Major] Vuk Rupnik came to my room looking worried
and asked if Krenner was awake. I passed him on to
Krenner's ordnance officer to wake him up and half an
hour later heard that Ljotic had gone to Rupnik the
night before with the terrible and unbelievable news
that the British had handed Tatalovic's Serbian
volunteers over to the partisans at Rosenbach on the
24th May.
Ljotic had escaped from the train before
it had pulled through the tunnel and secretly
returned to the camp. We were crushed by the news.
After the first shock Krenner, [Colonel] Bitenc, Bajlec
and Veble 51 decided this report was only a Serb trick
and attempt to get the domobranci to disintegrate out
of fear of being sent back to Yugoslavia and then
later have them join the Serb chetniks. My position,
that our intelligence should thoroughly investigate
the report so as to refute it at once if it was
false, was rejected by everybody on the grounds that
it was certain they were driving us to Italy. Ljotic
must be locked up because he is spreading panic in
the camp.
A Slovene civilian called Franc Veber reported on the same
evening that the domobranci were being driven to Rosenbach and
through the tunnel to Yugoslavia. Krenner was woken at one in
the morning, but dismissed his report on the grounds that three
patrols had been sent out that afternoon and had found no
evidence.
On Monday 28 May Colonel Drcar, undeterred by Krenner, sent a
soldier named Janko Marinsek to follow the next transport to
Rosenbach.
Marinsek talked with a railway man who told him
there was a permanent partisan garrison there and the British
were handing the domobranci over to them.
That evening Drcar
and Marinsek returned to the camp and reported their findings,
but the officers at HQ refused to believe them.
Three Serb officers also reported that the transports were
going through the tunnel to Yugoslavia but fell silent when
required to repeat their statement in front of the English.
Krenner did however go to the British army HQ in Klagenfurt in
51

. two members of the Slovene National Council or SNC, the

body representing the interests of the Slovenes who had fled
into Austria and Italy
89

the morning together with Colonel Bitenc and two members of the
Slovene National Council (SNC) to find out definitely where the
transports were going. At Brigade HQ a captain told them they
were going to Palmanova in Italy, a base half way between Udine
and the sea. The four then went on to Division HQ, where after
a wait of three hours an officer again told Krenner the
transports were going to Palmanova, but could not answer
Krenner's objections that the bridges were down on the only
route there was via Rosenbach.
The delegation returned to
Viktring and still did nothing to warn the domobranci.
On Tuesday 29 May Dr Basaj, President of the SNC, was able to
speak with General Keightley himself to find out what was going
on.
Keightley indignantly denied that handovers had occurred
and threatened with severe punishment anyone spreading such
rumours.
Drcar, for his part, went on bicycle to check on his own, and
found out from a railway worker and some local residents that
the British really were handing the domobranci over to the
partisans both at Rosenbach and at the nearby station of St
Helena.
He returned and reported that the trains were
definitely going to Yugoslavia. The answer of Krenner and the
other staff officers was that in that case the men must be
being driven across Yugoslav territory via Lake Bohinj to
Italy, or otherwise via Villach to Italy. Colonel Bitenc added
that the SNC knew for a fact the British were driving them to
Italy and anyone spreading panic rumours should be locked up or
dealt with more harshly. The same day a domobranec lieutenant,
Otmar Sprah, returned with a Serb woman and reported they had
succeeded in escaping from the British handover, but his
evidence was rejected on the grounds that he was an unreliable
witness.
On Wednesday 30 May Drcar took a Captain Tomic with him to
Rosenbach, where a partisan confirmed the British were handing
the men over to Tito's troops. They hurried back to the camp,
arriving around midday.
Krenner had also sent his chauffeur
Franc Sega to Bleiburg, and he confirmed that Bleiburg was
swarming with partisans who were taking delivery of the men.
Drcar and Tomic returned with Sega and then Dr Janez turned up
and the four of them reported to a meeting of the SNC in
Klagenfurt.
All the members of the SNC were still highly
sceptical and only the combined testimony of the witnesses, and
in particular that of Dr Janez, finally convinced them.
Eventually the SNC decided to send a delegation to the camp to
warn the domobranci who were about to be returned and any
accompanying civilian refugees that all the transports were
going to Yugoslavia, and not to Italy.
90

Franc Sega had in the meantime returned to his employer Krenner

and had a long session with him.
Krenner emerged, having
changed into civilian trousers but still wearing a military
shirt, stepped into his car and left without saying a word.
Captain Nigel Nicolson recorded his departure in his log book
next morning, "General i/c Slovenes missing in his green Adler
coupe".
Nikolai Tolstoy describes him as "a man remarkable
only for extreme ineptitude and cowardice." 52
Fourteen separate reports, all more or less corroborating each
other, were needed to convince Krenner and the SNC that the
British were lying, and persuade them to pass on the
information enabling the domobranci and civilians to decide for
themselves whether to risk their lives by boarding the trucks
provided by their British protectors.
The witnesses who were
not believed included nine Serbs - six officers, two soldiers
and one civilian - a member of the Slovene minority living in
Austria and ten Slovenes - six domobranci officers, including
Krenner's own chief-of-staff, three soldiers and one civilian.
The poignancy of the tragedy increases when it is recalled that
at least one British officer was also doing his best to save
them and risking severe disciplinary action if found out.
Drcar recorded that well before the repatriations started:
The British had dropped an obvious hint it would be better
if the soldiers changed into civilian clothes, and Dr
Bajlec [a member of the SNC] had even informed [me]
on 21 May the British had said they would consider
all those in uniform as prisoners of war and those in
civilian clothes as refugees.
What caused this tragic blindness, resulting in the avoidable
deaths of so many thousands of soldiers and civilians? Krenner
and his staff and the SNC were all equally determined to shut
their eyes to what was happening.
They were so sure the
western allies would enter their country after Germany's defeat
- as in fact happened with their neighbour Greece - that their
whole world collapsed when the hated communists seized power
instead and they had to flee. They were as a result in severe
shock, unable to face reality.
They had to have someone in
whom they could put their faith.
They hated and feared the
partisans and the Germans, Italians and Russians equally, and
that left only the English and the Americans. So they must be
trust-worthy, whatever the evidence to the contrary.
The powerful feelings of insecurity of the Slovenes led to
52

. Tolstoy, The Minister and the Massacres (London, 1986),

p. 168
91

paranoia, so that although they normally got on reasonably well

with the Serbs, inter-ethnic prejudices and mistrust now
prevailed and they deluded themselves with the fantasy that the
reports of repatriations were Serb chetnik plots to undermine
their morale and destabilise the domobranci.
Dr Mersol himself confirmed that Krenner and the SNC were
blinded by the assurances of people they trusted implicitly.
He wrote: 53
I asked Major Barre what was really happening.
Everyone
would agree that he was at that time our best friend
and a sincere man who looked as few others for the
welfare and benefit of our refugees, the civilians
and, where possible, the soldiers. He asked the army
- I don't know who - and was told that all our
domobranci were going to Italy.
It was no doubt his immediate superior, Major Johnson, whom
Major Barre asked.
Johnson may have answered him with the 5
Corps "official version" in good faith, unaware that it was a
lie. A Mrs Grapar, one of the refugees, told Johnson on 29 May
that rumours were spreading that the British were handing the
domobranci over to Tito's men, and he protested, hurt, "Don't
you trust us?" The school director Marko Bajuk got a similar
reaction from Barre:
He, visibly hurt, replied: 'Do you think that the British
could really do something like that?'
The Balding diary:
Wednesday 30 May
heck of a morning chasing round for Red
+ message forms etc
also furniture for MI [medical
inspection] Room
six chairs & two tables scrounged
called at 7th advance stores re scabies had very wet
FAU wished on me after lunch
The very wet FAU, also referred to as the WYM or Wet Young Man,
was of course me.
I must have finished my immediate work on
hygiene and offered to help with welfare.
The Florence P
mentioned in the next entry for 31 May was the second Red Cross
nurse Florence Phillips, whom I describe in my letters as
"Scotch, has imagination and ability and should be easy to work
with". The Balding diary continues:

53

. 23-page duplicated document "Events in Vetrinje in May

1945 written by Dr. Valentin Mersol according to his own
experiences", copy in possession of author.
92

went out to 5th corps near lake for permit for Benzil Ben 54
nice chatty time
collected BB on way to camp
delivered same at MI Room
took WYM round camp
ashamed to pass my OR [other ranks] friends
militia
almost gone from camp, camp in state think they've
gone back to Tito
Red + resigning in body unless
they get low-down
Thursday 31 May
very unhappy atmosphere in camp
much
silent weeping
persistent rumours of militia being
disarmed & sent back to Tito
must get position
clear
tea with ORs
managed to lose WYM
went
later in morn to civil hosp:
very inefficient, went
to Unterbergen in afternoon to Mat[ernity] hosp:
lovely spot shown every corner by doctors
seem very
genuine food very bad
returned to camp
civilians
to be removed tomorrow
left Major B. to find out
where & why
13 to supper
very successful
workers seem almost over anxious to please
Florence
P. sharing my house
hopes to work in camp
good
The Pernisek diary:
Thursday 31st May. Today we celebrate the Feast of Corpus
Christi. Our hearts are crushed, our souls sorrowful
unto death.
We suffered a terrible night: at the
moment when we are commemorating the greatest mystery
of our holy faith, the English are loading the last
lads onto their trucks.
Poor lads, what terrible
fate are they approaching! In the middle of the holy
mass which was celebrated in the castle courtyard by
Rev Canon Dr Tomaz Klinar it started to rain, and it
continued to rain during the modest procession.
For us today the Feast is not a day of joy. For us the
instant consists of the feelings of Our Lord and his
disciples on the holy evening when they went to the
Mount of Olives for His death. Oh Lord, this moment
we can well understand Your cry: "My soul is
sorrowful even unto death."
You had nobody on this
earth to help You, Your Father's Will was inexorable.
What happened to the domobranci might happen any
minute to us all.
We have no more friends on this
earth!
They have all abandoned us in our most
difficult hour.
Stay with us at least You, Lord:
stay with us in our hour of death!

54

. benzil
scabies

benzoate,

an

ointment
93

for

the

treatment

of

In the afternoon Dr Mersol returned from Podljubelj with

Major Barre. Lieut Hames's interpreter, Mr Kristof,
was waiting for them outside the camp office and told
the Major to go as quickly as possible to the
commandant of the military camp, because it was a
matter of the return to Yugoslavia of the civilian
Slovene refugees. This was the first time Dr Mersol
learnt that the civilian refugees should also be
returned. When he heard this he said to Major Barre:
So it's really true the English are sending the
refugees back home to be tortured and killed?
Earlier they sent back the soldiers, now it's the
time for us civilians. Up till now we didn't believe
the English were capable of lying and deceit, but the
facts confirm these dishonourable acts.
On hearing his words Major Barre turned pale and asked Dr
Mersol to accompany him to Lieut Hames.
The latter
objected to his presence during the conversation, but
at the Major's request gave way.
He picked up a
paper and said: "I've orders that tomorrow 1 June we
should send from the camp 2,700 Slovene civilian
refugees, that's to say 1,500 to Bleiburg station and
1,200 to Maria Elend station. They must be ready to
leave at five in the morning.
They will be
transported by trucks from the camp to the stations
mentioned, where a train will await them."
The lieutenant asked the major to carry out headquarters'
order, but the major asked him to wait so that he
could go to Klagenfurt with Dr Mersol and intervene
with the Military Government.
The lieutenant
telephoned HQ about this, and they arrived there
about six, to be received at once by Major Johnson,
Chief of the Department for Displaced Persons.
Dr
Mersol asked him to help save the Slovene refugees,
as this was their duty since they had taken them
under their protection.
Dr Mersol then withdrew to another room at Major Johnson's
wish and the two majors conferred together.
There
was a lot of telephoning in all directions.
After
about thirty minutes Dr Mersol was again called into
the office.
Major Johnson offered him a chair,
looked at him in silence for some seconds and then
said in Major Barre's presence: "We've decided the
civilians won't be sent back to Yugoslavia against
their will. Only those who want to, will go."
94

Dr Mersol recorded more of their conversation: 55

I

was very glad of this declaration, which came

unexpectedly fast for me.
I thanked him with kind
words, stating that he had helped save the lives of
thousands, and that the conditions in Yugoslavia are
terrible and far from being anything like democratic.
He interrupted me: 'You may not inform me about
conditions in Yugoslavia.
I know a lot about it,
therefore we decided thus as I told you.'

Johnson indeed knew a lot, having spent six months as a British

liaison officer at Marshal Tito's HQ. Pernisek continues:
After thanking Major Johnson cordially for his successful
intervention the two men returned to the camp and
informed Lieut Hames of their success.
He asked
Major Barre to arrange for him to receive the order
in writing from Division and wished to know how many
people wanted to go.
Major Barre returned to
Klagenfurt. When he got back at ten that evening the
whole camp committee was waiting at the office to
thank him cordially for his successful intervention.
The major was greatly moved and had tears in his
eyes.
The Balding diary:
Friday 1 June
had day in bed
might as well have been
up & about
everyone so anxious for my welfare
continual stream of visitors
got up for dinner went
to bed immediately after
decided I'm all agin
everything & everybody
high time I went home
Saturday 2 June
still all agin all, started day with row
hurt WYM feelings
told him I was used to men doing
men's work etc. Florence P., he & I now run camp me
babies
he hygiene
F.P. general welfare
have
decided to keep quiet if poss:
camp has option of
returning to Yugoslavia
150 out of 6,012 were for
it then backed out, persistent rumours of unarmed
militia handed over to Tito
mine went up in camp
no damage
domestic trouble
cook not to be
trusted!
The Pernisek diary:
55

. from a cyclostyled document in my possession: "Events in

Vetrinje in May 1945: written by Dr Valentin Mersol according
to his own experiences", p. 13.
95

Sunday 3rd June.

The people who wanted to leave, left
today.
There were about 100 Slovenes, the rest
deciding not to go, and 100 Croats and Serbs. They
travelled on 40 horse-drawn carts via Ljubelj. Today
a Montenegrin chetnik arrived, who'd escaped from
Radovljica where the communists shot on the bridge
about 600 Montenegrins and Serbs who'd been sent back
on the first transport from Carinthia.
The atmosphere in the camp is very depressed. Whenever I
look at the empty space where the domobranci had
their tents, an icy coldness grips my heart as I
think how the communists, drunk with victory, are
torturing and killing them.
The English have
disillusioned us in an appalling way. We never could
have conceived that such a vile and hypocritical
betrayal was possible. The good Mr Corsellis, who's
working for us in our daily needs, admits the English
who are with us are ashamed of what has been done.
There is nothing left for us but to lock our grief in our
hearts and not complain.
We are of course only
refugees, delivered up to the mercy of the English.
Major Barre told us that tomorrow someone senior and
very important will visit us.
Tolstoy
documented
the
Russian
and
Yugoslav
forcible
repatriations in meticulous detail in three substantial
volumes 56 , but only wrote briefly about the civilians' reprieve.
The subject deserves a more detailed analysis in view of its
historical importance as an early (probably the first) post-war
example of organised, logical and effective voiced opposition
to forcible repatriation by the refugees themselves, a
formulation for which I am indebted to Professor Sidney Waldron
of the Department of Anthropology, State University of New
York, an authority within the new academic discipline of
Refugee Studies.
We need to look more closely into the reasons for the reprieve.
Why did the Army change its mind and cancel the repatriation of
the civilians less than twelve hours before it was due to take
place?
Nigel Nicolson told an interviewing historian that
"oral protests by our officers were to no avail" in the case of
the soldiers' repatriation, and that:
two

or

three

men

..

came

back

56

to

warn

their

fellow

. Victims of Yalta (Hodder & Stoughton 1977), Stalin's

Secret War (Jonathan Cape 1981) and The Minister & The
Massacres (Century Hutchinson 1986).
96

countrymen
and
the
British
officers
what
was
happening .. we sent these people to the higher
headquarters, right up to the General, General
Keightley, commanding Fifth Corps, but either he
didn't believe them or else he thought that the
necessity to carry out the orders he was given from
further up were dominant.57
The repatriation of the civilians, on the other hand, was
halted after only half an hour of telephone conversations.
Why? Something must have happened behind the scenes. What, is
explained by two previously unpublished documents, one a report
from
John
Rose
and
Peter
Gibson,
senior
visiting
representatives of the Friends Ambulance Unit to their London
HQ in July 1945, and the other the memoirs of John Selby-Bigge,
the British Red Cross Assistant Commissioner for Civilian
Relief in Austria. Rose and Gibson reported: 58
Military Government (MG) has a DP Branch whose chief is Lt
Col Dufour. Dufour is a very good personal friend of
Selby-Bigge so that cooperation between BRCS and MG
on displaced person matters is excellent. .. BRCS/FAU
workers were on the territory several days ahead of
MG. .. During this period the untried relief workers
in the section won their spurs. ..
Intervention by BRC/FAU succeeded in remedying a serious
official blunder and a grave injustice. .. Pearson59
and Miss Couper 60 promptly collected evidence and saw
Selby-Bigge.
As a result, Selby-Bigge and Pearson
went to HQ 8th Army where they saw the Head of MG and
the Army Chief of Staff. The General was shocked by
the evidence and forthwith issued instructions that
no DPs were to be repatriated against their will.
For obvious reasons this story should be treated as highly
confidential, but it is an excellent example of
successful intervention by voluntary societies to
effect a highly desirable change in official policy.
The greatest credit is due to Pearson for the way in
which he took the matter up.
BRC RELATIONS

.. Pearson at HQ enjoys the closest and

57

. PRO 10968/2/1, p.4

. OCIT 110, Friends Ambulance Unit, C.M.F., 10th July
1945, "Austria", p. 9, from FAU archives, Friends House
Library, London.
59
. leader of the FAU contingent
60
. BRC supervisor for Carinthia
58

97

happiest relations with the BRC HQ staff and the

integration
of
field-workers
and
the
close
cooperation is in great measure a tribute to him.
The rather careful approach, and the tendency to
separate spheres of work in the initial arrangements,
have now been replaced by a considerable integration
of BRC/FAU personnel.
At headquarters this has
worked extremely smoothly and each operation is
discussed as a joint affair. In the field, the FAU
has not always found it ideal, but this is largely a
matter of personalities which might equally apply
within each society.
Selby-Bigge has the advantage of a very privileged
position with MG, and in particular DP Branch. This
is reflected in the influence BRCS/FAU can have on DP
operations. .. It is, incidentally, an interesting
fact that the total BRCS personnel at 27th June was
26 against the Unit's 25, and this included the HQ
staff, so that in the field there were 18 BRC and 24
FAU.
An earlier
added: 61

FAU

report,

probably

written

by

David

Pearson,

Relations with the military authorities have been good on

the whole, and the presence in MG of several officers
who knew the Unit and the voluntary societies at the
Maadi training camps 62 has been helpful in some of the
camps.
In others it has been necessary to break a
certain distrust of civilian workers, but this has
usually been removed after a period on the job, and
in some cases requests have been received for FAU
members to stay at a camp or to help in a new project
from officers who were at first somewhat prejudiced
against them.
HQ 8th Army HQ was outside Udine, an Italian town half way
between the frontier and the sea, 85 km south-west of
Klagenfurt and 30 km north of Palmanova.
It was there that
Selby-Bigge and Pearson saw not just the Head of MG and the
Chief of Staff but the Army Commander himself.
He was
installed in a "nice camp in the garden of a large country
61

.
Report
dated
13.6.45
Friends
Ambulance
Unit
Mediterranean Area: Relief Work in Austria: First Reports, p.5,
from FAU archives.
62
. voluntary society and UNRRA personnel were given
orientation at this centre just outside Cairo before going into
the field
98

house", according to Harold Macmillan's memoirs.

Selby-Bigge
prefaced his account of their visit with a description of his
team, which included 63
twenty-five workers of the Friends Ambulance Unit; I was
much impressed by their modesty, intelligence and
keenness. .. On May 15th our first party moved into
Austria.
Meanwhile Dufour was in despair.
He had
collected some staff officers and opened his HQ
office in Udine; but as yet he had no staff,
personnel or equipment for his camps. ..
Elsewhere in his memoirs Selby-Bigge described Colonel Dufour
as a wiry little French-Canadian who combined the incisive
brains of the French with the drive and realism of the
Canadian. At first sight he seemed tough, gruff and uncommonly
reserved; but in time I realised he had a fine sensibility and
a heart of gold.
Selby-Bigge continued his account:
The next day I went on to Klagenfurt .. There were few
standing camps to be found, and many refugees were
camping in the fields or railway yards. In one field
there were about 6,500 Slovenes with their families,
living in shacks made of branches, with their horses
picketed behind them.
Whether they were chetnik
irregulars or peasants fleeing from Tito, nobody
quite knew. .. All that could be done at that stage
was to feed and delouse them.
A team of FAU lads
toured the camps, powdering the population 64 ; within
the camps our workers were busy getting small
hospitals and surgeries going.
By some miracle,
illness was slight and epidemics almost unknown.
These were difficult days for MG officers. Their Staff HQ
was far away at Udine; and in Austria the 5th Corps
Commander was in charge of the occupation forces.
But 5th Corps was a fighting force, and its Staff
knew
little,
and
cared
less,
about
Military
Government.
Dufour's Refugee Section suffered the
most.
As he was unable to cope with all the
situation through lack of personnel, 5th Corps opened
many refugee camps on their own initiative and
without reference to him.
When these camps became
63

. typescript memoir of J.A.Selby-Bigge OBE, pp.217-9,

kindly loaned to me by his daughter Mrs Mary Edwards.
64
. with DDT powder, then widely used against lice, now
forbidden as a poison
99

congested,
5th
Corps
loaded
the
refugees,
irrespective of nation-ality or category, into trucks
and dumped them over the Italian frontier. This was
done without any notice to HQ, either in Italy or
Austria, and caused considerable confusion and
hardship.
A

serious situation soon arose in the refugee camps

controlled by 5th Corps, and to a lesser extent in
the MG camps.
Forcible repatriation was being
exercised in a most discreditable manner.
White
Russian emigres, who had joined the Cossack regiments
of the German Army to fight the Bolsheviks, were
loaded up by force and driven off to the Soviet
boundary - including wives and civilians.
These
emigres had mostly become citizens of Poland and
Jugoslavia, after leaving Russia in 1918.

Similarly, Slovenes chetniks 65 or civilians who had fled

from Tito were driven over the frontier; many were
taken out of the camps and put into trains for
Jugoslavia, under the pretence that they were being
transferred to another camp.
Some escaped and came
back to the camps with terrible tales of mass
slaughter and rape; many of the Russians took to the
woods or committed suicide; at Viktring the whole
Slovene camp went into mourning; in other camps of
mixed nationalities the sight of soldiers, armed with
pick handles, sweeping through the camps to round up
people for repatriation spread terror.
My workers
got increasingly restless; one of my supervisors
threatened to resign; the head of the FAU66 said his
team would not continue to work under these
conditions; wherever I went I was met by the dejected
faces of my workers. From our point of view, as Red
Cross workers, the position was untenable; and I
don't think the Army officers or their soldiers were
much happier.
I collected some written reports and wrote a report to my
Commissioner in Rome, describing the situation and
suggesting 'the British Zone of Austria was not a
65

. used here in a sense that was then common, of "members

of guerrilla bands". There were in fact some Slovene as well
as Serb chetniks, but most of the Slovenes in uniform were
domobranci, members of the "home guard".
66
. David Pearson, whom Selby-Bigge described as "having
considerable experience and a sound imagination - his simple
frankness made him an easy partner".
100

suitable field of operations for the BRC'.

Before
sending this off (and in fact hoping it would never
be necessary) I intended to give a copy to Benson 67 as
was customary. I took Dave Pearson with me and set
off to Udine in pouring rain. We arrived at teatime,
wet and bedraggled.
The Chief [of MG] and his Deputy were camped near the Army
Commander's HQ. They were extremely perturbed by my
report but knew me well enough to trust my judgement.
They asked me to withhold the letter, until they saw
what could be done. The Deputy telephoned the DAAG68
and asked him to come down; at the same time he
advised me to talk perfectly frankly to him.
The
DAAG took the matter seriously and said he would
speak to the Chief of Staff 69 about it that night,
asking me to return in the morning.
The next morning we found the DAAG. He said the Chief of
Staff would like to see me personally and took me
along to his caravan on the hilltop.
He considered
the matter very grave and asked my permission to show
the documents to the Army Commander, it being
understood they were not to be treated as official.
So Dave and I started back to Klagenfurt. This was Dave's
first experience of how BRC worked on the higher
level and he was amazed at the speedy and informal
way matters were handled. Late that same evening an
Aide-de-Camp rang my doorbell in Klagenfurt and said
the Army Commander wished to see me the next morning
at 11 a.m.
Dufour looked at me over his glass and
said 'Holy Pete! What a fellow! You do stick your
neck out!' so I asked if he wouldn't have done the
same in my place.
Early

next morning I was off to Udine once again. I

reported to the ADC and sat down to wait for the Army
Commander, feeling extremely nervous.
Half an hour
later I was taken to his caravan.
It was a bare
room, with a writing desk and two arm-chairs.
He

67

. Air Commodore Constantine Benson, Head of MG at 8th

Army, an old friend of Harold Macmillan, described by SelbyBigge as "lean and nervous, with much of the temperament of an
artist".
68
. Deputy Assistant Adjutant-General
69
. Major-General Sir Henry Floyd, who had had recent
experience of cavalier treatment in Yugoslavia as commander of
the ill-fated Floydforce
101

shook me by the hand and motioned me to a chair, then

got up and offered me a cigarette from a box on the
desk. He was a tall, lean man, with a terse manner
and a nervous smile.
He was dressed simply in a
cotton shirt, open at the neck, and drill trousers;
only on his shoulder straps could one see any mark or
rank. I sensed a ruthless energy and a keen decisive
mind.
He plunged straight into the matter, and for forty minutes
we argued the points.
I could see he exacted
absolute truthfulness and would be merciless on any
humbug. On one point however I had to be silent and
accept his reproof. He wanted to know why I had not
reported the matter at once to the Corps Commander.
I could only reply I had followed my official
channels through MG.
He then explained to me at
length the difficulty of the military situation,
which had necessitated the clearance of a certain
area without delay. Under such circumstances, hasty
decisions and injustices were bound to occur. But my
main thesis he accepted and regretted.
He gave me
his assurance 'there would be no more forcible
repatriation, and no repatriation at all without
proper screening by qualified MG officers.'
At the same time, he invited the BRC to help in the camps
under Army control.
This I agreed to on my own
responsibility, at any rate where women and children
were involved. The BRC had always been vague as to
its policy on helping enemy subjects, but I felt I
could take a chance in the care of Hungarians and
White Russians, as they had their womenfolk with
them, who were certainly not soldiers whatever the
men might be. I got up to take my leave, but he told
me to come along with him to lunch.
We strolled
through the camp, and other officers joined us in a
casual way.
When we entered the big marquee, he
introduced me to his staff and sat me down beside
him. Everyone was in shirt sleeves and the meal was
simple and informal.
My impression of General
McCreery was of a very great gentleman.
After lunch I returned to Klagenfurt, very impressed by my
experience. My workers were delighted at the success
of my demarche but I was nervous as to the reactions
at 5th Corps HQ. However, two days later the Corps
Commander invited me to lunch at his HQ and received
me in a friendly manner.
We had a few minutes
conversation over a cocktail, and he asked me in
102

future to bring any problems direct to him or to his

staff.
As his staff were present, I knew the door
was now open to the BRC; in fact they gave us every
assistance afterwards.
As the emergency phase passed we were able to begin more
constructive plans.
Dufour and I agreed that, as
repatriation slowed down, the static camps should
develop as far as possible into self-contained
communities. They were to have their own workshops,
schools, clinics, sports and amusements.
Employment
was to be arranged for those now classified as
'Displaced Persons' (i.e. not repatriable).
Selby-Bigge wrote this account a year or more later in
memoirs intended for publication. But much earlier,
only a few weeks after the incident, he told a senior
British Red Cross colleague, Lady Falmouth, of a talk
he must have had with the Commander of 5 Corps,
General Keightley, some days before his meeting with
McCreery.
The Dowager Lady Falmouth told the story
to Tolstoy after a gap of forty years. 70 Selby-Bigge
described to her the forcible repatriations, and then
went on:
A short time after they'd gone one came back to say that
when they got there they'd all been put up against a
wall and shot - or, anyhow, liquidated. This man had
escaped and said to his friends: "now, whatever you
do, don't go." So when the next lot of them were due
to go, they refused.
There was a good deal of
difficulty in the camp.
Nobody more was sent, but
they [presumably the Camp Commandant] reported back
to the Corps Commander, Keightley, that they didn't
want to go.
He

[Keightley] saw Selby-Bigge, who was the Red Cross

representative, who got on very well with them [the
people being repatriated], who evidently accepted his
advice. [Keightley] said he wanted him to encourage
them to go. To which he replied that he didn't think
he could, because this report had come back, which
appeared to be authentic, and the Red Cross couldn't
do that.
They couldn't encourage people to do a
thing that they didn't want to do, when it was
obviously difficult.

70

. Nikolai Tolstoy,
(London, 1986), pp.297-8.

The
103

Minister

and

the

Massacres,

Keightley was very insistent, saying it was an order from

higher up, and on Selby-Bigge's refusing he said,
"well, this is an order!" To which Selby-Bigge said,
"well, I'm very sorry, sir, but I'm not under your
command: I'm an official of the Red Cross, and I'm
afraid I can't do this."
So Keightley said, "very
well, you must go", and sent him back to England. To
which
Selby-Bigge
said:
"of
course
I
quite
understand. I'll go back and report to my people. I
can't do it." That was the end of the interview. As
he went out of the door, Keightley said: "it's all
right, they won't go". And they didn't.
The two conflicting accounts can be reconciled if Keightley
summoned Selby-Bigge to see him on 30 May and the army
continued to send the Slovenes back next day, and also Cossack
and White Russian troops and their families, in spite of the
general's assurances. The only thing Selby-Bigge could then do
was to try to stop the repatriations by 'following his official
channels through MG', which meant taking David Pearson with him
to Udine.
When McCreery asked why he had not reported the
matter at once to the Corps Commander, he accepted the rebuke
in silence because he had in fact not done so but had been
summoned by the Corps Commander and asked to do something he
felt was wrong.
He would not have wanted to damage his
relations with Keightley by telling McCreery of Keightley's
threat and subsequent climb-down which might be considered to
Keightley's discredit.
He could recount all this to Lady
Falmouth, relying on her discretion, but did not include it in
his memoirs which were intended for publication while Keightley
was still alive.
Shortly afterwards the Army Chief-of-Staff sent Selby-Bigge a
letter, copies of which were given to the BRC/FAU field workers
for their reassurance 71 :
Major-General Sir H.K.Floyd, CBE
Main Headquarters, EIGHTH ARMY
16th June 1945
Dear Bigge,
The Army Commander has asked me to write you a line to
tell you that he has personally gone into the
difficult problem of the repatriation of displaced
persons in Austria.
A letter has been sent from
these Headquarters to 5 Corps with instructions that
in future no repatriation of anyone will take place
without full classification by the Displaced Persons
71

. in FAU archive, Friends House Library, London.

104

Branch of AMG [Allied Military Government].

The

Army Commander has given instructions that on no

account is any force to be used in connection with
any repatriation scheme.
I think it is fair to
remember that 5 Corps have been faced with a colossal
problem, and that on the whole, the situation has
been well handled. I think that you can rest assured
that matters will improve, but if you have any
further cause for anxiety I hope you will not
hesitate to contact General Keightley, Commander 5
Corps, who is fully conversant with the full facts.
Yours sincerely,
Henry Floyd.
This instruction saved the lives of not only the six thousand
civilians at Viktring but also of tens of thousands of other
Yugoslavs in and out of uniform, because the order was to send
back "all surrendered personnel of established Yugoslav
nationality" and would have applied to Italy as well as
Austria.
How was it possible for the powerless refugees, a Canadian MG
major
and
51
civilian
relief
workers,
half
of
them
conscientious objectors, to challenge successfully an allpowerful 8th Army still celebrating total victory?
A number
of circumstances made it possible, some directly relevant to
the world of today. I have identified fourteen:
1.
The democratic structures, solidarity, discipline and
moderate behaviour of the refugees, and their decision to elect
Mersol as their leader and back him fully.
If they had not
gained Barre's admiration and sympathy so quickly, he might not
have intervened with the same speed, courage and conviction.
2.
Mersol's transparent integrity which led Barre to trust
him. Also his tact, fluent command of English and year spent in
North America, which enabled him to relate more easily to
Canadian and British officers.
3. Barre's rugged Canadian independence which resulted in his
not being overawed by the British military hierarchy, and what
might be described as a chip on the shoulder 72 which led him
72

. Major Barre has challenged the reference to a chip on

the shoulder in a friendly letter.
However after careful
consideration I have not removed it, as it is not intended to
be in any way to his discredit and does not diminish the
outstanding merit of his courageous stand, while it is a
reasonable hypothesis which may help to explain the factors
that moved him to act with such decisiveness.
105

more readily to take offence at the cavalier manner, as he saw

it, with which the British were treating him, and to fight back
vigorously.
4.
Selby-Bigge's orthodox background and unorthodox career
which gave him self-confidence, style and a mind of his own and
resulted in his not being overawed by the military hierarchy,
but on the contrary handling it with great tact and skill. His
father Sir Amherst Selby-Bigge was a member of the civil
establishment who progressed from Oxford don to permanent head
of a major government department.
He himself received an
"establishment" education at Winchester and Christ Church
Oxford but then rebelled to become a painter, regularly
exhibiting with his more famous friends Edward Wadsworth, Paul
Nash and Ben Nicholson; while three years of active army
service in World War I as an officer with marked linguistic
skills, latterly as acting captain in Macedonia, enabled him to
negotiate with the military during World War II on close to
equal terms.
5.
The personal qualities of four men, Slovene, Canadian,
English and Welsh - the refugee Mersol, MG officer Barre and
Red Cross and FAU leaders Selby-Bigge and Pearson - three
civilians and one soldier, who all confronted the crisis with
courage, coolness and decisiveness.
6.
The humanity shown by all ranks within the British Army
which led them to protest repeatedly.
Their protests were
insufficient to save the domobranci and other Yugoslav soldiers
or the Cossacks, but were effective in reinforcing the relief
workers' protests on behalf of the civilians. Tolstoy records
that officers as senior as Major-General (later Viscount)
Robert Arbuthnott and Major-General Sir Horatius Murray
protested, as did rank and file who 'were nearer mutiny than
anyone had known before' as reported by the Rev. John Vaughan,
Chaplain to the Hampshire Brigade. 73
7.
The threat of withdrawal by the civilian relief workers.
For this to be effective, they had to have the fullest mutual
confidence with their leaders Selby-Bigge and Pearson.
The
leaders for their part had to have the sensitivity to recognise
the urgency of the complaints, the courage to press them to the
highest level and the tact to present them convincingly so that
the officers did not reject them but passed them higher up
without delay.
8.
The vigorously asserted independence and autonomy of the
British Red Cross and the FAU.
73

. Tolstoy, Ministar i pokolji, pp.218, 233, 275.

106

9.
The language skills of the relief workers.
This enabled
them to listen to the refugees and learn what was happening.
10. The training, experience and dedication of the relief
workers.
This led the army to respect their professionalism
and listen to their protests.
11. The humanity of the officers at army HQ. This led them to
recognise the strength of the case put by the two junior
civilians, Selby-Bigge and Pearson, and recommend it to their
immediate superiors.
12. The efficiency of the army administration. This allowed the
protest to move up the line of command fast enough for the
order to be cancelled in time to save the civilians.
13. The army's flexibility and informality.
This led to its
commander being prepared to listen to junior civilians.
14. The enlightened army policy of accepting civilian workers
in a war zone during and immediately after hostilities.
The
workers introduced a restraining civilian conscience into a
situation otherwise totally dominated by military expediency.
The policy also made possible the relationship of mutual
confidence and friendship between the civilian Selby-Bigge and
the officers Benson and Dufour, resulting from their previous
close and prolonged collaboration in opening and running
refugee camps in Italy.
Selby-Bigge's comments on the army illustrate the last four
points: 'from the desert days it had been a privileged army,
with a frankness of speech and a lack of formality which in no
way impaired its discipline.
Moreover it was remarkable that
long years of fighting had not brutalised them.
They would
flood to hear classical music or opera.'
The refugees, although told on the Thursday that the
repatriations would not be taking place, remained fearful until
the following Monday when Field Marshal Alexander visited
Viktring. The Balding diary:
Monday 4 June
The day
went to camp early
rumour that
F.M. Alexander is in Klagenfurt & coming to camp
later
told he was not coming
he arrived as we
decided to go home to lunch
stood with Major B. to
see him go past
he stopped & got out of car to
shake hands
talked for about 10 minutes
shook
hands
again filmed an' all, I felt better
immediately full of beans in fact, troops moved out
107

of school house in afternoon

camp moved in sorted
rooms out, camp in high spirits, 'cos F.M. said they
wouldn't be sent back Yugo.
Writing 50 years later, the then 15 year old schoolboy Marian
Loboda remembered it rather differently:
One day a report spread that a top American (sic) military
commander was going to visit us.
The teachers
summoned us and lined us up at the entry to the
courtyard of the Vetrinje convent.
A huge red
limousine
appeared
and
we
greeted
Viscount
Fieldmarshal Alexander (sic), commander of the allied
forces. They said he had given the order that no one
else should be forcibly repatriated to Yugoslavia.
For us this meant we were saved. Confidence and the
desire to live began to revive.
The Pernisek diary:
Monday 4th June.
At 11 a large number of soldiers and
military police surrounded the camp.
People were
very apprehensive.
Major Barre told Dr Mersol that
Field Marshal Alexander was coming. He was asked to
be at hand as he could easily talk with him. Hearing
this, we all quietened down. At 12.30 six cars with
English officers drove into the camp.
In the third
was Field Marshal Viscount Alexander.
He made it
stop in front of the administrative personnel,
including Dr Mersol, who were waiting for him outside
the camp office.
A powerful figure alighted and stepped in front of the
assembled group.
Major Barre saluted him and
introduced the group. The Field Marshal shook hands
with everyone in a dignified manner and at once
started to talk with the camp leader Dr Valentin
Mersol.
In the exchange which lasted about 20
minutes he was very kind. It was evident that he was
very well informed about all aspects of our
situation.
There wasn't time for Dr Mersol to
prepare a written statement, so he explained directly
in a brief clear manner who were the people among
whom he had come.
We are Slovenes, anti-communists, who came across the
Karawanken mountains to Klagenfurt and were conducted
to Viktring plain.
They now ask you for your kind
protection and assistance, for the Slovenes as also
for the other Yugoslavs in the camp.
They
108

particularly ask you kindly to order that the Slovene

and Yugoslav civilian and military refugees should
not be sent back to Yugoslavia, for there awaits them
there prison, torture and death.
That it is so, our soldiers tell us who were returned
to
Yugoslavia
last
week
but
escaped
from
concentration camps where they were being beaten and
tortured and in most cases killed without any
hearing, judgement or sentence.
Those who escaped,
crossed the mountains and reported to us.
Some of
them had open wounds because they had been shot but
not mortally wounded, and had climbed out of the mass
execution pits under cover of darkness.
These
domobranci didn't fight against the Allies: on the
contrary, they saved Allied pilots and helped the
Allies whenever they could. They fought only against
the communists, who in Slovenia and other parts of
Yugoslavia behaved like robbers and murderers."
Dr Mersol thanked him for all the help he and the English
authorities had given them up till then:
We are asking you for asylum, protection and help
also in the future; and we beg that you leave us here
in Viktring and don't send us back to Yugoslavia,
because that would mean for very many of us torture
and death.
The Field Marshal listened carefully, and here and there
asked a question. His final answer was soldier-like,
well considered and brief:
As far as I'm concerned, you can remain here in
Viktring. Please rest assured that we will help you
and your people.
Dr Mersol thanked him sincerely. The Field Marshal shook
hands with him and all the others and sat in the auto
and drove ahead through the camp to look it over.
Major Barre also rode with him and showed him the
camp. He was very satisfied with the cleanliness and
order
in
spite
of
the
otherwise
unfavourable
conditions and commanded that our living quarters
conditions be improved. On the same day at 7 in the
evening
the
commandant
of
the
military
camp
Lieutenant Ames received the directive:
New army policy respective Jugoslavs effective forthwith:
109

1. No Jugoslavs will be returned to Jugoslavia or

handed over to Jugoslav troops against their will
2. Jugoslavs who bore arms against Tito will be
treated as surrendered personnel and sent to Viktring
Camp at disposal: further instructions awaited.
3. All this personnel will be regarded as displaced
personnel and ultimately routed via Italy.
4. No evacuation from Viktring TFO [till further
orders].
Thus did God help us in those terrible days of distress
and dread.
We prayed much and our prayers were
heard.
We filled and still fill the church of Our
Lady of Victories.
It is certain that never since
the White Friars left Viktring long ago were there
such fervent prayers in that church and holy ground.

110

C H A P T E R

5 - 29 June 1945

Camp life returns to normality. From their differing viewpoints

Pernisek, Director Bajuk, the 16-year old Majda Vracko and the
11-year old Tinc Mersol recall the classes that were organised
for the children.
The Slovenes' resilience is illustrated by
the "very festive" solemn mass celebrated a week after the
forcible repatriations, but Pernisek then returns to the subject
of the tragedy.
Later he deplores the departure of the
Slovenes' beloved saviour Major Barre, but has to admit that his
successor, the Englishman Major Bell, is equally concerned for
their welfare.
The refugees prepare for
departure from
Viktring and dispersal between four long-term camps.

So the Field Marshal left and life returned to normal.

And what now?
Tuesday 5th June.
answered this question briefly:

What awaits us?

The Pernisek diary:

Mr Corsellis

Now we'll have to register you as displaced persons, DPs. When

you get your registration card you'll be just a DP number,
stateless and without rights.
You mustn't demand anything but
you can ask and it will be granted you so far as possible.
Among us English who have to look after you there's a firm will
to help you and make easier the truly hard life of the stateless
person without rights.
These frank words have had a very calming effect on us although not
pleasant to the ear. We are serfs without rights, small change
in the hands of international brokers and speculators which
they'll use to settle their accounts, and we are cheap labour
for the locals. From now on our motto is: "Trust firmly in God!
Help yourself and God will help you!"
DP INDEX CARD A.0153341 Franc Pernisek
Pernisek next day records a message sent by Dr Miha Krek, the spokesman for
the Slovenes in exile and former leader of the Catholic Slovene People's
Party 74 and Vice-Premier of the Yugoslav Royal Government in Exile in London.
It was addressed to Dean Matija Skrbec, the senior Catholic priest living in
the camp and an acute observer of the political scene well-known for his
financial acumen, whom I remember as an energetic and colourful character
straight out of Trollope:
Wednesday 6th June. Dean Skrbec told
to tell us how Dr Krek sees our
consequence at all politically
influence.
All he can do is
74

us a delegate had come from Rome

current situation. We are of no
and he himself has no political
make use of his many personal

. Slovenska Ljudska Stranka

111

contacts from the time when he was a minister in the Yugoslav

Royal Government in Exile in London and later in the
Mediterranean Council. He knows a lot of people and is highly
regarded and respected by many influential Americans and
Englishmen, as well as within the Vatican.
They've set up a "Yugoslav Welfare Society" in Rome which is
recognised by the English and American authorities and is the
only body now accepted as representing Yugoslav anti-communists
there.
Because its chairman is Dr Krek, it's held in high
esteem and is the only body in a position to offer protection
and support. As we can't achieve anything by political means in
the present situation and it's in the interest of all refugees
to stop political activities, we need to establish a branch of
the Yugoslav Welfare Society here in Carinthia.
So a working
committee was appointed today to take over leadership.
Thursday 7th June. The young people are our first concern. We have a
careful organiser, teacher and educator in the high school
director Prof Marko Bajuk. He gets started at once, vigorously
and decisively, without hesitating or wondering if it'll work or
not. After all, we're on a bare field with less than any gipsy
encampment.
Today he called a council for the systematic organization of all
educational and cultural activities.
It decided to: 1. start
systematic teaching immediately in an elementary and a secondary
school
2. form a choir for church and popular singing
3.
arrange talks of general interest for the whole camp 4. issue a
camp bulletin 5. organize gymnastics, sports, technical courses
and foreign languages instruction
6. put youth work in the
hands of the Salesian fathers.
Bajuk himself recorded in his annual report for the school-years 1944/46 75
that in fact it only took the Slovene refugee committee four days after their
arrival to issue, on 16 May, decree No 1 providing for the constitution of
the new Secondary School and two more days to appoint himself, on 18 May,
"Chief of Culture, charging him to organise all the schooling among the
Slovene refugees in Carinthia".
Kindergarten and primary school classes
started at once, but it took longer to get the secondary school going: 76
On 12 June the technical sitting was held for all the subjects and a
discussion on the course of instruction in general.
Regular
teaching began on 14 June with Holy Mass.
Teaching was
extremely difficult.
There was a great want of any kind of
teaching material, paper, pencils and copy-books. There were no
books at all. After carefully searching we found single books
among the scholars, at second-hand dealers, at individuals at
Klagenfurt. These were used by both professors and scholars.
.. It was necessary to draw it [the curriculum] up at common sittings.
75

. Studia Slovenica Archive, St Vid, Ljubljana: Marko

Bajuk, Annual Report for the School-Years 1944/45 and 1945/46
(Peggetz, Lienz, undated) 23 page duplicated text.
76
. ibid, p.7
112

The teachers were obliged to prepare the scripta for all the
subjects, write down Latin and Greek lessons and texts, compose
mathematical problems, etc.
All this required enormous work,
and it was specially difficult because all the members of the
teaching board lived under tents.
Majda Vracko, then a 16 year old pupil in the secondary school, recalls:
I had many friends at Viktring, the ones we were going over the
Loiblpass with, and we were meeting with them; also school
friends, friends from the family, and the director of my school,
Dr Bajuk. That made me feel very good because he said, "Don't
worry, we won't waste an hour: we'll start with school right
now" and he started it. We were meeting outside on the grass of
the monastery in a corner, and when we were there in 1989 we
visited that corner and it's still the same.
We were meeting
very regularly and each day there was another new professor that
came from somewhere, so that we had quite a good selection. At
the school lessons of course there were no books, no note-books,
but we had every major subject covered from the languages to
even geography, history and stuff like that.
What I also thought was very nice, they said this would continue, when
they were starting to talk about splitting people 77 which caused
a lot of trouble: my father was helping with that and people
were saying, "Why did you send me here? Everybody goes there".
It wasn't easy to do that, yet it had to be done.
One criterion was that families with older schoolchildren and the
gimnazija should all go to Lienz. What made me feel very good
was that at least people I knew who also were in school would
all be together, so it didn't sound like the whole world would
end.
Because when we left we didn't know anybody, but after
being together for two months through really difficult times you
realised that this was all we had, friends.
And if they took
that away!
Nigel Nicolson and Major Barre both remarked on the overriding priority the
Slovenes devoted to education. Joze Jancar, my Italian-speaking interpreter,
has described a meeting he attended with three of his fellow refugees. The
Dr Blatnik he referred to was one of the many Salesian priests at Viktring:
while the others devoted themselves to their traditional activities of youth
welfare and school teaching he had a finger in many pies. He was a man of
mystery, proud of having been held by Mussolini in the notorious Regina Coeli
jail in Rome and always hinting at secret connections and surrounded by an
aura of intrigue - more Jesuit than Salesian. He combined half-time teaching
in the secondary school with managing camp printing and publishing and
editing the camp newssheet and numerous other publications.
Joze Jancar
recalls:
Mersol, Blatnik, Bajuk and I met one evening, because during the day
we were busy, and started to talk about school and they said,
"what would be best?" I said, "the best thing would be you talk
with Corsellis; he's the man to help us" because Bajuk had said,
"look, there are kids around the fields, we need a school". So
77

. between the four long-term camps they were sent to.

113

you met Mersol, Bajuk and others, and that was the beginning of
the secondary school.
The infant and primary schools had
started earlier.
Psychologically this was terribly important
for the children, for the families, for the youngsters, for the
teachers and the leaders because they felt, "alright, we've lost
everything, let's get back a little".
And this was very
successful.
They smuggled teaching materials already, because people were going
illegally to Ljubljana.
And already in Viktring numbers of
people came back with rucksacks of books. They also got a lot
from Gorizia 78 and Klagenfurt - stories for the children, because
they have a Slovene primary school in Carinthia.
Majda Vracko described the school as experienced by a 16 year old girl. Tinc
Mersol now gives a picture of Director Bajuk and camp life seen through the
eyes of an 11 year old boy.
He was the youngest of Dr Mersol's four
children, who all attended the secondary school.
He is today a highly
successful surgeon in Ohio with six children and numerous grandchildren:
Prof Bajuk was a short portly man with a goatee beard.
He'd had a
habit even in Ljubljana of walking into classes and popping
surprise questions in Latin at the younger boys and in Greek at
the older ones. It was standard practice to have a spy keeping
a look-out on the hall and when Dr Bajuk was on the rampage he'd
yell, "Hannibal ante portas".
The old abbey in Viktring was surrounded by a U-shaped moat which had
a real treasure trove on one outer side. It was an ammunition
and weapons depot with rather inadequate fencing, absolutely
irresistible to any 11 year old.
A whole group of us would
sneak in there and steal ammunition, the bigger the better.
There were flat doughnut-shaped rings of mortar-propellant as
well as machine-gun and small cannon ammo. All the shells could
be wedged open and the powder used for fun. To really bug the
British we learned how to shoot the mortars. All you had to do
was pop a shell into the hills and the British would play their
sirens, roar away in their trucks and be generally annoyed and
ineffective.
Food was very scarce even for the Austrian civilians and there was a
brisk barter and black market trade going.
We were quite
hungry.
I remember being near the British mess where they'd
just had roast beef and were clearing the scraps into the
garbage; I tried to take some, and the generous British cook
yelled and chased me away with a meat cleaver.
The water in Viktring was not the greatest and there was a great deal
of diarrhoea going around. Dad had brought some medicines with
him and he'd give us drops of opium to control the cramps but it
didn't help much.
A lot of very dignified older folks were
caught short and on any walk you could see the sudden Viktring
78

. Gorizia and Klagenfurt were Italian and Austrian cities

just over the border from Yugoslavia which had substantial
Slovene ethnic minorities.
114

side-step into the vegetation.

After we left I'm sure the
fields didn't need fertiliser for years.
The Pernisek diary:
Friday 8th June. Today is the feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and
the atmosphere in church during the community morning mass is
very festive.
The young girls decorated with garlands the
altar, a massive and beautiful piece of ancient art. This was
the altar at which the famous Abbot John of Vetrinje said mass.
In the 14th century he wrote here a history of great importance
for Slovenes; he described the enthronement ceremonies of the
Carinthian Dukes at Gosposvetsko Polje as he witnessed them
himself, and the old custom whereby the free Slovene landowners
gave their dukes a mandate of government in the Slovene
language.
One can see everywhere this church is really old. The parish priest
Musger says he is very worried about the woodworm which is
slowly eating away the main altar and transforming it to powdery
dust.
The stained-glass window from 1390 gives the altar its
special charm.
On this feast our hearts are filled with
unshakeable confidence, hope and consolation.
Our trust is in
the Sacred Heart.
If everyone abandons us, Jesus will never
close his heart and we will never be ashamed of trusting in Him.
People who fled into the woods for fear of
Tuesday 12th June.
forcible repatriation are returning to the camp, as are the
first domobranci who escaped from the transports.
Some even
escaped from the mass graves into which they fell wounded but
still alive; they have unhealed wounds and terrible stories to
tell.
The partisans are carrying out mass killings of our men and lads,
driving four to six hundred from the prison camps into the
forest in a night and mowing them down with machine guns. The
main execution grounds are Teharje near Celje, Skofja Loka,
Podutik near Ljubljana, Hrastnik and Kocevski Rog. Out of the
first transport which left Vetrinje on the 27th May probably not
a single individual remains alive.
Around Podutik so many
bodies were thrown into the pits and ravines that the water is
contaminated from the rotting corpses. Even here we've heard a
report on Ljubljana Radio that "the reactionaries have been
poisoning the wells around Podutik".
Thursday 14th June. Today in the field in Vetrinje our grammar school
in exile came into existence.
At nine all the students and
professors gathered in the church for mass and the students were
then divided up into classes.
Its official name is "Slovene
grammar school for refugees", founded on the 16th May 1945 by
order of the National Committee for Slovenia. 140 students were
enrolled today.
It is a classical, humanistic grammar school
with a modern stream.
Major Barre found us some classrooms. The young welfare officer John
Corsellis has been appointed the camp administration official
responsible for education, an unassuming youngster, a law
115

student by background, very hard-working, conscientious and

always kind and patient. The beginning is very modest indeed,
with three classrooms lodged in the empty house Knesebech in
Thal on the edge of the plain of Vetrinje and with the teachers'
room and office in the kitchen. The fourth classroom is in an
outhouse next the cattle shed.
There are no books, teaching
aids, paper or pencils; all the same the subject matter will be
taught and learnt quite efficiently.
Dr Basaj presented Major Barre a memorandum on
Saturday 16th June.
behalf of the National Committee:
Major Barre!
We the Slovene refugees are grateful to you for your great efforts to
lighten the burdens of the lives of refugees.
Our bodily suffering is nothing compared to the agony of our minds and
hearts because of the hard fate of our relatives who were handed
over with the Slovene National Army to Tito's bands.
Fully
trustworthy testimonies of those who saved their lives by
escaping tell us that the officers, non-commissioned officers
and soldiers handed over are suffering such hardship, torture
and harassment that for one after another death is salvation.
Those who don't die from hunger, thirst, beatings and other
tortures are to be judged by the so-called "people's courts",
which means simply that a stirred-up mob will judge them.
Handing over to Tito means handing over to death.
We, the relatives, are suffering deep anguish and beg you to help them
urgently.
Intervene, Mr Barre, with the British military
authorities to enquire about the fate of our sons, husbands,
brothers and fathers.
We are convinced the British military
authorities could not only find out the present situation of
these repatriated soldiers but also intervene effectively so
that the men will be treated in a humane way.
Over 10,000
Slovene men must not become victims of the wild revengefulness
which is the guiding principle of Tito, as it was of Hitler and
Mussolini.
If our husbands, sons and brothers defended the lives and property of
their families and the freedom and faith of our nation in the
face of communist revolution, in doing so they did not commit
any crime. Rather they were exercising their natural right of
self-defence and fulfilling their sacred duty to defend their
faith and homeland. For that defence they were acting in accord
with the international convention on the legal status of people
living in occupied territories. These conventions were accepted
by the Kingdom of Yugoslavia and by Great Britain and the USA,
but not by the Soviet Union. We ask you, Mr Barre, kindly to
intervene urgently before it is too late.
We are very sad.
Major Barre took leave of us
Monday 18th June.
today and departs.
A Canadian by birth, he was a very kind,
outstandingly calm and good man whose heart was on our side. He
paved the way and established our good name and trustworthiness
within the military authorities.
We got used to the man who
116

understood us, was compassionate and shared with us our deepest

sorrow and helped us whenever he could.
We gathered in the castle courtyard and Dr Basaj said farewell on
behalf of all of us, while the choir sang two Slovenian national
songs for him.
People cried openly and he himself went away
with tears in his eyes.
Farewell, good man, we will never
forget you! 79
Major Barre's successor, Major Bell, introduced
Tuesday 19th June.
himself to us. A man in his prime, tall, a red-head with long
red moustaches, he frowns and speaks a curiously hesitant and
unclear English. His appearance is anything but sympathetic. If
you would judge by appearances, you would say, "This one is not
going to be good for us".
We

were therefore all the more pleasantly surprised by his warm

opening speech. He said he knew who and what we were and what
Major Barre meant to us, and he wanted to be at least as good as
him.
When he heard we were still afraid of possible forced
repatriation he asked the higher command about our future and
secured renewed guarantees that no one would be sent to Tito
against their will. He warned us we will shortly be moved to a
permanent and well-equipped camp and should be ready for this at
any time.

My letter-diary:
Wednesday 20th June.
I now divide my day between three activities:
hygiene and sanitation and two English classes at the 6,000
Slovene camp and work of a general nature in a 700 person "enemy
national" refugee camp in the town itself.
The wide variety of responsibility and work is very useful to me
personally, showing what kinds of situation I am competent to
handle and where I am a failure. Also coming across such a wide
selection of types is instructive - British army officers and
ORs, BRC and FAU, Austrian officials and refugees, Jewish and
Slovene refugees from town and country.
So

far I found surprisingly and disappointingly little difference

between Italians and Austrians.
I thought Austrians would
anyhow be intermediate between Italian and German standards of
efficiency etc, but I haven't yet seen much to choose between
Italians and Austrians, and on the whole the choice would be in
favour of the Italians. I will give you more details about my
Austrian camp in my next letter, but my main difficulty there is
to get any sort of life into the director and staff.
79

. A three column "Tribute to Major Barre" in the Ljubljana

newspaper Slovenec of 9 May 1996 recorded: "In celebration of
his 90th birthday Toronto Slovenes gave him a letter of thanks
with 300 signatures and a banquet in his honour. .. When asked
why he had acted as he did 50 years ago, he looked at me
vigorously and answered: 'From humanity'.
Then he added
quietly: 'I am of course a Christian'".
117

This comparison failed to take into account the Austrians' disorientation

after their world had just collapsed around them, while the Italians had
already had time to adjust to their fate.
The Pernisek diary:
Friday

*
*

*
*
*
*

Dr Vracko, Anica Dolenc and I work on the

22nd June.
preparation of lists for the move. Major Bell told us where we
are going and how many are going to each location. It's up to
us to decide sensibly who goes where. According to the wish and
suggestion of the Social Committee for Slovenian Refugees, which
changed its name from Yugoslav Welfare Society, we are compiling
lists following these criteria:

people should be kept together so far as possible, the move being

organized according to ethnic groupings (people from Gorenjska,
Dolenska, Notrajnska and from Ljubljana and its surroundings)
each community should be as homogeneous as possible and should
already now choose its own leadership
high school and grammar school pupils should stay together in the
camp with the biggest population, which should be the central
camp, and of course the parents should go to this camp
the same applies to the grammar school teachers and a proportion of
the secondary teachers
primary school pupils don't have to go to the central camp, because
each camp will have its own primary and nursery schools
in each camp there should be sufficient male and female teachers,
and also some intelligentsia
in the allocations we should try wherever possible to respect the
wishes of individuals, including teachers and priests, the first
priority being to keep families together.
Priests should go
with the people to the new camps and Chancellor Monsignor Dr
Jagodic should allocate those unable to choose for themselves.
The camp commandant fully agreed with these criteria.

Dr Joze Jagodic ranked second in the hierarchy of the refugee clergy after
Bishop Rozman. He reappears periodically in this narrative, but I give his
His
tragic family history now, as it epitomises that of the Slovenes 80 .
father started as a tailor, but by the time Joze, his fifth child, was born
he had built up a small-holding. This began with just one cow, to which he
added a horse, a couple of piglets and some chickens, and then a second horse
to deal with the milk round. His family grew, eventually to nine children six boys and three girls.
The partisans shot the eldest daughter's husband already in 1942, in front of
his wife and children.
The eldest son, after a chequered youth, became a
communist agitator and was imprisoned in the 1920s and then released; he
joined the partisans in 1941 and the Germans took him as a hostage and killed
him early in 1942. The second son (married and with ten children) and the
fourth son joined the domobranci, were forcibly repatriated from Viktring and
killed by the partisans. The fifth son spent nine years in prison during and
after the war, held by the Italians, Germans and his own people successively;
while the sixth and youngest joined the partisans, reached the rank of major
80

.
Mons.
Dr.
Joze
(Klagenfurt, 1974), passim.

Jagodic,
118

Mojega

Zivljenja

Tek,

and survived the war, only to shoot himself and his wife three years later in
a crime passionel. So of the six sons, two joined the partisans, three were
killed by them and one fled from them to become a permanent exile, together
with one of his sisters.
My letter-diary:
Friday 23rd June.
Many thanks for further Listeners arrived and
Harold Nicolson's 81 novel, and letters with a lovely lot of news.
About voting, I gather it is very doubtful if our postal forms
will be through in time owing to some muddle in London.
So
could you very kindly vote for me - I nominated you on my proxy
form. If it is a straight fight between conservatives and some
other party, will you please vote for that other party.
If a
three- or more-cornered contest, for whichever party seems most
likely to beat the conservatives.
The Army paper here is
reprinting all the broadcast speeches and they make interesting
reading. What did you think of Churchill's first effort? Such
people as I heard discussing it said this intemperance would do
his cause more harm than good, and certainly his very wild
remarks about the opposition "forcing" the election roused a lot
of avoidable hostility to him.
The Pernisek diary:
Thursday 29th June. Between the 25th and the 29th June the camp was
evacuated and the field cleared.
2,600 people from Gorenjska
and Ljubljana went to the largest and so the central Slovene
camp at Lienz in East Tyrol: 1,600 from Dolenska and Notranjska
to Spittal on the Drau: 600 from the surroundings of Ljubljana
to St. Veit on the Glina; and 400 people, some from Ljubljana
and its suburbs, to Judenburg.
The Feast of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul.
This morning we
gathered for the last time in the venerable church of Our Lady
of Victories, which was always open to us during the terrible
months of May and June.
*At your feet, O Mother, we wept inconsolably, before you we poured
out our grief and suffering and through you we besought the help
and consolation of your dear Son Jesus. In this church we came
to find peace for our souls and in our mortal fear besought the
Lord have mercy on us and spare us. Goodbye, dear Mother, thank
you for all your care. Wherever we are, we'll not forget you,
Mary the Victorious. We don't know what is in front of us, but
we trust in the power of your intercession. Be with us in our
journey through the desert into the promised land!
Goodbye,
venerable church!
Here for eight hundred years, you probably
never saw more sorrow and suffering, or more fervent prayers
uttered, than during the last two months.
You saw us off
handsomely, you were our parish church.
Here we grew through
suffering and prayer towards greater maturity.*
They put us on wagons.

We still boarded them with some mistrust and

81

. famous diarist and author, and father of Captain Nigel

Nicolson, quoted on pages 00.
119

the men hid axes among their belongings so as to open the train
carriage doors should there be any sign we were heading for
Today is the second anniversary of when I was
"Palmanova" 82 .
rounded up in an Italian army raid and taken to the barracks in
Ljubljana.
Thank God I was not sent on to an Italian
concentration camp. Today I'm again sitting in a lorry and we
are driving to our new home in a real camp.
The ride is
interesting and not tiring, past Woerthersee on the way to
Villach, which is terribly laid waste. We are getting anxious,
waiting to see in which direction we will now turn. Not to the
right, not to the left, but straight towards Spittal, passing a
camp where some Slovenes are already settled.
It's by the
roadside and the barracks are quite pleasant to look at, but we
don't like the high barbed-wire fencing.
At Oberdrauburg we stop and stretch our legs, the sky clears and we
can see the majestic Dolomites around Lienz. The soldiers tell
us we are approaching the town.
We are driven through
Tyroletoerl.
At the beautiful village of Doelsach the valley
suddenly opens up, and at Nussdorf we turn from the main road
onto a side road. We then reach our destination, the "city of
barracks" in Peggetz near Lienz.

82

.
The town in Italy where the British army said the
Slovenes were going, when in fact they sent them back to
Yugoslavia.
120

P A R T

C A M P

L I F E
C H A P T E R

30 June - 12 August 1945

The Slovenes now face a new challenge: adjustment to life in Lienz.

The camp provides shelter against a Tyrolean winter but is run
by Russian refugees not prepared to share control with the new
Slovene majority.
The British officers in overall charge are
unsympathetic.
Marian Loboda describes life in the camp,
followed by the Pernisek and Corsellis diaries.
Pernisek describes the censorship imposed by the British on the
Slovenes' collection and distribution of news - an important
issue for refugees struggling to empower themselves - and the
good relations that were quickly established with the local
Austrian "host community", with the parish priest even inviting
the Slovenes' Bishop Rozman to officiate as principal celebrant
at the village's annual Patronal Mass.
Director Bajuk describes the reopening of the secondary school and its
inspection by the deputy head of Education Branch of Allied
Military Government.
The text of the report is quoted - the
first of a number of official documents which add an extra
dimension, depicting the perceptions and policies of the British
and of UNRRA.
While the school children have been cared for from the start, what can
be done for the university students? Joze Jancar describes his
illegal journey to Italy in search of university places for
them, and his fellow student Mark Sfiligoi tells of plans by
other refugee leaders to start a refugee university inside the
camp itself - plans overtaken by events, when the Russian
occupiers withdraw from Graz and a special refugee camp for
students is opened there.
The Pernisek and Corsellis diaries continue their accounts of camp
life.
Marian Loboda describes life in the new camp as seen through the eyes of a 15
year old schoolboy:
We reached the camp that evening, and felt we were arriving at the
best hotel. The wooden huts seemed veritable luxury after the
rickety hovels, built from scraps of canvas and branches, we had
occupied on the meadows of Vetrinje.
My mother and I settled
into a room with two other families, so that ten of us shared 4
x 5 meters. Fortunately there were double-decker bunks so that
we could each sleep in our own bed.
Next day we boys reconnoitred. We soon discovered bullet holes in the
wooden walls, and mounds of fresh earth close to the camp, some
with Orthodox crosses. We met a Russian mother and daughter and
learnt what had happened to the Cossack refugees 83 who had
83

. fully described in Bethell, Nicholas (1974, reprinted

121

occupied this spot before us. The English loaded them by force
onto trucks and took them to the Russian zone near Vienna and,
as the people resisted, used their weapons to carry out their
sad commission.
We had lived through our own tragedy unaware
that in many places similar and greater injustices were being
repeated against the helpless refugees who had escaped from the
Russian armies and their communist allies.
We

soon established order in the life of the camp.

A hut was
transformed into a chapel in which the priests daily said
frequent Masses. The teachers organised school for the children
and all kinds of cultural activities were started up.
The
biggest problem was the severe food shortage.
I was never so
hungry as in those first weeks in Lienz. We soon discovered the
people in charge of the kitchen, Russians who remained in the
camp when we arrived, were largely to blame, and when the camp
commandant entrusted the kitchen to our own people things
improved visibly.

I soon started to go to school. Who will forget the attractive mock

leather jackets all the pupils of the primary and secondary
schools were given for the winter, or the YMCA and YWCA camps,
or the Boy Scout troop which gave so much for our human
development? I remember the pride and seriousness with which I
raised my arm and recited "on my honour I promise ..." and the
camp on the banks of Lake Millstatt.
One day I was strolling on the big sports ground and learning a lesson
for school when I saw a young man stretched out on the grass
taking the sun. The face seemed familiar and I walked past him
a number of times. I couldn't believe it, because I knew Frank
Jerman had been handed over to Tito's partisans with thousands
of fellow domobranci. He was from the village next mine and a
great friend of my uncle who'd been abducted, but I thought he
was dead. All the same here he was, though much thinner. When
I greeted him he recognised me immediately, and told me how he'd
escaped death almost miraculously. I ran to tell my mother the
good news.
Frank started to study. One day he couldn't answer a question in an
exam set by Director Bajuk. When asked why, he said he didn't
have the book from which he could have learnt the answer. Bajuk
said he didn't mind where he found the book, but he had to know
the subject.
Frank wasn't a man for half measures.
He was
absent from class for nearly a week, but when he reappeared he
handed Bajuk the book he'd mentioned and a few others.
He'd
crossed the frontier to his home in Slovenia, loaded a haversack
with schoolbooks and returned, running a real risk of death: if
the partisans had caught him his end would have been terrible.
Frank blamed himself for his rashness for the rest of his life the communists heard of his secret visit home and put his sister
in prison. She was held for some years for failing to denounce

with epilogue 1995) The Last Secret (London, Andre Deutsch &
Penguin) and Tolstoy Nikolai (1977) Victims of Yalta (London,
Hodder & Stoughton).
122

him, and by the time she was released was half paralysed.
were privileged to live with real heroes.

We

Camp life for us youngsters was quite tolerable. We studied, attended

meetings of the boy scouts and religious organisations, played
football and went on excursions on Sundays with our teacher
Luskar.
We always had something to do.
These were without
doubt the happiest years of my youth.
It wasn't the same for the older people. It was painful to see how
those from the country, professional people, craftsmen and
ordinary workers, suffered from not being able to exercise their
skills and provide their families with a worthy hearth and
secure future.
A further burden was the frequent visits by
Yugoslav government missions, looking for people they charged
with war crimes or pressing us to return to Yugoslavia.
They
didn't have much success, as everyone knew there was a bloody
communist dictatorship at home, guilty of massacring the
domobranci among other atrocities.
Marian Loboda was not alone in describing how the school children were looked
after and remembering his teacher Luskar. Franc Rode was only ten when his
family reached Austria - father, mother and seven children, of whom two were
sent back, the older being killed at Teharje and the younger eventually
released. He attended the camp schools at Viktring and Judenburg to start
with.
Then in 1946 he passed the gimnazija entrance exam and joined his
sister Francka and brother Vinko there, first in Lienz and then in Spittal.
He remembers the order of priests who traditionally concerned themselves with
education;
...

Later I got to know the Salesians.

These were priests,
outstanding
priests.
Outstandingly
devoted
and
selfsacrificing, they lived in truth only for us, for the young
people.
The time in the camps could so easily have been
cheerless and miserable in an atmosphere of depression and
apathy, but owing to the Salesians we lived an exceptionally
vigorous and joyful existence. We were also very well taught.

There were some great, great Salesians.

Above all Janko Mernik, a
wonderful man from Stajerska, exceptionally gifted: then our
teacher of religion at the gimnazija, Alojzij Luskar, a saintly
man with a warm heart and great worldly wisdom: the talented
musician Silvo Mihelic, our teacher of singing and music at the
gimnazija, a true scholar: Dr. Franc Mihelic, who taught us
natural science, a true scientist; and finally two more
Salesians, who we realised were laymen and who specially
involved themselves with our leisure-time activities, Janez
Ambrozic and Rudi Knez.
When we went to the woods to play
soldiers, they were two halves. One camp was with Mr. Ambrozic,
the other with Mr. Knez.
We played tag in those woods and
captured camps.
These

people devoted themselves totally to their vocation and

sacrificed themselves for us.
When I think back on them I
cannot but feel a boundless respect and admiration for the
devotion with which they brought us up, acting as positive role
models.
They were always available to us, so that our lives,
123

which could easily have been sad, wretched and hopeless, were on
the contrary very happy.
The author of these words was installed Archbishop and Metropolitan in
Ljubljana on 6 April 1997.
Rode's predecessor in 1945, the exiled Bishop Gregorij Rozman, visited the
Slovenes as soon as they arrived in Lienz. His former chancellor, Monsignor
Dr Joze Jagodic, recorded 84 :
Sunday 1 July. Bishop Rozman came and celebrated mass for the Feast
of Christ's Blessed Blood and delivered a deeply moving sermon
to an immense throng of Slovenes in the open air between the
barracks.
There were around 3,000, including a number of
Croats.
A week later I also reached the camp, and wrote home:
Sunday 8th July. I've transferred from one end of the British zone to
the other. The Slovenes are being sent to four camps. As there
were already FAU men in the three main centres they were going
to, I thought I'd lost "my Slovenes" and was feeling
disappointed. But I had a pleasant surprise. David Pearson, our
chief in Austria, decided on a swap round of personnel and I've
now found myself at Lienz (where half the Slovenes have been
sent) together with another FAU man, who's had no previous
experience in camps but wide interests and enough drive.
Before leaving Klagenfurt I handed over my job at the Austrian refugee
camp to a man supposed till then to have been browned off for
lack of work. I was talking solidly for four hours covering the
small amount that had been done and the pile that could be done!
My last afternoon was cheering as the director showed signs of
bucking up, having seen the Burgermeister to hurry up urgent
roofing repair without any prompting.
The journey to Lienz was lovely - along the valley of the river Drau,
past the enormous Woerthersee lake which was a popular Austrian
holiday resort and along the winding river flanked by impressive
mountain ranges, ending up in the Lienz valley dominated by the
Dolomites.
On a hot afternoon the mountains have the hard
brilliance of the hills in the Riviera, but on cooler days they
produce superbly soft colours and we often have glorious skies.
The work may be wearing but it certainly has its compensations,
living in some of the finest tourist country of Austria.
The position in the camp is delicate and complex. It holds 3,500, and
has over 4,400 and so is somewhat overcrowded!
1,600 are
Russians and Yugoslavs who were here before the Slovenes arrived
and thus occupy all the jobs in the office, kitchens, stores and
workshops.
Then arrived the 2,500 Slovenes, who had virtually
run their own camp at Viktring.
The camp director 85 is not
84

. Jagodic, Monsignor Joze (1974), Mojega Zivljenja Tek

(Klagenfurt), p.258.
85
. Captain Martyn.
124

nearly as imaginative or liberal as the two we had at Viktring,

and reacted strongly to the overtures made by the Slovenes who
are in an absolute majority.
At Viktring the one thing the
majors were keen on was that so far as possible the refugees
should run their own camp, while here the captain is determined
that if the refugees realise only one thing, it's that the
British army are running the camp.
Thus the over-enthusiastic
Slovenes were severely snubbed and the Russians remain in
virtual monopoly of camp jobs, which leads to ugly results. The
food is undoubtedly poor in quantity and quality, and the
Slovenes are convinced the Russians in the kitchen put water
into the soup doled out to the Slovene barracks.
The only
solution is a mixed kitchen staff but the powers that be resist
the idea.
Combined with this, the two FAU men who preceded us had spent all
their time abroad as medical orderlies in an army hospital and
were content here to carry out a no doubt useful and necessary
job of little scope of the sergeant's or corporal's type, one
looking after food stores and kitchen, the other running a camp
information and Red Cross message service.
The real thing we're sent to do is to help and encourage the refugees
start
their
own
carpenters',
blacksmiths',
tinsmiths',
bootmakers' and tailors' shops, train apprentices in them, get
schools going, adult education and lectures, gymnastics, sports
and recreations, concert parties and gardening and many suchlike activities so that they don't fall into the all too common
apathy and later "unemployableness" to be found in camps 86 . But
the captain has more limited ideas and has shown mistrust of the
two meddlesome Red Cross men who disturb the quiet of his camp
and give him more work to do. So one has the delicate task of
going slow to overcome his mistrust and wait till he gets to
know one better and has more confidence in one before pressing
too many new ideas, and on the other hand dealing with the not
unnaturally dissatisfied Slovenes, trying to temper their
enthusiasm which will only make things worse with the Officer
Commanding (OC), who will be strengthened in his conviction that
these so-and-sos are trying to run his camp.
Things seem to be improving in the last day or two; we've got some gym
and football going in which all the camp takes part, and have
taken the opportunity, provided by some school benches and other
material scrounged from a bombed school in the town, of forcing
the Russian and Slovene doctors to cooperate in deciding on the
sharing out of the proceeds.
One can see each coming to the
conclusion that the others were not quite such awful people as
they'd imagined.
I'm hoping to start a lending library of English books for the many
refugees who are studying English, and my already impressive
86

. The training the FAU gave its fieldworkers in this

respect was heavily influenced by Quaker experience of work in
Wales in areas of mass unemployment in the 1920s and 1930s
depression.
125

store of Penguins will form an excellent nucleus (I've given

away very few of the ones you sent me, having had the idea for
some time). The Listeners should also come in handy, especially
as they've plenty of simple direct narrative prose.
**Saturday 14th July.
An FAU man I know who is responsible for the
supervision of Hitler Youth camps turned up with the MG officer
i/c education in the Gau and picked two of us up to go to half a
dozen camps that evening and next morning up in the hills. The
kids are mainly from Vienna and housed in winter sports hotels
in the mountains.
We spent the night at the camp where the
Vienna Boys' Choir are: it is an ancient foundation to which all
the kids with first class voices in Vienna are sent, and they
sang to us in the evening.
They were really beautiful, doing
songs of Mozart and Schubert's "Lark", the Blue Danube and
another Strauss waltz, some folksongs and the old Austrian
national anthem.
One or two had amazing voices, and their
precision and technique and feeling were superb. The school had
had several clashes with the Nazis, but kept its character
pretty well.**
On Wednesday 25 July the camp newspaper ("Novice" or "The News") 87 contained
an announcement on a development which transformed the lives of hundreds of
refugee students in Austria.
The issue opened as usual with world news:
Winston Churchill, Antony Eden and Clement Attlee had returned from the
Potsdam Conference to London to hear the General Election results, the
Americans had made massive air raids on Japan. It then turned to sport and
blamed the Slovene football team for an ill-disciplined performance against
the Croats, who won 4:1, but praised the referee, my FAU colleague John
Strachan, for his firm handling of the match which prevented more unpleasant
incidents. Then came the announcement:
FOR UNIVERSITY STUDENTS the English camp authorities have started to
take a very active interest, to enable them to continue their
studies for the new academic year. Yesterday on the initiative
of Mr Corsellis a meeting of all male and female university
students was also attended by representatives from Spittal and
Anras. A committee was elected to assist Mr Corsellis with the
preparations for university studies, consisting of Jancar Joze,
Kompare Tone, Sah Max, Malovrh Roza, Dr Kalin Angel, Hudic Lado
(Croat) and Zaruba Vlado (Russian).
Joze Jancar describes on page 00 how the students were eventually found
university places, but other developments have to be recorded in the
meantime. My letter-diary:
Sunday 29 July. It looks as if things are at last beginning to sort
themselves out. * A fortnight ago a major plus camp team arrived
suddenly. At first no one knew when he was taking over and so
all intelligent planning was paralysed - the OC not being
interested in pressing for supplies which would not arrive until
after he left.
We were then told calmly by Army HQ that the
change-over wouldn't take place for a month or more which was
87

. Novice for 25 July, 1945, duplicated camp daily

neswpaper, in Studia Slovenica archive, Zavod Sv. Stanislava,
Ljubljana-Sentvid.
126

infuriating, as this camp can only be adequately got ready for

winter if firm and energetic action is taken, and the present OC
even before he knew he was going was not exactly bursting with
energy: he felt he'd worked quite hard enough during the war and
deserved a rest and intended taking one. Then the BRC suddenly
without warning withdrew two of its five workers and so the
three left, already with enough to do, had to share between them
their work.* Thank goodness yesterday we received news that the
change-over to the major's camp team will take place at the
weekend.
The major 88 is a "regular ranker", i.e. had been in the Army as an NCO
some ten years before the war. He's pretty friendly and I think
we'll cooperate well - fortunately my FAU colleague is a keen
footballer which provides common ground - and he seems to have
plenty of push: he certainly isn't conspicuous for understanding
of or interest in the viewpoint of the refugee or the Slovene as
such, but is keen to help the people to be efficient and make
the camp a success, and that is saying a lot. He's not the type
that shows any signs of war weariness, although he's had his
full share of it.
I had already sent three letters home before Pernisek resumed his
diary:
Sunday 30th July. It's a month since we arrived and the Slovene part
of the camp is gradually getting set up. We are having a great
struggle dealing with the Russians, who took the best and most
attractive barracks.
They were here when we arrived and they
manage in their own way.
Most are old Russian emigrants who
lived in Yugoslavia for more than twenty years and enjoyed King
The
Alexander's 89 goodwill, and speak Serbian very well.
majority appear perverted and corrupted, proficient in slander,
lies, swindle and theft. Still there are some highly educated,
refined, noble individuals who are ashamed to belong to the
group.
We get on with them well and understand each other.
Many are deeply religious and very ecumenically minded, and we
talk about the need for more unity among Christians, especially
after the intense suffering we are all undergoing.
Among the Russians from the Soviet Union there are labour camp people
and soldiers of the Vlasov army who escaped into the woods
during the forced repatriations. They believe in the bolshevik
doctrine, are morally less scrupulous, addicted to vodka and
quite poor as well.
There is intense hatred between the old
Russian emigres and the Russians from the Soviet Union.
There is a difficult battle to be fought, on very unequal terms,
simply because we have no "women for sale", while the Russians
use this weapon to open all doors. They have dances and merrymaking till the early hours and different competitions presided
over by former Russian dancers from Belgrade night-clubs and
88

. Major A.E.Richards.
. King Alexander I, born 1888, succeeded to throne 1921,
killed by a Croat assassin 1934.
89

127

cabarets, and even by less reputable women. One of these has a

great influence over the camp commandant, a British Major. Her
room in the camp is the centre of intrigues and activities and
the Major spends long hours there. The so-called superintendent
of the camp is a certain Engineer X who is a master liar,
intriguer and thief.
The post was invented by the Russians
themselves.
When they have a celebration or a marriage the
inhabitants of the camp immediately suffer a shortage of bread today we got only one loaf for sixteen people.
We have organized the teaching in the school, and all three sections
have classes regularly. The camp administration has banned the
issue of the newssheet Domovina v Taboriscu [The Homeland in the
Camp]. We are allowed to publish one called Novice [The News]
in Slovene, but the news is sent to us by Sergeant Jud Shany.
He underlines in red articles from the Kaerntner Nachrichten
[Carinthian News] and we can only publish them.
Anything on
religious, political, ideological or national subjects is
forbidden. Sergeant Shany knows Russian well and can understand
Slovene and that's why he is in charge of censorship.
But we
are publishing Domaci Glasovi [Voices from Home] in Klagenfurt
to supplement what cannot be published in Novice. The number of
copies of Novice is very low. Our hope is that the censorship
will stop soon, as Sergeant Shany is due to be recalled to
active duty.
Sergeant Shany left next day and I was asked, or volunteered, to replace him
as censor. Pernisek's hope was fulfilled and I was able to stop censorship
to all intents and purposes, limiting myself to persuading the Slovenes to
exercise restraint and avoid outspoken anti-communist comments likely to
provoke the Yugoslavs or Russians into protesting formally to the British
army.
Pernisek believed Father Blatnik's story that the outspoken "Voices
from Home" was published in Klagenfurt, but Blatnik himself tells the truth
on page xx. Pernisek continues:
We are trying little by little to get some workshops started in spite
of the Russians having stolen most of the equipment. Our people
are able to make some tools themselves; there are loads of old
military transport vehicles on the banks of the river Drau which
are invaluable for making tools and other useful things. Good
Mr Corsellis procured some hammers and other tools for us, and
people brought axes and smaller hand tools with them from home,
so the workshops have started operating well.
There was a terrific storm during the night,
Thursday 9th August.
the river Drau rose rapidly to a dangerous level and in the
early hours of the morning waves were crashing over the bridge.
By nine the bridge was gone!
The people of Tristach are celebrating the
Friday 10th August.
feast of St Lawrence, their patron saint.
The good gentle
priest Ferdinand Fritzer invited our Metropolitan Bishop Dr
Rozman as the main celebrant of Solemn Mass. This parish priest
is our benefactor, advocate, protector and "generous father" to
our children, who gives them everything he has himself and
everything he collects from the parishioners.
128

After Mass Bishop Rozman headed a long procession which wound its way
through the village and the fields, and the parishioners carried
the statues of the saints from the church. The mayor, very tall
and of imposing appearance, carried the large banner himself, no
small feat in such a wind. The women walked behind the statue
of St Anne, wearing Tyrolean national costumes, black dresses,
silk aprons of vivid green or blue and black, low round hats
with large black bows and ribbons reaching the ground.
It's
simple, but very elegant and beautiful, and the women wear it
for church services on Sundays and Feastdays.
The girls line up behind the statue of Our Lady. Their costumes are
beautiful, long black dresses and blue or green silk aprons,
bareheaded, with braided plaits adorned with small white
garlands wound round their heads.
The younger children and
teenagers follow the statue of the Guardian Angel.
The town
band also wear traditional Tyrolean costume, black suede leather
short trousers held up by green embroidered braces, long woollen
stockings and black boots, white shirts and large silk neckscarves.
Around their thighs they have wide leather belts
decorated with multicoloured small leather ornaments and on top
of it all coarse woollen cloth jackets with vivid coloured
borders and on their heads tall cone-shaped black hats with
curved feathers.
Four field altars were erected along the route, where the Bishop
blessed the people four times with the Most Blessed Sacrament,
as during the Corpus Christi procession, and Slovene priests
from different camps assisted.
Such a procession in the
beautiful mountain setting is majestic and colourful, and the
people were most devout, with no chatter to be heard but only
deeply experienced prayers. There were few men as they haven't
yet returned from the war fronts. I also missed bell-ringing as
the military had confiscated all the church bells, and only the
smallest bell is heard, little better than a death knell.
Dr Rozman was the most eminent of the Slovenes to escape to Austria,
and was hated and pursued by the Belgrade government as a
leading anti-communist and alleged collaborator.
The British
held him under house arrest in Klagenfurt from August 1945 while
considering a demand for his extradition as a war criminal.
They decided not to, and in November 1947 he moved secretly to
Salzburg in the American zone of Austria, and then to
Switzerland and the USA.
He was a controversial figure and
Father Kozina has described how hurt he was when in 1950 his
request to see the Pope privately was declined.
He spent his
remaining eleven years as a "wandering missionary and bishop"
based on Cleveland, Ohio, the centre with the strongest
concentration of Slovene immigrants in the States.
Pernisek put schools high on the list of the Slovenes' priorities on arrival
at Lienz, and Director Marko Bajuk, appointed already in Viktring by the
Slovene National Committee as educational supremo, recalls the progress that
was made:
No sooner did we organise ourselves at Viktring than there came a
bomb-shell, we had to move! ... We were able to continue with
129

lessons under most difficult circumstances.

In August I
approached the HQ in Klagenfurt to let them know we were
intending to hold the baccalaureate exams and ask them to send
us someone to head the exam commission.
Instead they sent
Colonel Baty, overall head of education there, who arrived very
late one evening. I was summoned to the office at 11 pm, and he
was asking me so many detailed questions I was soon able to
guess his profession - headmaster of a London grammar school.
He wrote such an excellent report on our work that none of our
people could have written it so well.
The report does indeed make moving reading 90 . Its interest is the greater,
because of the closeness with which its author follows the format of
contemporary official inspection reports of Her Majesty's Inspectors of
Education on grammar schools in Britain:
1.

An inspection was made of this school, and especially of the

upper forms, on Thursday and Friday, 9 and 10 August, 1945.

2.

HISTORY.
The school began spontaneously, under the lead of Dr
Marko Bajuk, at Viktring during June 1945, and consisted of
Slovene boys and girls who had been in attendance at
intermediate
(British
terminology,
secondary)
schools
in
Ljubljana. Most of these pupils were soon after removed to the
Lienz camp, where the school has been continued.
Practically
all the pupils are Slovene, and without exception they are Roman
Catholic.

3.

ORGANISATION and STAFFING.

The constitution of the school
follows the plan normal in Jugoslavia, and since the head master
was for some three years inspector of secondary schools for
Slovenia, he is very well acquainted with the standards,
syllabuses and regulations in force there.
Dr Bajuk is a man of outstanding personality and energy.
Both
from the reports of the camp authorities and from direct
observation it was clear that his leadership was the most vital
factor in the school.
His experience as a scholar, an
administrator and a student of music is invaluable.
He
exercises a general advisory direction over the primary school
also, though it has its own head: and he also concerns himself
actively with adult education.
The other members of the staff, seventeen in all (some of them
with part-time duties only), are understood to be qualified
according to the requirements for Jugoslav secondary schools.
So far as an outsider not speaking Slovene can judge, their
ability as teachers is undoubted, and their personal relations
with one another, with the camp management and with their pupils
appeared natural and happy.
A weekly meeting of the whole
teaching staff is held, at which both general matters and
individual problems are discussed.
90

.
duplicated
seven-page
report
headed
Headquarters
Military Government Land Kaernten Ref: MGK/3870/DP, signed Baty
(Deputy Controller, Education Nr., Allied Comm. for Austria)
and dated 12 August 1945, Studia Slovenica archive, LjubljanaSentvid.
130

The role of the camp commandant corresponds to that, in an

English school, of a friendly and well-informed chairman of the
governors, who makes it his business to give all possible
facilities to the school, but wisely leaves the head master a
free hand in running it. In his dealings with the school, he is
greatly helped by Mr John Corsellis of the Friends Ambulance
Unit, who makes the educational side of the camp his special
business.
4.

PREMISES. The secondary school has its premises in a long hut

with rooms of different sizes, none of them large.
It is
unfortunate the lavatory accommodation occupies a part of this
hut: for in consequence some of the classes, even of the
secondary school, have to be held elsewhere. These same rooms
are extensively used for adult courses in the evenings.
It was observed that during recent heavy rain, school work had
been curtailed because rooms were flooded: and that the windows
were in some cases defective, and in all cases seen single.
This would clearly be serious in winter. A good deal of school
furniture had been secured: but even so, in some rooms equipment
was very incomplete.
The school day is, for reasons of accommodation, divided into two
shifts. The four senior years have classes from 08.30 to 12.15
hours, the four lower years from 14.30 to 18.30 hours.

5.

BOOKS.
From the nature of the circumstances in which these
Slovenes left their homes, they have almost no books. In most
subjects the teachers have to prepare texts, or to copy the one
existing text-book on a duplicating machine with which they have
provided themselves.
This imposes immense extra work on the
staff, whose conditions are already difficult.
Apart from the
class-teaching difficulties, the absence of a library will very
soon prove a basic defect to staff and pupils alike. They are
living on capital from a pedagogical point of view. At present
they are living on capital in an educational sense.
If their
background of culture is to be maintained, this cannot last.

6.

TEACHING. In view of the immediate occasion of the inspection,

the classes actually visited were all in the upper half of the
school, and pupils ranging from about 14 1/2 to 19 were
concerned. The total numbers in the secondary school were 124,
of whom about 50 were girls.
All classes seen, with one
exception, contained both boys and girls.
A systematic time-table, much on English lines, was shown and it
was clear that it corresponded exactly with what was in fact
carried out.
All classes were orderly, punctual and welldisciplined. The manners of pupils were rather more formal than
is usual in England, but it was abundantly clear that their good
external behaviour proceeded from natural courtesy and a
determination
to
make
the
best
possible
use
of
their
opportunities.

The report then appraised five lessons. Two were by Dr Bozidar Bajuk, one of
the headmaster's sons and "evidently a good scholar and a teacher above the
average". A Greek grammar lesson for boys aged 14 - 15 reached "a standard,
for the age concerned, I have no hesitation in saying higher than will at
present be found in Greek classes in most English secondary schools in which
131

Greek is taught"; while in a Latin lesson on Livy for ten boys and two girls
aged about 18, the "reading of the Latin (very wisely insisted upon) showed
an excellent grade of the sense as well as an appreciation of quantity".
The third, geography, lesson for fifteen boys and seven girls was taken by Mr
Max Sah and was "exemplary in its attention and its manners"; while Dr
Zudenigo, the only Croat teacher, took the last two, Italian, lessons which
were "very lively and responsive classes". The report continued:
Time
a)

b)
c)
d)

7.
a)
b)
c)

40
20
d)

8.

9.
1.

did not permit an inspection of other classes: but it was

ascertained that:
religious
instruction,
by
teachers
duly
qualified
and
ecclesiastically approved, has two periods a week throughout the
school.
physical training has due attention (a class of children of the
elementary school was observed).
hygiene, taught by a Slovene doctor of distinction [Dr Puc], is in
the curriculum.
music (in which Dr Bajuk himself is an expert) plays a live part in
the camp in general and in the school in particular.

MISCELLANEOUS.
The camp choir, assembled at short notice, gave a delightful
recital of Slovene songs.
The camp produces a daily news-sheet in Slovene.
There are roughly the following university students in the camp
whose courses have been broken off short, and for whom, in the
absence of tutors and books, nothing can be done at present:
law
30 medicine
humanities, vet science and others
3 agriculture
A number of intending teachers are among the pupils of the 8th
(top) class. On completion of the normal school year they will
continue to study, taking the theory and practice of teaching in
an intensive course.
GENERAL CONCLUSIONS.
This school is maintaining, under very
great difficulties, the best traditions of European education
and culture.
In the circumstances the venture can fairly be
called heroic, and deserves all possible recognition and
support.
The kindness and helpfulness of the camp commandant
and of his FAU workers made the inspector's visit a pleasure:
and the courtesy and appreciation shown by the Slovenes is a
high testimonial to their work and understanding.
The
recommendations involving action are given below.

RECOMMENDATIONS.
That military government should exercise the privilege which its
responsibilities for DPs confer, and should recognise this as a
secondary school.
This would involve the issue, under the
authority of MG, of certificates in accordance with Jugoslav
practice at, at any rate, the following levels:
a) Abiturienten, or Reifepruefung [maturity exam] which corresponds
roughly to higher certificate, and is essential for those going
on to universities, whether in Italy, in Austria or elsewhere.
This would be awarded on the examinations now about to be held.
b) Lehrerbildungspruefung [teacher training exam] to enable those
senior pupils, mostly girls, who are combining "sixth-form" work
132

with a teachers training course to obtain posts as teachers in

elementary schools.
These steps are urgent, since pupils are in danger of dispersal
and the question of university admission will arise during the
summer vacation.
2.

That the greatest possible care should be taken not to disperse

this very homogeneous unit.
For the cultural future of these
Slovenes, the continuation of this school is vital. Further, if
steps can be taken to regain those pupils who were lost to the
school by the move to Lienz, that would be most desirable.

3.

That Dr Blatnik, a priest and a teaching member of the staff, be

enabled at the earliest possible moment to go to Rome in order
that, by way of the Pontificia Assistenza [Papal Aid] at the
Vatican, arrangement may be made for the absorption of
a) this year school-leavers, and
b) existing university students whose courses are incomplete, in
universities in Italy or elsewhere.
The potential loss of
doctors, lawyers, teachers and educated men generally is very
disturbing, if these persons cannot get into touch with such
bodies, which are willing and able to help them.
If this is
entirely impossible, a representative of Pontificia Assistenza
might be invited to Lienz.

4.

That books should be secured by any possible means, for teaching

and for library purposes. The first need is for Slovene books,
but Italian and German books would have great usefulness and
many of the pupils, as well as adults, are learning English.

5.

That the contents of this report be communicated to all persons

mentioned and that it be shown to Major Richards, camp
commandant, Mr J.Corsellis, FAU, at the camp and Dr Marko Bajuk,
head master.

All the recommendations were carried out. The one exception was Dr Blatnik's
visit to Rome, which was overtaken by events.
It had been included as a
result of intensive lobbying on my part, after I had been approached already
in Viktring by the powerful team of Bajuk himself, Dr Mersol, who was
previously lecturer in the medical faculty of Ljubljana University, Dr
Blatnik, a senior Catholic priest specialising in youth welfare and former
gimnazija director, and Joze Jancar, medical student and spokesman for the
university students. Jancar recalls:
Mersol was saying, "what about the university students?" and I said,
"look, I think the first priority should be kids.
The
university students have plenty of time until October but the
kids need school now." "But for the university students, what
about books and whatnot?" We discussed that and I said, "look,
ask Corsellis.
He might be organising something".
The chap
Blatnik said, "we have to have a list of the students first".
He was a very good organiser, he had the names. Next morning he
said, would I talk to you?
So we started: I was mentioning
Italy and you were very enthusiastic. But I said Mersol and I
are holding the students back for later.
It was not easy to do anything for them.
133

Austria had been divided into four

separate zones occupied by the British, French, Americans and Russians, and
it was easier to travel to Italy, illegally across the poorly guarded
frontier, than to the other three zones.
The only universities were in
Innsbruck, Vienna and Graz, the first two of which were in the French and
Russian zones, and the third in a part of the British zone the Russians had
occupied and showed no signs of leaving.
So that only left Italy.
Joze
Opara recalls:
This was a marvellous time.
In July I went black [illegally], over
the hills, to Italy to find out about university, to Padua. I
spoke with the Pro-Rector, we were talking in Latin, and he
said, "yes, come, we'll accept you."
This was for me
personally, I was going on my own. I'd no mandate from anybody
else. But where to get finance?
Several students crossed illegally on their own to see if study at Padua or
Bologna was possible. Joze Jancar was different. He travelled on behalf of
all the students. He recalled the background in conversation with me:
When

you arrived in Lienz the first priority was the university

students, and we had a long discussion. You said you'd check:
and there wasn't a hope in hell of Graz.
You said it may be
later, and I said later is a year gone, or a term gone, and I
remember we were sitting in a meadow and discussing other
alternatives.
I said, "look, a lot know Italian, what about
Padua? It's the nearest. Rome's too far. I'll go to Padua".
You were very sceptical but agreed and gave me some provisions
and your blessing so I felt all right.

I heard a Peter Maler, a Cistercian monk, was going to Merano 91 . We

went across and he said, "you look on the left and I on the
right. Whoever first spots the FSS 92 or a car with an English
registration dives straight to the woodland on one side or the
other.
Not the two together, because if they catch one .. it
depends who's unlucky".
It was heavy going, we saw a lot of
people going across, Germans, Hungarians, smugglers and all
kinds of queer people. We walked all the way.
We came down to Merano, saw the station and said goodbye to each
other, he to the monastery and I on the train. I didn't know
what time, I didn't ask, I just sat there. It was about midday
we left and then the chap came along, Italian, and said
"biglietti", tickets, and I mumbled something and offered a DP
card .. and he clipped! I'd no money! Nothing.
We were going along happily, and the next thing, "all out!" because
the line was bombed. It was Cortina d'Ampezzo and there was a
big lorry coming along with some wood and a lot of people
singing and happy. They stopped and somebody dropped down and I
said, "can I?"
"good, jump on!" and we were going through
Cortina and they were singing, Avanti Populo, Bandiera Rosso
[Forward the People and the Red Flag]. "My God Almighty, where
91

. Italian town 170 km west of Lienz

. Field Security Service, the British
frontier police
92

134

political

and

am I?"
They were Italian partisans!
And, "da dove siete?"
[where are you from] and "oh God! what shall I say now?"
I
mumbled something and said, "I'm searching for my colleagues.
They must be somewhere in this area".
"come to our
headquarters: we've names", and we stopped suddenly and I said I
had to go to the loo and, my gosh, I went where nobody could
catch me! They waited a while, then somebody was shouting, "oh,
leave him!"
I got to Padua and saw Father Preseren 93 , the Slovene chief of Jesuits
there, and I said, "could you arrange me an interview with the
University Director?" "I might with the Secretary, but not with
the Director".
I said, "look.
Secretary's no good", and
explained and he said, "you are daring, aren't you!" and I said,
"look, this is vital.
Either I have the answer or we're in
trouble for a year.
Because I don't know what's happening in
Graz".
And he said, "all right.
I'll explain to him.
I'll
ring him personally".
So he rang and the chap said I could see him tomorrow.
I was as I
was, and I apologised: he said, "did you travel by .. ?"
He
knew. I said, "I went over the mountains", and he said, "where
were you studying?"
"Ljubljana".
"Oh, Provincia Ljubljana.
Have you any documents?" "Yes. I've four indexes", university
records of completed studies.
He looked at them.
"This is
exactly what I want. I'll accept all your qualifications, and
anybody else who studied in Ljubljana University".
God!
I
nearly jumped through the window with joy and went off to
Preseren who said, "tt, tt, tt, I can't believe it, because he's
God Almighty, you know!"
So anyway I came back, and it was a very arduous walk, actually harder
because I was getting exhausted and afraid all the time. Next
morning you were surprised when I was reporting to you, and you
said, "now we move", and started to organise things.
While Jancar and I were exploring the Italian connection, an alternative
solution was being put forward by some of the older Slovenes - Pernisek, the
social insurance worker and diary writer, Mavric, a public auditor and
businessman, and Dr Puc, who was running the school clinic and teaching
hygiene in the school - as recalled by Mark Sfiligoi, at the time 19 years
old and one of the 21 students who passed their school-leaving exams in Lienz
in September and were poised for university:
Pernisek, Mavric and Puc were very active: they wanted to start a
Slovenian university at Lienz!
We and the university students
had a lot of discussions with them arguing against, that it
would be only a school in the barracks, not comparable to the
high school we have with Dr Bajuk.
But Pernisek was a big
proponent of a Slovenian university.
Of course it never
materialised because we sort of laughed it off and went to Graz.

93

. Monsignor Anton Preseren, who happened to be a Slovene,

was in fact Assistant General, or second in charge, of the
Jesuits worldwide.
135

I remember Franc Pernisek very, very well: he was impressive because

he was the most important politician among them, although selfpropelled.
He was involved deeply with the formation of a
temporary Slovenian government on the 3rd May in Ljubljana Tabor, or People's Convention, they called it. He was telling
that he was appointed as a Srezki Nacelnik which would be like
the head of a county in Slovenia, a local government official,
and as such he acted and was very close to the National
Committee of the refugees in Viktring.
He was with the
Slovenian People's Party or Christian Democrats. He was a very
good man, devoted. We young students were kind of laughing at
him because - how important he took his position which did not
exist!
He took life very seriously and tried to exercise his
authority and so on, but there was nothing but just an imaginary
title!
Director Bajuk wrote in his memoirs that he decided to back both projects:
Because the registration of our undergraduates in Graz that first
autumn appeared to be sticking and we had a well-founded fear
that nothing would come of it in the end, we had to start
thinking about a "temporary university" or rather some sort of
high-school courses.
We had lined up lecturers in medicine,
philosophy, natural history, chemistry and law.
There was a
deadline on a certain day. The favourable telegram arrived from
Graz that they were taking all our candidates, so our university
"fell in the water".
But everything was prepared for it space, books and students were all allocated.
Jancar explains how the "favourable telegram from Graz" was achieved:
A few days later you said, "I've news for you.
The Russians are
moving out of Graz". Then the circus started and we were really
going fast because September, October - it's only two months.
What was important was food and lodging, and then the
university, would it accept us?
Anyway you organised it: to Graz, to investigate.
You gave me a
letter to UNRRA or the army.
When I arrived it was getting
dark.
I came to the station.
Everything was bombed and I
couldn't get anywhere.
So I looked around and there was a
siding. It was warm so I went and slept there, under the train,
nice and comfortable.
The danger was somebody will pinch
whatever I had, and I'd a big loaf of bread from you!
I went in Graz and a nice man there, very sympathetic, a Military
Government officer, asked, "how many are you?"
"About a
hundred". "Oh God! Where'll we put them?" He started to ring
around.
He said, "right.
There's the Kepplerschule.
We're
moving the people out". He took me to it and said, "would it be
good enough for you?" and I said, "fantastic!"
I'd been
thinking of a ruddy barracks!
"Great!" he said, "all right.
I'm not 100% sure, but I'll organise that and I'll get in touch
with Corsellis and tell him".
I returned to Lienz and reported to you and then went back to Graz to
see the University Dean. The chap there said, "I think the Dean
is very busy".
I said, "look, I've a very urgent appointment
136

with him". "oh, you've an appointment?" "yes", and he took me

in. I didn't have any appointment! And I said, "good morning".
And he said, "ste vi Slovenc?" [are you Slovene?], my gosh! and
I said, "da". "Razumem Slovensko" "I understand Slovene". He
was very sympathetic, and again I had my documents.
He said,
"if you can find accommodation in Graz, I'll be very pleased to
help you. How many are you?" "A hundred".
My diary now takes over. I am not sure if I visited Graz before or after
Jancar, or between his two visits. The important thing is that between us we
succeeded. I wrote:
undated.
At last John Strachan is back and work is not quite so
desperate. To my surprise, my visit to Graz re the university
students has had some result. Graz is 200 miles from here, and
Klagenfurt, our "county" HQ and FAU HQ, 100 miles, so that
agitating for the arrangements for 145 students from three
separate camps to begin or continue their studies at Graz was no
simple matter.
If you just write a memo and forward it to your official channel and
await results, you can be confident nothing will happen.
You
have to type as many copies as possible, send them to everyone
who might possibly be interested in the scheme and help it
along, and then buttonhole every likely person you see and try
to guide the conversation along the right channels. Luckily our
FAU chief 94 is a live wire and did a bit of pushing from the
Klagenfurt end, and the BRC supervisor in Graz 95 is an excellent
and most energetic woman, and they both exerted pressure.
Eventually a Colonel Hall, i/c camps welfare, visited this camp during
a general tour and I managed to impress the urgency on him - the
project was first aired some three months ago, and nearly two
months ago I circulated a comprehensive memo - I'm getting quite
a hand at memos! - with detailed analytical lists. I got him to
approve my visiting Graz to survey possible accommodation and
then report back to him, only to get as far as Klagenfurt and be
halted by fierce telephone messages from BRC Graz telling me not
to poach.
Of course I was poaching, but it was their own fault as they had not
let me know they were doing anything.
So wasting two working
days I returned here only to be summoned four days later to a
conference at Graz, a whole day's journey away. The conference
was composed of Colonel Hall, a major i/c DPs in Steiermark who
is pretty hopeless, the UNRRA regional director 96 who was very
alive and supported the scheme strongly, the MG education
representative, two other souls from MG and UNRRA, the BRC
supervisor and myself.
I was in a strong position as I wasn't speaking only for one camp, but
for three camps containing the majority of refugees in Kaernten,
94

. David Pearson.
. Miss Joan Couper.
96
. Mr. Cornwall.
95

137

the only group that had produced comprehensive lists. All the
principles were settled reasonably quickly but the inevitable
stumbling block appeared over the accommodation question. Graz
is badly bombed and the Army doesn't consider students a high
priority. I left Graz depressed as another three days had been
wasted.
But pressure from BRC and UNRRA was just strong enough and a camp has
been found for 250 students from camps in the British zone and
100 in the American zone.
You can imagine I'm pleased!
Our
children are not losing time as they all go to reasonably good
schools, and now the same will apply to our undergrads.
While the fight for a special camp for the university students continued, so
did ordinary life at Lienz. My letter-diary:
Saturday 13th August. Things still happen with alarming rapidity and
every week one hopes that at last they will calm down and we
will be able to relax into a tolerable routine. A truck has at
last arrived for us, which will simplify work. We have just had
three days solid downpour - the worst for sixty years: three
bridges washed away locally including one just by the camp,
which is a great nuisance.
Monday 15th August. At last the news has come that the war is over in
the Far East - what an enormous relief. One can feel that the
vast
machinery
of
the
world
is
now
concentrated
on
reconstruction.
The Daily Telegraphs are starting to arrive.
For the last six weeks I've had to rely entirely on the Austrian
paper, as for some reason the copies of the British army paper
fail to arrive: excellent for my German, but it only contains
the most important home news.
We certainly have our elated and depressed periods. For four or five
days we've been pretty depressed, but now things are looking up
again. I've been spending time recently trying to get going a
fair and efficient clothing distribution system, seeing that
what little we do get goes as quickly as possible to those who
really need it. Our camp contains 2,100 Slovenes, 1,700 Russian
emigrants to Yugoslavia, 250 Croats and 40 Serbs. I'm trying to
get each group to form its own clothing committee and allot it
its rightful proportion of such clothes as we receive or make.
They then prepare lists of who should receive the clothes and my
store issues by the lists. The Russians are my main headache.
They have little idea of unity and "solidarity" and not much
confidence in their leaders. Still I hope to issue some 2,700
pairs of trousers, with some shirts, in five days.
The whole of this job is finding the right people to do the work for
you, handle them so they work well and keep an eye to see they
remain honest, contrive the simplest system you can find and
then step aside and be ready to deal with the inevitable
difficulties that arise. It is complicated by the fact that the
Major interferes in quite unexpected ways, and sabotages my
distribution system by giving people permits to have clothes
made if they come to him with a good yarn.
138

My bugbear as usual is the interpreters.

They wield enormous power
and have no scruples against using it as they think fit and are
at the bottom of most intrigues.
It is amazing how unaware
people are, of how much they are in their interpreters' hands.

The Pernisek diary:

Friday 18th August. **The banks of the river Drau are one big garden.
The dark green pine trees, bent and broken by the storm, lord it
over the slender alders whose leaves are turned to silver by the
glaring sun.
A light breeze makes the leaves quiver and the
barberry bushes, covered with a thousand rubies, shimmer in the
summer sun, while swallows circle overhead in large circles.
The Drau rushes through this garden after it has won freedom
from the chilly walls of the Dolomites and overcome the narrow
rocky gorges as, unchained and boisterous, it speeds eager to
explore the wider world.**
I stand with my little daughter on the bank and we tell the river to
carry heartfelt greetings to our beloved and lovely Slovenian
homeland and to our dear family and friends. Walking along the
shore we come across the untended graves of disaster victims.
In those terrible days of May when the British Army was handing
over soldiers and civilians, deportees and their wives and
children from the refugee camp to Stalin's Red Army, those
unfortunates who could do so fled the camp and threw themselves
in desperation into the river, killing first their wives and
children and finally themselves. The British buried the corpses
wherever they found them.
Many more were carried off by the
waves and deposited who knows where.
We pick barberries. As we gather the red grape-like clusters I seem
to be home in our Slovene woods and the bushes are sprinkled
with the blood of our fathers, sons and brothers. Dear brother
Joze, which bush in Rog 97 is sprinkled with your blood? We pick
the berries but my fingers feel sticky, smeared with blood.
Dear girl, let's stop, stop picking the red barberries, let's
stop and go away.
They remind me too much of our slaughtered
heroes.
Friday 25th August. The food is poor, scant and insufficient: some
days it's only green boiled water. People who'd been in Gonars
concentration camp tell us they were given more, and more
sustaining, food.
Today it was decided to campaign for a
separate Slovene kitchen to put an end to the theft of food
supplies. The Russians obstinately resist handing over control
although they could easily keep the barrack 25 kitchen for
themselves; but they're in an absolute minority in the camp and
obviously if they hand over the kitchen they'll have no one to
97

. Kocevski Rog, the wooded area of south-east Slovenia

where the worst partisan massacres of the domobranci took
place, and where a commemorative mass is celebrated each year,
attended by thousands of Slovenes.
My wife and I, together
with Count Tolstoy, were invited to attend this in 1995.
139

steal from! There were angry exchanges at a joint meeting when

the self-styled Superintendent K called the Slovenes "filthy
swine" and said the Russians would never eat what the Slovenes
cooked.
All the same we won the argument and took over the
kitchen for the whole camp.
The next entry in my diary is an account of an incident I described in my
letter-diary at the time and then discovered forty years later that Father
Blatnik had written his own version 98 . The differences are fascinating! I
give his version first.
He starts by describing the activities of his
Salesian colleagues:
The number of Salesians was proportionately large in the stream of
Slovenian refugees. When we found we were present in strength
at Viktring we started to think how we could help our fellows
and particularly the young people best, and six of us offered
our services to director Dr Marko Bajuk in the establishment of
a gimnazija. Most of us were sent from Viktring to Lienz: five
worked on the staff of the gimnazija while Father Mernik taught
religion in the primary school and opened a youth centre.
Father Ivan Matko taught in the technical school and Father Dr
Silvo Mihelic directed a magnificent choir which even the
British enjoyed and praised tremendously.
I edited both of the duplicated daily papers in the camp, "The News",
issued in the morning, and the afternoon "Voices from Home".
The former was published with British approval on the
understanding it shouldn't contain anything that would annoy
Tito or the Soviets.
I was even summoned before a Soviet
military commission to explain why we only published news from
British radio and not from Moscow.
I said the reception from
Moscow was poor and they retorted that on the contrary it was
very powerful; to which I replied, "very possibly, but we don't
receive it well in these valleys", and didn't hear from them
again.
"Voices from Home" was an underground paper. Our people wanted news
from home but this was always of a kind not welcome to Tito and
therefore also not to the British, so we wrote and duplicated
the paper in the camp but gave its place of publication as
Klagenfurt. We let the distributors have it at about three pm
to give the impression it had been sent up with the mail on the
afternoon train from Klagenfurt.
I was always afraid I'd have difficulties with the British because of
the illegal publication, but never did. I could hardly believe
the English and Tito's communists wouldn't see where the paper
was being written and duplicated.
To be sure we typed the
stencils on a different typewriter than the one used for "The
News" and so tried to cover our tracks. "Voices from Home" had
a comparatively large circulation because we also sent it to
other camps and individuals in the Tyrol and Carinthia.
One Saturday our "welfare officers" Corsellis and Strachan came to our
office and invited me to go with them on Sunday on an excursion
98

. article in the weekly journal Ameriska

Cleveland, Ohio, issue no. 201, 20 October 1971
140

Domovina,

into the frontier zone, up towards Anras and Sillian so that I

could visit friends I had there. Refugees needed a special pass
to enter the zone and we couldn't get there, so I was specially
pleased by the invitation although I suspected it might have
given with an ulterior motive. I was afraid it had something to
do with "Voices from Home", because Corsellis was ultimately
responsible for all camp publications. My first impulse was to
decline but then I felt this might offend them, which wouldn't
have been a good idea.
Till then I hadn't heard of the camp
administrators inviting any refugee on such an "excursion",
least of all into the frontier zone. If they asked me they must
have had some confidence in me, and so I accepted.
No sooner
had we left the camp than they began:
We've been together for a good summer and truly admire your people's
high culture, deep religious faith, love of cleanliness and
order, excellent way of bringing up their young people, honesty
and high moral standards, but one thing we can't understand,
your attitude to communism. You fly into a passion like turkey
cocks at the sight of the colour red, but all the same the
communists are human beings like us. One has to adjust to them
and talk things over with them democratically, but you flare up
at the very word communism.
It's clear the right attitude to
communism is the only issue we don't agree on.
We find you
kind, friendly and appreciative, but on this point you don't
trust us.
I won't go into details how I explained the atrocities the communists
perpetrated during the war against everybody who was on the side
of the English and what happened to the domobranci who were sent
back - those the English handed over to Tito under the lying
pretence they were sending them down to Italy: and they had seen
for themselves how they were loaded on to the trucks at Viktring
and carted away from there. In the end they thanked me and said
they now understood us better.
I was not very happy at calling on friends and acquaintances in the
frontier zone because by doing so I'd be showing them the people
I was in contact with.
Of course I couldn't trust them
completely - something they themselves justifiably reproached us
with. So I only drove them to the vicarage at Anras where Dr
Mirko Kozina, who is now in California, was curate. On his desk
Corsellis noticed "Voices from Home", pointed to it and said to
me: "your writings travel far!
I congratulate you".
"You're
mistaken", I answered, " that's not mine, it comes from
Klagenfurt, just look".
Then he came right up to me and said
quietly, "Herr Doktor, halten Sie mich bitte nicht fuer so dumm"
[Doctor, please don't think I'm that stupid!]. I was startled
because he'd shown the camp administration had seen through my
deception; but I also realised he wasn't going to make
difficulties for us and felt grateful for his consideration. I
don't know if he fully understood my answer: I just said, but
this time really meant it, "thank you!"
And now my diary entry at the time:
25th

August.

am

writing

at

the end
141

of

very

pleasant

and

successful Sunday. John Strachan, my FAU colleague, and I went

out at ten o'clock in the truck with Father Blatnik to visit
some neighbouring Slovenes and have a day in the country.
Father Blatnik, one of the foremost personalities in the camp, is a
Salesian priest but always wears lay clothes (the Salesians are
a very active Catholic order who work mainly for orphans and
youths generally: they have colleges in London and Oxford and
all over the continent).
During the war he was doing welfare
and liaison work with Slovenes deported by the Germans to Serbia
and interned in concentration camps in Italy, cooperating on
this with the Vatican 99 . At the same time he managed to smuggle
information for use of the British out of Yugoslavia via the
British Minister to the Vatican and got shoved in jail in Rome
three months by the Italians - in Regina Coeli, the jail from
which the leading Fascist escaped four months ago. Earlier in
Ljubljana he was headmaster of a Salesian secondary school, and
in the camp here teaches the classics in our secondary school
and edits the excellent camp newspaper and generally looks after
the interests of students, among other things.
In the neighbouring hills there are also many Slovenes, mainly exuniversity students, working on the land.
So this morning we
went some fifteen miles by truck and then walked up into the
hills to a lovely typical Tyrolean village, Anras, where there
are some students.
It was a remarkably fine day with no low
clouds or rain and hot sun. I had a long and interesting chat
with a Slovene law student.
The only way the war had apparently affected the villagers had been in
the casualty lists. Every village has its roll of honour, and
on it nearly all the men have fallen on the "Eastern" or "S.E."
front. The farmers certainly have to work very hard as do their
womenfolk to wrest a living out of the soil: their land is so
steep, and often very stony. All their crops they cut by hand,
with scythe or sickle. When the war came the Germans sent the
farmers a lot of Czechs, Poles and Ukrainians.
These the
farmers worked very hard and paid nothing - just fed them. Now
they're gone and the farmers do the same with the Slovenes 100 .
Even an Austrian farm worker only receives food and 6d a day
pay!
We then picked up another Slovene priest 101 and his brother with whom I
had worked at Viktring and went on further and had a picnic
lunch in a field with an excellent view of an old castle. Then
up again in the hills towards the Italian frontier to a village
99

. Bishop Gregorij Rozman selected him for this delicate

mission: see Kolaric, Jakob (1977) Skof Rozman (Klagenfurt),
passim.
100
. While this may be true about some Austrian farmers it
is unfair as a generalisation.
Farmers often paid their
Slovene workers generously in food for themselves and their
families.
101
. Father Vladimir (Mirko) Kozina and Joseph Kozina. See
also pages 00 -00.
142

from which there were three or four superb views.

There we
visited the local Austrian priest with whom a Slovene was
lodging; the latter was out, but we had a couple of glasses of
wine and bread and a pleasant chat with the old character of a
priest - he'd been in the same parish with eighty souls since
the first world war! He couldn't make out if John and I were
really harmless or not, and made very cautious replies to any
doubtful questions. This was the first time I've had wine since
Italy.
We then visited a church with some fine Gothic wall
paintings and called in on a charming Slovene family who
entertained us with hot milk - again my first real milk since
Italy.
The father of the family was chief local government
officer for a large area of Slovenia, and he and his wife and 22
years old son spoke very good German and Italian - a most
successful day!
I probably did most of the talking, about "the right attitude to communism"
and "talking things over with them democratically". I do not know if I was
really as naive as that 102 or was being loyal to the British official policy.
John Strachan and I were probably unaware of the full scale and nature of the
forcible repatriations and massacres until Father Blatnik enlightened us.

102

. I may have been, as in England I depended for my news

and views on the News Chronicle and the New Statesman and
Nation.
143

C H A P T E R

13 August - 31 December 1945

Vida Rosenberg and Mirko Kozina explain how many Slovenes are
not living in the camps at all, but are self-settled in private
accommodation, often with Austrian families. The narrative then
returns to Lienz and to a memorandum I write in August 1945
which summarises the progress the Slovenes have made during
their first eight weeks.
Miroslav Odar follows with a very different picture of camp
life, as seen through the eyes of a schoolboy without influence.
Pernisek follows with a traditional end-of-year school excursion
and my diary describes an inspection by the British Army
Commander-in-Chief and his entourage, followed by preparations
for the handover of the camp to the inter-governmental
organisation concerned with refugee care, the United Nations
Relief and Rehabilitation Organisation, and my own transfer to
UNRRA from the NGO or non-governmental organisation I have
worked with up till now.

144

The last chapter referred to the many Slovenes living with Austrian families
rather than in camps - who were self-settled, to use modern terminology.
Vida Rosenberg explains how this happened.
Vida was the 20 year-old law
student with ambitions to become a juvenile court judge who panicked when
left alone with the luggage during the flight (page 00).
She went on to
describe how her group arrived in Austria before the British started
diverting the refugees to Viktring:
We were the very first people out and so went to Lienz.
We had a
problem on the train, because there were some Circassians,
Russians, and one lost his mind and attacked an Austrian girl.
It was an awful incident.
We reached Lienz the next day and
stayed in a Gasthaus and were sleeping on the floor.
We got
meat to eat and somebody said it's horse's meat, but we were
hungry enough and ate it. And at night it was so stuffy we went
out and slept on the benches.
The next afternoon the British came. We saw British soldiers and were
so afraid - soldiers, because we thought they might take us for
Germans, and God knows what. But my two friends 103 spoke English
and said, "don't be afraid, they won't do anything". We went to
wash in the brook morning and evening and they came there
walking and Anka started to speak to them!
They gave us what
they had on them .. government chocolate, I don't remember, but
next day they came again with loaves of white bread, the first
I'd seen in ages.
So every memory has good and bad parts. It proves there is goodness
in human beings, but on the other hand there are vicious ones,
and I won't forget, because we were hungry and so on, that
beautiful loaf of white bread.
We were just smiles and they
gave us I don't know what else; and, you know, one feels, oh,
there is goodness in people.
Memories are in these little
clumps, some that hit you terribly or gave you pleasure. Today
a loaf of bread is nothing but then it was, like the old Slavic
custom when a guest came, that you got bread and salt - almost
sacramental.
We stayed three or four days, and engineer Muri
arranged - I believe he knew somebody in Anras because his
relatives were there somewhere, he knew the countryside - for us
to be accommodated, first in Abfaltersbach and later in Anras.
Vida's account is supplemented by Mirko Kozina, whom Father Blatnik took us
to see on our Sunday excursion and who was ordained by Bishop Rozman in Anras
at the end of May. Three years earlier he had lain hidden in the loft of the
family home, powerless to intervene, when the communists brutally murdered
his elderly father and mother and crippled brother in the rooms below. He
described this in a remarkable book 104 , and how on the 8th May he arrived
with three of his surviving sisters, probably on the same train as Vida:

103

. Dora and Anka Zebot, who both eventually settled in

Britain, one marrying an English officer and the other a fellow
Slovene.
104
. Kozina, Rev. Vladimir (Mirko) (1980) Slovenia land of
my joy and my sorrow (Historical Commission of ZDSPB Cleveland
& Toronto), pp. 84-85 and 180-182.
145

A group of seventy-five Slovenes now walked from the station to the

centre of Lienz.
Rubble, debris, houses without roofs,
devastated buildings, all lay about the medieval castle.
We
were fortunate to discover an undamaged Gasthaus, the White
Horse Inn.
Its bare dining room floor, tables, chairs and
benches made admirable but spartan lodgings for the night.
Next day the Allies entered Lienz. My first impression of the British
soldiers was disappointing.
I expected to meet tall, neatlydressed men and officers, all armed to the hilt! Back home we
Slovenes pictured the English as a nation of martial giants,
blindly placing our faith and trust and even our destiny into
the hands of these Tommies, whose arrival we'd desired so much
during the years of national strife. Now they had come! They
were squat, dusty and slovenly.
My former admiration for the
victorious Allies vanished. I was appalled by the loose conduct
and shabby appearance of Lienz's "liberators". Had the English
really come to free us? Or had they brought us more misery and
suffering?
Mirko's bitterness may seem unreasonable until we recall what the British did
to ten thousand of his compatriots three weeks later.
Meanwhile it was necessary for the Slovene DP families to find a safe
place away from our new occupiers. Leaders of our group knocked
on the door of the Lienz Parish House. Father Budamaier, pastor
of St. Andrew's, had already opened his house to the Bishop of
Ljubljana and his driver.
In a spirit of true Christian
charity, he now listened cheerfully to our pleas for help. His
reassurances were not empty promises, for he immediately
telephoned a young assistant, Father Georg Schuchter, asking him
to come down from Anras for an urgent meeting. When he arrived,
Father Budamaier explained our group's uncertain status.
Returning home Father Georg talked to his superior, Pastor Engl,
himself a refugee from the Italian South Tyrol, who gladly
welcomed the Slovene refugees to Anras. My sisters and I left
Lienz next day.
Since buses and trains had ceased operating
after Germany's surrender, we had to walk the 20 km.
Vida Rosenberg continues:
I stayed with a farmer's family that had sixteen children, in Anras, a
Herr Meyerhof. They were so good, at least to me. All other
students had to work, but they had three sons on different
fronts and said, "no, don't do anything. God will help me if I
help somebody, God will help my child."
So they were thanking
me for being there so they could help me.
They just fed me and every day I was a little bigger, you know! The
old man, who was very imposing, would come and cut me bread and
some of that Austrian smoked bacon which is absolutely
delicious. Never in my life was I so fat, every day I was half
a kilo more. I came up with 50 and ended with 66. They did it
so that somebody would help their children, their sons -they
didn't know are they dead or alive. While I was still there two
returned sound. And in the spring when we were already in Graz
I received a huge parcel, thanking me for being there, now that
146

their last son had returned home from the front.

Someone came to Anras. I asked him and he knew my brother very well
and said Janes was sent back.
I was astounded, but to start
with we did not know what was happening to them. Later the news
of the massacres came and I feared the worst.
So many people
were more or less in the same position, the shock was lessened,
we almost shared each other's burdens, and I went to Mass every
day, which was an enormous support. I was able to an extent to
verbalise and share my fears.
It was blind trust that protected us and the prayers with the priests
helped us, and that we would see each other again was
comforting. And it wasn't me praying, it was me as a member of
a group praying, I was conscious of people who had to face
losses or fears greater than mine praying all around me.
The
Mass itself was very helpful and the Austrian priest, what was
his name, Schuchter, he was a marvellous person.
I went to Lienz a lot, we were back and forth all the time. I slept
there sometimes.
I walked from Anras to Lienz, for me it was
nothing. What was it? 30 km? Nothing. And up in Anras I came
across Gustl Kuk, we went to the same gymnasium in Celje until
1941. I remained in Anras until November, then everybody left.
It was time, you couldn't stay there in winter. First of all,
what do you do there?
Specially as they didn't let me do
anything, they just fed me. Some went to Lienz to the camp and
some started to look, like Cop and Klaus, how to finish their
studies in Austria. A lot went across the border to Italy.
In November we went to Graz. There I knew what it is to be hungry,
and all that food they served me up in Anras really protected my
health! It was strange, I didn't lose it so quickly because it
was good Tyrolean fat!
I think about those people and the
village with such warm feelings because they could have sold a
lot of that, but they gave it to me.
Some other people had
experiences opposite to mine, and the girls, they really had to
work and were not spoiled as I was.
Most of the Slovenes may have been made to work hard, but Stefanija Stukelj,
15 1/2 years old at the time, remembers being treated much the same as Vida:
This was not a particularly wealthy farmer but they were very, very
good people with four children of their own.
I helped around
the house and in the fields cutting the hay, with the potatoes
sometimes, but was treated almost like a daughter of the family
and behaved like one. I had a bed in their living room on top
of the Kachelofen, the stove in which they would have a fire in
the winter, and was feeding much better than I had been in
Ljubljana.
They were very kind and very helpful.
It was a
typical Tyrolean house, fairly clean, they live at this end and
there would be the stable on the other side. I stayed until the
beginning of September and then my brother decided there might
be a possibility of studying in Italy so we went over illegally,
hired a guide who got us over, along small paths high up,
staying overnight in a stable or haystack or whatever.
147

Gustl Kuk, a male law student, experienced much the same:

Local farmers received us as refugees and were very good
kept saying, if we are good to you, maybe our boys
for most were still on the Russian front. We were
with chores, collecting hay and of course we were
family, so we ate, slept with them, everything.
friendly and humane, very good people.

to us. They
will return,
helping them
part of the
They were

Up to now, to tell the story of the Slovene refugees, I have drawn mainly on
the two diaries and quoted from the recorded memories of a wide variety
individual Slovenes.
I now also draw on an ample archive of official and
unofficial correspondence, reports and memoranda written at the time and
preserved either in my own collection or in the admirable UN/UNRRA archives
in New York. The memorandum that follows is relevant here because it records
how much the Slovenes had achieved during their first eight weeks at Lienz,
and explains why the army and UNRRA had chosen Lienz as the model camp to
which newly arrived UNRRA teams should be sent for induction.
My colleague John Strachan and I were trying to persuade the army to hand the
camp over to the Slovenes to run on their own, with only one or two officers,
left in a liaison capacity, in place of the Major and twelve other ranks then
running it.
Later attempts at lobbying were successful but this one was not.

Notes on Slovene Refugees in Austria

August 1945

The following notes on the Slovene refugees in camps in Austria have

been prepared by two BRC/FAU workers [John Strachan and myself]
who have perhaps special opportunities to observe their problems
and capabilities; both have worked eight weeks with them in
Lienz, while one has also worked with Yugoslavs in the Middle
East and was with the Slovenes at Viktring. It is assumed that
the authorities will be making plans for the administration of
refugee camps during the next few months.
The Slovenes would
presumably be disposed of in these general plans.
We suggest
the Slovene problem is substantially different from that of
other groups such as Croats, Russians, Serbs or Latvians, and
that therefore a different policy should be adopted in their
case.
6,000 Slovenes arrived at Viktring, near
The first seven weeks
Klagenfurt, on or about May 12th.
About one in six are
townspeople and the remainder from the country; the majority of
the townspeople are from Ljubljana. The people from the country
form a representative cross-section of a normal rural community
and all come from a small geographical area; the farmers are in
the majority but there is the normal quota of mayors, teachers,
priests and craftsmen.
On the other hand the townsfolk are
mainly drawn from the intelligentsia and black-coated workers,
with teachers, clerks and students strongly represented.
At Viktring under exceptionally difficult conditions the refugees ran
the camp themselves with the minimum of equipment, and ran it
well enough for its inmates to compare life there favourably
with that at the camps to which they were later sent.
Apart
148

from having responsibility for the general administration of the

camp and the collection and distribution of food, they
registered all the inhabitants, prepared complete nominal rolls
for their transfer to four separate camps and ran a secondary
school for 140 students with a comprehensive curriculum in a
neighbouring farm house.
From Viktring the refugees were dispersed to four different camps,
Judenburg, St. Veit, Spittal and Lienz.
2,000 were sent to
Lienz, where there were already some Serbs, Croats and 1,700
Russian emigrants to Yugoslavia. The administration of the camp
was entirely in the hands of the latter group, working under the
direction of the control camp team.
The administration has
remained for the most part in the [Russian] emigrants' hands,
and the following summary only deals with the Slovenes'
activities.
The Slovenes maintain their
The Slovenes at Lienz: administration
own office with a registration system containing comprehensive
details of every Slovene in the camp.
They have a
representative in each barrack in which their nationals live to
look after their interests, and this work is coordinated by a
committee of five men, each responsible for four or five
barracks. This organisation prepared list of those people most
in need of clothing, on the basis of which a clothing
distribution was carried out satisfactorily; when completed they
summoned a mass meeting of representatives from each room to
discuss and criticise the fairness of the distribution.
Their

general committee meets once a fortnight and consists of

chairman (a former chairman of the Slovene Medical Association
and vice-chairman of the Yugoslav Medical Association) 105 ,
secretary 106 and the chairmen of the six sub-committees for
registration and housing, food, education and recreation, labour
and employment, welfare, and hygiene and health.

The kindergarten and elementary schools, at

Education and Recreation
which attendance is compulsory, are staffed by qualified
teachers. The secondary school, which provides a full classical
and modern syllabus, has received warm praise from Mr. Baty,
Deputy Director of Education, Allied Commission.
A domestic
science school has recently been started to cater for the 150
girls who do not attend the secondary school [a number of girls
did attend the secondary school], with a class on agricultural
subjects for youths. Adult education includes language courses
for English, French, Russian, Italian and German.
Sport and
gymnastics for school classes and adults are organised by an exOlympic games athlete.
A choir of over 120 voices under the
direction of a doctor of music maintains a high standard in
spite of a complete lack of musical supplies.
The newspaper
office produces a daily newspaper in Slovene and Russian as well
as duplicating an elementary Slovene reader which is issued
serially and much other material for the schools.
A weekly
children's newspaper and a cultural and educational review will
105
106

. Dr Valentin Mersol.
. Franc Pernisek.
149

shortly be produced.
Health

The camp hospital was already staffed by personnel supplied

by MG and so the Slovene doctors have opened a child welfare
clinic, at which detailed records are kept of every child in the
camp. Every child receives a routine monthly inspection by the
doctors. A comprehensive analysis and report was prepared after
the completion of the first examination of all the children. A
daily visit to every room in the camp is carried out from the
clinic by a nurse or medical student, and the clinic also
undertakes general hygiene propaganda.

The establishment of workshops has only been

Labour and General
hindered by the lack of tools. However a carpentry shop and a
forge have started and have been producing their own tools as
far as possible.
The enthusiasm for work is very great and
there are few trades for which trained men cannot be found. In
all fields the Slovenes have qualified and capable leaders. For
instance the headmaster of the secondary school is Dr. Bajuk,
who was for many years inspector of secondary schools and before
he left Slovenia was director of the senior secondary school in
Ljubljana.
Also the head of the workshops is G. Brodnik, an
architectural engineer who managed a building firm in Ljubljana
which employed more than 100 men.
The Slovenes have a high degree of social consciousness and form a
closely-knit and cohesive community.
They have shown a marked
leaning towards and aptitude for democratic methods of
administration.
Their leaders work hard for those in need of
their help and oppose any preferential treatment for themselves
or their friends.
The director of the secondary school, who
could have secured a room for his family if he had asked for
one, lives in the most crowded barrack of the camp with several
other families.
Their interest in and close contact with the
other Slovene camps in Austria is also remarkable.
Their
newspapers and educational sheets are sent to Spittal, St. Veit
and Judenburg, and they willingly make available facilities to
other camps.
Relations with local Austrian authorities are
excellent.
The administration of the Slovenes at Viktring and Lienz
Conclusion
shows that they have enough competent leaders and skilled
workers and are a unified enough community to be able to run
their camp by themselves.
If they are in the future
concentrated in a camp or camps in which they would be in a
majority, the most satisfactory course would seem to be to
attach one or more liaison officers in an advisory rather than
directory capacity.
This would contribute greatly to the
preservation of that individual and communal self-respect which
is usually the first casualty in the refugee camp.
Our memorandum had no apparent effect on the army - it was not even
acknowledged - but the UNRRA Director for the British Zone of Austria, Major
C.D.Chapman, a competent and humane Australian, did address a zonal staff
conference two months later, in November:
It should be impressed on the DPs that at last they have the privilege
150

of being under the care of the United Nations. National groups

should be set up and this can only be achieved with the
cooperation of the DPs. They should be told that UNRRA is here
in a purely advisory capacity, and that they themselves will run
the groups and elect their own leaders.
Daily conferences
between all members of the team will help considerably in this
respect. (my emphasis)
And earlier, at another staff meeting in September, he said:
You can put military organizations in charge of displaced persons and
just give them food and clothing but the job is more than that!
The challenge is greater!
These people have faced great
disaster and must be given hope, courage and retraining to face
normal life again. They must be "helped to help themselves" as
rapidly as possible.
Sadly, he quickly forgot his brave words and allowed the more or less
paternalistic, autocratic and arbitrary army style of camp administration to
continue, though modified by a degree of democratic consultation which varied
from camp to camp and director to director.
My letter-diary continues:
5th September. * The Telegraphs certainly are welcome arrivals, and
more interesting now that it is an opposition paper. The Sunday
before last we were feeling a bit cut off from the world here
and anyhow had to collect some clothing stores, and so combined
business with pleasure going down to Klagenfurt by truck on
Sunday morning, seeing everyone there and hearing what they had
been doing with themselves and what new work had developed.
Monday morning we collected the stores and then started on our return
journey, having lunch with some colleagues en route and making a
detour through some lovely country to visit Gurk, where there is
the best-known monastery and abbey in Kaernten. The abbey is an
impressive building and has a beautiful set of murals and a fine
porch and another set of murals in the lobby. We arrived back
weary but refreshed.*
Work continues to be something of a trial as supplies promised months
ago still have not turned up. The camp is scheduled for 3,500
people and we now have 4,350 people, which means that
overcrowding is acute and progress in most directions is blocked
by lack of accommodation.
On top of that a considerable
proportion of the barrack roofs leak, and while the Army find no
difficulty in roofing new camps they are building, material for
mending our roofs has been promised for two months now.
The
same applies to elementary things like straw palliasses, glass,
blankets, etc, all or most of which are available if only the
right person would wake up! What a life!
The 5th September was notable as the last day of the school-leaving or
matriculation examination at the camp secondary school, which had had its
official inspection a month before. All the candidates passed - 16 boys and
5 girls between the ages of 18 and 22 - and so, thanks to the successful
official inspection of a month ago, would be able to start study at
151

university if one could be found for them by the autumn. Three boys and two
girls were adjudged excellent scholars on the strength of their written exams
and previous school records, and so were exempted from taking the oral tests.
Five years ago I interviewed the youngest of these "excellent scholars",
Miroslav Odar, in Cleveland Ohio. He had been sent, together with his mother
and brother, from Viktring to Spittal camp rather than to Lienz with the
other secondary school pupils.
Three other boys in the same situation
travelled to Lienz specially to take the school-leaving examination on the
5th September. Odar tells their story:
There were four of us, four boys. We asked at the main gate because
we wanted to attend the school and were turned away by the camp
police 107 . We didn't even get as far as the registration office
or the school. It was at night, about 7.30 in the evening, it
was dark and we were kind of tired.
We'd ridden on a train
which had no windows and was cold. It was terrible, not to have
a place to lie down or to sit down. I was nearly nineteen and
the other boys the same age. My mother didn't encourage me to
go to Lienz, that was my decision. I was doing things on my own
as long as I remember.
Things

would have been different if I had gone to see the camp

director in Spittal and asked him to arrange for me to visit
Lienz, but that would be like me going to God! There were some
people you couldn't talk to, they were the authorities.
Besides, the whole situation was so confusing, the orders didn't
come down to the right people for days, and that's part of it.
I don't want to blame anybody, but I was terribly disappointed.

When they refused us admittance we went round the camp and found a
gap; there was a wooden fence and the plank was loose, so we
removed it and went in, and stopped at barrack 14. It was a big
hall, and there were people sleeping along the wall, all the way
round, so I just stayed there, laid down, and that was it and
nobody chased me away.
Nobody questioned what we were doing
until Dr. Vracko found out and came to us and said, "you are
here illegally and if you're not gone by tomorrow morning, I'll
call the police." I don't remember why we were allowed to stay,
but I stayed one or two weeks just to take the exam.
They
wouldn't feed us, they said we were in there illegally, till I
found a trainee priest - he's a priest in Minnesota now - the
whole family was there, the mother and two sons, and he was
thinking at that time already about the priesthood and all that,
because he gave me half of his rations, and I remember that to
this day: he saved me, my stay at Lienz. I have no recollection
how I got to the school, how I registered, I must have been
fairly persistent. I wanted to finish, even if I wouldn't have
a chance to go to university, that would give me a lot.
I
107

. The police were in fact only doing their job. The Camp
Director, Major Richards, had just had a prominent notice
printed in the camp newspaper: "Peggetz camp is closed from now
on to anyone wishing to move to it.
This regulation will be
strictly enforced. Residents will please warn refugees living
outside the camp who may be hoping to settle here".
152

finished the gimnazija and went back to Spittal.

I think the
other three boys stayed the two weeks and took their matura.
After we came over to Austria, they set up a whole school system. That
was really unbelievable, I think unique. I don't remember any
other schools like that.
From the end of the school to the
exams we had a week of teaching to get us into the spirit of the
whole thing and we were studying like crazy.
We had to know
history, geography, mathematics, Latin or Greek. I remember Mr.
Gantar 108 for the Slovenian language and Bozidar Bajuk for Latin.
I had the full Abitur exams, they took a whole week.
I was
taking Latin and Greek, Director Bajuk's boy! He took very good
care of us and had persuaded the British authorities to allow us
to take the matura. I'd been in Mr. Bajuk's school in Ljubljana
and there was no question about my grades, because Bajuk brought
all the paper works with him.
Miroslav Odar and the three other boys were not the only ones who met with
difficulties when they tried to attend the Lienz gimnazija. Paula Hribovsek
was also turned away, not from the camp but from the school. She had left
home in Slovenia on her own. Her father was dead and her mother and older
sister decided not to go, probably hoping to look after the small family
property, and anyhow neither had made themselves conspicuous as anticommunists.
Paula was an "open Christian" and so she said yes when her
godfather, a prosperous farmer who lived in the same town, Radovljica, called
in on the 6th May and asked if she wanted to go. Two of her cousins went
with them:
*When we arrived in Klagenfurt by train, because the ordinary trains
were still running, we were there for one day and then my cousin
walked in the city on the 9th May and came back and said she saw
partisans. We were so afraid we said we must go further, and we
went to the station and there was the last train to Spittal
which we took, and then we were told the train will not go on.
And so this priest who was with us went to the church and spoke
with the parish priest and he arranged with an Austrian family
to give us, we were six or seven persons, a room.
We were there for a few days and then this family arranged with other
families to give us work. My two cousins worked as cook in a
family and the boy helped in the shop.
And my godfather and
myself and the daughter of my godfather and his wife were
working at a farm. We all spoke some German already. Then when
the other people from Vetrinje came to Spittal, we joined them.
We worked for a month or two with these families. They fed us
quite well and they were kind to us. I think we moved to the
camp just to be together with all the others, no other reason.*
The dean of Radovljica was also at Spittal and he said to me, "Paula,
108

. Professor Dr Caetan (Kajetan) Gantar taught Slovene and

Italian at Viktring, Lienz and Spittal until 15 September 1947,
when he returned to Slovenia.
His son, also Kajetan, born
1930, is a leading philologist in Ljubljana, university
professor of Latin and corresponding member of the Slovenian
Academy of Sciences and Arts.
153

why aren't you going to Peggetz?

There is a secondary school
there.
Go and study".
And so I went on my own, leaving my
godfather and cousins in Spittal.
I showed Director Bajuk my
certificate of the secondary school in Kranj for the third and
fourth year but he said "No, this is worthless, you can't study
here". So I went out and cried, and professor Jeglic saw me and
asked, "why are you crying?" and I told him. "Come with me", he
said, spoke with Director Bajuk and then told me I could study
but had to begin with the third, not the fifth year.
So I
studied with the third year and did the fourth year privately so
that I completed two years in one.
It was part of Bajuk's character.
He always said, "girls are to be
kept in the kitchen, and not to study"!
This in fact was a
great help in my case. If he'd been sympathetic and sensitive,
I wouldn't have cried and Jeglic wouldn't have noticed me, and
I'd have gone to the domestic science school, accepting the
ruling of authority as a good Slovene girl and catholic! No one
would have argued for me - no one would have appealed or
questioned the judgment apart from a fellow teacher. Jeglic did
so because he first asked me where I was from, and I said
Radovljica: "Ah, my wife is from Radovljica!" I feel this was
the hand of God!
In Peggetz I lived in the Convikt (boarding house) for the girls with
Brother Peterlin and his sister. We had two rooms with eight or
ten to a room, and the Peterlins had a room to themselves in the
same barrack. The boys were in a different barrack, quite a way
away! I stayed at the gimnazija the whole time in Peggetz and
moved with it to Spittal.
I missed the Matura by a month,
because I had to leave for Argentina!
Four students of our
class stayed and finished, but the majority left before the
exam.
The Pernisek diary:
Our final year high school students were
Saturday 8th September.
taken on an outing to Heiligenblut and the Pasterz Glacier at
the foot of Grossglockner, and my wife and I went with them.
The day was cold and cloudy. The English army lorries took the
steep ascents and hairpin bends in their stride.
The Moell
Valley is beautiful, but in and around Heiligenblut it's a
little paradise.
*After a short stop at this lovely place of
pilgrimage we continued on the fine Grossglockner motorway, a
real feat of engineering with wild slopes, curves and hairpin
bends.
We got to Pasterz at about nine in the morning, a
marvellous
display
of
natural
beauty
and
might.*
Grossglockner's peak was shrouded in mist, but this lifted for a
few moments so that we could admire it spellbound!
Some lads went down to the glacier, others climbed the sheer slopes in
search of edelweiss.*
They found some but they were small,
puny. The glacier glistened below emerald-green and lured us on
temptingly, but the crevasses are hazardous. The lads knew this
and approached cautiously up to a safe distance, and didn't go
onto the ice.
The hotels, shops and restaurants on the
esplanade are deserted with all kinds of things strewn around,
154

looking as if they had just been looted. On the way back we had
a look at the Church of the Precious Blood, a magnificent and
beautiful late Gothic masterpiece, its main altar in the form of
a diptych one of the loveliest and richest in Carinthia.
The
church's situation and orientation in relation to Grossglockner
is exceptionally felicitous.*
*So we came to a spot of historic importance for us Slovenes, because
this is the highest point in Carinthia our forefathers reached a long time ago but there are still some people of Slovene
origin living here.
Father France Zabret, who used to be the
parish priest of Bled and now assists the local parish priest,
told us there are still old people in the mountains who speak
Slovene and say their confessions in Slovene, but they are the
last remnants and when they die the last Slovene-speaking people
in these parts will have disappeared.*
When we returned home happy from the excursion we found our little son
in bed with a very high fever.
*Our cousin was looking after
the children during our absence and when we left the boy said
nothing unusual and looked alright.* We sent for Dr Mersol and
he said the boy had scarlet fever, a most unpleasant surprise.
We had to take him to the hospital in Lienz, where the doctors
diagnosed scarlet fever, diphtheria and an infection of the
inner ear. He soon received as fellow patient the small Bajuk,
son of Prof Bozidar Bajuk.
My letter-diary:
11th September.
*A letter answering all your letters - they are so
marvellously regular I feel ashamed of my patchy efforts.* If
what has just been announced actually happens, my work should be
a good bit lighter and I hope my letters thus more regular - HQ
says all Russians are to be concentrated into special camps, as
are all other nationalities in other national camps.
We have
1,700 Russian emigrants to Yugoslavia here, and their departure
would ease our accommodation problem enormously and simplify
administration very much. They have no idea of organisation at
all, and while you can tell the Slovenes what you want done and
leave them to get on with it, you have to keep a continual eye
on the Russians. Also they have no idea of pulling together or
any feeling of solidarity - you may speak at length with a
spokesman of the Russians, only next day for streams of them to
come up to say that he was not speaking for them! Compared to
them the Slovenes are ideal.
15th September. It may interest you to know some of the irons I have
in the fire and how I spend my time.
(1)

justice: this is a new sideline and is taking up a most

aggravating amount of time.
Seven of our refugees were taken
into detention for interrogation; it being an Austrian gaol they
only got Austrian rations, so refugee rations had to be laid on
and their families to visit them.

The case, a flimsy one, was first in the hands of an unpleasant MP

(military police) lieutenant; he leaves and hands it on to a
155

friendly sergeant.
Today he leaves and hands it on to a
corporal - the people are still under detention and haven't yet
been charged. In England one could make the police's pants feel
very warm for that, but not here!
All the time the relatives are naturally very worried. Today I went
to see the local Austrian police and spoke with an efficient but
human woman re arranging for the defence. Her reply, "yes, I've
been feeling rather worried about that recently - there never
seems to be a defence at the court here: they just go up and are
sentenced".
This refers to our courts, and is a stunning
example of how the British are teaching the Austrians democratic
administration.
So I've got to see the corporal i/c the case
and also possibly the military government major, so that our
Slovene high court judge can visit the men and prepare their
defence.
Also I've arranged for the wife of a man given nine
months for crossing the frontier to visit him once a fortnight Austrian law is I think more lenient than English on this point.
[see below, p.00]
(2) education: approaching every possible authority to arrange for our
hundred odd undergrads to continue their studies at Graz or
Innsbruck, Vienna or Padua - no one knows who is responsible.
Trying all sources for text books for the secondary school which
is at last officially recognised and can give exam certificates.
(3) newspapers: I'm beginning to sympathise with censors - I'm now one
myself. On the one hand I want to encourage [the refugees] to
extend their journalistic efforts - they now produce a daily
paper in Russian and Slovene and a weekly children's newspaper
and a weekly cultural, educational and political review - on the
other hand I must make them tone down their anti-communist
material: they have every reason to be anti-communist, but HQ at
Klagenfurt or the Yugoslav attache may not think so. So there I
sit solemnly with [Mr Kremzar], a man nearly three times my age
who was chairman of a group of papers in Ljubljana and one of
Slovenia's foremost journalists, and have to try to suggest
tactfully that while it would be all right to print that letter
describing conditions in Slovenia it might be wiser to be a bit
guarded and cover oneself in the editorial!
(4) the English class: my colleague and I take turns to teach a group
including the ex-headmaster of a secondary school, a judge, a
doctor, the ex-head of the finance department of Slovenia and a
woman who was a professional language teacher before she
married.
You can imagine me telling them off - they must not
try to speak so fast or they will never improve their
pronunciation!
(5) the hospital with two doctors, six nurses and fifty beds for which
I'm "responsible".
The head doctor is a very charming,
conscientious and hardworking man but has little idea of
organisation, will do everything himself and is very jealous of
other doctors, such as the two that run the children's clinic.
So to start with my main function was to persuade the two
parties that the others were not ogres - they are now uneasy
friends.
156

(6) the clothing store and the two sewing shops with eighteen workers
in all.
Clothing distribution is one worse than censoring.
Everyone in the camp has a very particular reason why they
should receive one of the garments in short supply: I run the
distribution on a national committee basis, which works all
right with the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes who abide by their
committees' decisions, but when we come to the Russian emigres
they all flock to the office and swear that the committee is a
set of rogues that only looks after its friends. Well, I've a
cold in my nose and must go to bed!
20th September. What a life! It is hardly possible to believe that
an Army which undoubtedly was very efficient and successful at
waging war could be quite such a failure at dealing with
civilian problems (a combination of events coming too close
together has stretched my patience almost to breaking point, so
you mustn't take this letter too seriously!).
I continually
think it must be my extremist judgment at fault but my colleague
here, who is very different from me, comes to the same
conclusion, and the surprise of the UNRRA teams that have
arrived here to learn camp admin. (they were told they were
going to a model camp) is obvious.
The most elementary
organisational principles are ignored - they could hardly
believe it when they found that there was no one person
effectively responsible for supply, the most urgent problem in
the camp.
Neither the major nor the captain have had any refugee camp experience
or apparently any other administrative experience, except in the
army where the organisation is ready-made and fool-proof, and
neither shows any signs of wanting to learn.
Even on the most severely practical matters where I thought I was
pretty dense, they leave me miles behind in stupidity.
Yesterday two barrack huts had to be dismantled at a place near
the camp and reassembled in the camp, so they were quite happy
to send some lorries along and collect the pieces and dump them
here. It never occurred to them it might be a good idea to send
a camp carpenter who would be responsible for the reassembling
to see what they looked like up and number the pieces.
They
even allowed the pieces of the two huts to be mixed together!
And we have plenty of qualified people in the camp. That is but
one example.
Also they don't take any interest in their NCOs
and men who are consequently very "browned off" and thus do only
half the work they might, although they are a very pleasant
crowd.
The strain of having to make the most obvious suggestions in spheres
of work quite outside our own without giving the impression that
we are trying to run the camp is pretty colossal. It needs the
continual use of tact and a nice sense to see that one does not
push a point too far. But if we did not do this our own work
would be impossible as it depends on a reasonable efficiency in
the running of the basic services. We're continually having to
take on jobs that are in no way welfare ones as we know if we
did not, they simply would not get done.
157

It is clear that it would be a mockery to offer a "welfare programme"

to people who have not enough to eat even to allow them to do
light work properly, to start schools when they won't have fuel
enough in the winter to warm the school rooms, or to get school
benches made when not one person in two has a bed.
The major and captain are very friendly and tolerant of us - we must
be a trial - but simply haven't a clue on camps. They are taken
in by all the rogues and are of course in the hands of their
interpreters, and the effort needed to counteract all this is
colossal.
Of course all staffs are not the same; at Viktring
the second major and captain would have run a camp excellently,
and also probably the first major. But here there is little to
choose between the first and the second staff.
To make things worse, this is the first camp my colleague has been in,
and the job is a little more than he can tackle.
He is very
conscientious and works very hard, and has a much fairer
judgment than mine which acts for me as an excellent corrective,
but he has not had enough experience of handling people (that
one comes well from me with my two and twenty years!) and lacks
organisational experience and enough self-assertiveness and
tact.
As I said to start with, don't take this letter too seriously, because
on this particular evening "my patience is exhausted"!
29th September.
My last three sheets have been overflowing with
righteous indignation but life has its compensations - butter,
superb country, occasional good reception of music on the
wireless! In the last week it has turned quite cold with snow
on the hills. It is painful to think of the refugees here, many
families without beds or palliasses and less than one blanket
per head.
Thank goodness some roofing material has at last
arrived, so soon the rooms won't be leaking like sieves when it
rains.
The main compensation for work here is the people themselves - the
Slovenes are a charming crowd.
Their only fault is that they
spoil one!
I will be a most impossible person when I return
home when my opinion will no longer be treated with ten times
more respect than it deserves - people will no longer leave what
they are doing when I enter the room to see what the oracle has
to say!
The attraction of the Slovenes mainly lies in their
strong self-respect, the complete lack of any attempt to draw
advantage out of any position of responsibility they may hold,
the genuine devotion of their intelligentsia to the well-being
of the whole community and their unquenchable readiness to help
themselves however unpromising their equipment may be. We have
at last managed to get quite a large supply of books for the
secondary school and schoolmasters, which should make their work
a little easier.
It must be terrible trying to teach without
books.
How I would like you to meet so many of the Slovenes here.
The
headmaster of the secondary school, who looks like a cross
158

between Lenin and Sir Thomas Beecham, has incredible energy and
enthusiasm for a wide range of subjects especially music - the
choir has already sung some of his songs and arrangements of
folk songs, which are really fine. Or his son, more retiring,
but also a strong character and also a teacher.
Or his other
son, chief of the Slovene workshops, an engineer, a bit too kind
but with a delightful sense of humour.
Or our Slovene judge,
rather earnest but very human.
Or our terrifically active
nursery school teacher with fair hair brushed back and red face.
30th September.
The enclosed copies of our camp newspaper and the
photo may amuse you [see p. 00]. The former are in Slovene and
Russian, and the top article over the caricatures headed "Thank
you" has as its immediate cause the release of three Slovenes
and a Russian who had been arrested by the local police for an
assault on two Tito Yugoslavs near the camp, solely on evidence
of identification given by the latter; I was 90% convinced the
police had caught the wrong men.
The authorities were very
dilatory and inefficient in handling the case and it was nearly
a month before it was eventually dismissed because the two
assaulted men simply failed to turn up to give evidence.
The
prisoners were very grateful for the trouble we took over them.
The paragraph continues generally in appreciation of the
activities of the welfare officers in the camp.
The photo is of the students of the High School who passed their
"Higher Cert": sitting from left to right are Dr Bajuk,
headmaster and prolific choral composer, my colleague John
Strachan (one year law undergrad at Cambridge) the camp
commandant Major Richards, myself and another master. Standing
front row left is the camp gym instructor, a charming man who
was one of the Yugoslav representatives at the Olympic Games and
is still an impressive gymnast, while right but one the small
man with the glasses is Dr Mersol, an unassuming physician who
studied in America, was in charge of the infectious diseases
wing of the main Ljubljana hospital and is very industrious but
a little too gentle for his present job.
The man wearing a hat to the right at the back is Dr Bajuk's son, an
able classical scholar and teacher, with an attractive singing
voice. The man in the centre wearing a dark jacket and glasses
is one of the leading Croats, teaches Italian and English and
engages in endless other activities. Third left from him also
in dark jacket and glasses, is Dr Zagar, the science master who
is also a Salesian priest: a very charming man.
1st October. My last letter was two pages in a mightily browned-off
vein.
Since then we have had more opportunity of judging the
quality of the two UNRRA teams sent to the camp for experience.
It's been amusing "teaching" two highly qualified welfare
workers from America (women with years of experience) how to run
camp welfare! The two teams seem to us pretty good - able, wide
general experience, broad-minded and with keenness and a real
concern for the job. One director is Dutch, one South American
Pole (first excellent, second fair), two Dutch nurses, one
English secretary, a first-class Australian supply officer and
some pretty poor and uninspiring American drivers.
159

The total impression is that they are far better qualified than the
normal run of Army staffs (the UNRRA people we've seen so far
are of a distinctly higher level than those I've seen in the
Greek, Yugoslav and even Italian UNRRA missions). But the Army
has been giving them a raw deal, putting difficulties in their
way instead of trying to help them and doing their best to delay
the handover of the refugee problem as long as possible.
To be fair, the Army should hand over at once or see the camps through
till the spring - and not leave things until winter has set in
and give UNRRA the job of holding the baby for the Army's lack
of preparation for the winter.
It is very galling seeing
personnel keen to take over who could clear up the incredible
muddle existing now, but not allowed to because a handful of
officers refuse to give up some cushy jobs - the vested interest
is composed entirely of officers because NCOs and men get very
little out of the deal.
I have always received friendly and
kind treatment from the officers, but I am not here for the
welfare of 20 officers but of 4,000 refugees.
4th October.
Things look as if they are going to improve here. The
bulk of our Russians are going, which means that the major will
I expect be forced to hand over the administration from them to
the Slovenes.
A large part of our difficulties are caused
directly
or
indirectly
by
the
Russian
administration's
incapacity of organising, dishonesty or lack of willingness to
cooperate with the other groups in the camp. The other groups
are no angels but the Russians are certainly the worst.
We've been having a rash of inspections here.
First two from the
local brigadier and then one from McCreery, the British C-in-C
for our zone of Austria. General McCreery came yesterday in a
superb black car. Forty of the local Scotch regiment were sent
beforehand and posted all over the camp to guard the great man!
He arrived half an hour late and the party that toured the camp
consisted of one lieutenant general, one major general, one
brigadier, one colonel, two majors ... and two FAU!
Our first port of call was the hospital - part of my sphere of
influence - and so I reached the front of the procession just in
time as the general, who apparently spoke no German, was asking
a question of the doctor who certainly spoke no English. After
I'd been interpreting a couple of minutes some member of the
cortege got a bit worried about the presence of the unlabelled
object at the front of the procession (I was wearing a pullover
and so had no epaulettes showing) and started mumbling something
about "worker from the FAU" and our major introduced me.
We then entered the children's ward and ascertained that the three
babies lying together weren't triplets - only twins and one odd
one - and proceeded along the passage and left the hospital. As
luck had it the general was asking me where I had picked up my
German and where I had worked in camps before, so we entered the
main thoroughfare of the camp engaged in deep conversation as a
result of which my stock has risen in the camp considerably! So
even visits of inspection have their advantages!
160

They next visited the school, with McCreery and our major first and
FAU a short head in front of the major-general and brigadier the school is also our "zone".
Here I tried, with scant
success, to get it across that we badly needed some milk for the
children aged 6-14. The general was in a tearing hurry, but I
think it sunk home with the brigadier.
After the schools we
fell back a bit nearer our rightful place and after visiting the
kitchen, concert hall, wood-pile and workshops the general left
with a flourish of salutes. The major has been in an excellent
humour as the general expressed himself highly satisfied with
the camp.
One's position in such inspections is a bit
embarrassing as a civilian wearing military uniform.
Work in
the camp was put back three or four days but we may get blankets
and stores a little more quickly as a result, so it may have
been worthwhile.
Three announcements in the camp newspaper for the 7th November illustrate its
value as a source of information on camp life and also help fill a long gap
between diary entries:
FOR UNIVERSITY STUDENTS
We have to thank the tireless endeavours of Mr Corsellis for the fact
that the majority of our academics are assured of places at the
University of Graz. Military Government in Klagenfurt has sent
an official notice to all camps to compile definitive lists of
all those interested. Other camps were prepared for this, but
some not as well as ours.
The student camp will be run by
UNRRA.
Anyone who seriously intends to study at Graz should report personally
today at the office of the British Red Cross in barrack II. As
pressure on places at the university is great and only a limited
number of refugees can be accepted, only those who really wish
to study should apply.
Military Government has announced
officially that all those who do not settle down to serious
studies will be sent back to their camps of origin. Last date
for application is tomorrow at 11 am. Anyone who does not apply
personally will not be able to study at the university.
Transport to Graz will be arranged a week from now.
FOR SCHOOL CHILDREN AND STUDENTS ATTENDING COURSES
who are studying
English, the camp office of the British Red Cross has obtained
free admission to English film shows in Lienz. Conditions are
that they turn up punctually, do not occupy the better seats,
behave in an orderly manner and if the cinema should be full
give up their seats to the English.
Everyone will be issued
with a permanent entrance ticket.
WITH REGARD TO YESTERDAY'S MOURNING COMMEMORATION
of our Slovene army victims we must pay tribute to the organiser and
all his supporters and thank them for the beautiful and
sensitive manner in which they expressed our sorrow at the
greatest sacrifice of the Slovene nation.
We request them to
repeat the commemoration soon, so that every Slovene resident in
the camp can participate.
161

Dr Colin Parkes in his classic Bereavement: Studies of Grief in Adult Life

(London, 1972) stresses the importance of memorial services at the expiry of
a set period of time, which can "have the significance of a rite de passage,
setting the bereaved person free from the dead and allowing him to undertake
fresh commitments" and can also be a positive contribution to "community
mental health".
The newspaper announcement about studies at the University of Graz was
followed by the departure of the rejoicing students the following week.
Shortly afterwards the redoubtable Director Bajuk also visited the
university, as he recalled in his memoirs:
In November 1944 the government in Vienna ordered that all refugee
students
who
did
not
possess
authentic
baccalaureate
certificates would have to re-sit the exam before an Austrian
commission, which would have been impossible for our boys language, geography, history, literature!
I went to see the
Chief in Klagenfurt and he responded to my four suggestions with
a short, sharp: "nein, nein, nein, nein".
I took my courage in both hands and went to the University of Graz. I
was already in the office by 8 am and found the Vice-Chancellor
had just got back that night from a three-week conference in
Vienna. At 9 am, after a lecture, he received me very kindly,
quickly understood the issue and promised to put it on the
agenda of the 11 am Deans' Meeting, so that I would know the
result at 12 am.
Impatiently I returned at 11.30 to enquire.
He spotted me through the half-open door of his office as the
Deans were putting on their gowns for the graduation ceremony.
He beckoned me in, introduced me and said:
We have decided unanimously (a) that you are a trustworthy man and we
accept your report (b) that you know which students have passed
the baccalaureate exam in your capacity of headmaster and
schools inspector responsible for baccalaureate exams for
several years
(c) that your reliability is also confirmed by
your pupils who are now our students, who are all hard-working,
conscientious and well-behaved, so much so that we point them
out as examples to others, and therefore
(d) baccalaureate
certificates for any of your students, issued by you and signed
by you and stamped with your official stamp, are acceptable
substitutes for authentic baccalaureate certificates.
My

head swam.
How was it possible to secure such a miraculous
decision from the university, which went against the directives
of their government - a university which used to be known for
its nationalistic chauvinism? I wanted to thank them, but was
so taken aback I only managed to stutter, I know not what. All
I do know is that all the deans shook my hand and the ViceChancellor conducted me to the graduation ceremony where I sat
to the right of the seat of honour - which remained vacant.

After the ceremony I sped back to the camp to let the lads know of the
miraculous success.
They flew straight through the window to
the university to enrol for various exams, as time was running
out. Later I received a report that following my attestations
they passed 72 exams successfully. All credit to the lads and
162

to the university.
first degree.

This was generous broad-mindedness of the

My letter-diary:
19th November. For the last week work with the major has been a good
bit easier. I'm not sure if I mentioned to you the business of
the second i/cs - I think not: it's rather a long story. The
major's kind of Army camp team should have a captain on its
strength plus four sergeants and about twelve ORs, but when the
major arrived at the camp he was the only officer, with myself
and another FAU to help him.
This was by far the largest DP
camp in the British Zone and it was obvious it needed two
officers.
At last the second officer came, but the major is so hopeless at
dealing with people and without imagination that he did not take
the captain at all into his confidence or divide the work with
him, but gave him one or two stooge jobs and left it at that.
The captain's reaction was, "if the major won't play, I won't
play", did as little work as possible and applied for a transfer
which he got.
We then remained five weeks without a captain
until one arrived who had been i/c quite successfully of a
smaller camp which had been taken over by UNRRA.
The major
adopted the same treatment with the same result, so that within
six days he was gone! The likelihood of our getting another 2
i/c is now nil. This has meant that for the bulk of the time I
have been virtually acting as 2 i/c but without the status, rank
or prestige or authority of one, and with a minimum of support
from the major.
The snag has been that he is entirely new to camp work but never
consults or confers with his staff: he is mentally incapable of
considering one problem for more than six minutes at a time.
The result is that only rarely can we corner him in his office
and run through a list of problems - or he thinks these damn
conchies 109 are trying to run his camp for him. All suggestions
have to be slipped in indirectly over the lunch table and one
has to spend an inordinate amount of energy in trying to handle
him. Combined with this is the fact that he spends a lot of his
off-duty time with a Russian female in the camp, whose room is
the centre of intrigue and who influences him considerably.
All this sounds rather black, but there is the other side. He is a
regular soldier - was a sergeant for some twelve years before
the war - and it is not his fault that his superiors should have
made such a bad choice for the o/c of a civilian refugee camp,
with all its manifold civil problems and needs of which a
"regular" cannot be expected to have any conception.
Also he has lived all his life in Army messes and it must be a
considerable strain to have to live with two youthful, highbrow,
109

. slang for conscientious objectors or pacifists, who for

religious or humanitarian reasons refused to serve in the armed
forces during war-time
163

non-smoking,
non-drinking,
non-card
playing,
non-swearing
conchies who seldom even dress in the correct way and haven't
even got any uniforms smarter than battledress.
He is
remarkably tolerant to us and has always been very kind and
friendly. Also he is genuinely concerned in the welfare of the
people in his charge. He works very hard and does do his best
in his own way - unfortunately not seldom he does more harm than
good.
23rd November. Still no definite news. My hopes are still high that
I may be back on leave before too long. Things drag on here and
every week we are told that "it will be decided definitely at a
conference at Klagenfurt, or Vienna, when the camp will be
handed over to UNRRA" and it never happens.
The latest event is that our major at a Serb festival announced to the
assembled refugees that UNRRA was taking over on December 16th,
that he was joining UNRRA and would be staying on as camp
director.
This information was staggering but next day it
emerged that the major was well primed with Serb "cognac" and
the facts he gave were by no means certain, especially the last.
So we're no further on!
The only definite thing is that my
colleague leaves in under a week.
4th December. * Last weekend the FAU man who lives with us here but
works in Lienz town on district welfare had to go to Salzburg on
business so we arranged things slightly, I acted as chauffeur
and we journeyed there on Saturday, had all Sunday in Salzburg
and on Monday did our business and returned -a restrained and
respectable jangle!
My colleague had left the camp for good
which meant that I could look forward to three weeks of
concentrated work, and so I particularly jumped at the
opportunity of escaping for three days while it was possible.*
I was very sorry to lose John Strachan but the decision to transfer
him was quite right.
From the FAU's point of view we are
justified in letting two workers stay at a camp only if there is
a particularly urgent situation there or if they can plan two or
three months ahead with reasonable security that their planning
is not a complete waste of time, and neither of these conditions
here apply now.
The latest news is that UNRRA will be taking
over shortly.
An article I wrote for the FAU Chronicle complements John Strachan's and my
memo of the end of August and conveniently summarises the progress the camp
had made after four months:
*3,700 refugees are housed in barracks that are well designed and
constructed as barracks in Carinthia go: the layout of the camp
is pleasantly irregular, with more distance between the blocks
than is usual.
Two-thirds of the refugees are Slovenes, onequarter are Russians - a large proportion of these having lived
in Serbia since 1920 - and there are smaller groups of Croats
and Serbs. Two FAU members have worked in the camp ... and have
been undertaking many jobs not of a direct welfare nature.
Methods and standards of work of the two groups [Slovene and
Russian] differ greatly, and it is almost impossible to get them
164

to collaborate closely in peace.

The workshops have to be
divided - there is a Slovenes' carpenters' shop and a Russian
one, and the same applies to the smiths' shops, tailors' shops
and kitchens.
The daily camp newspapers in Slovene and Russian have a combined
circulation of 1,100 and find their way to nearly all camps in
Carinthia - over 250 copies are sold outside the camp.
The
newspaper office also produces a children's weekly and two
weekly political, cultural and educational reviews, including
excerpts from the British and American presses and original
compositions. Copies are distributed to other Slovene camps by
special courier.
News is largely collected over the radio from London, Belgrade and
Klagenfurt. The refugees run their own buying organisation for
the considerable quantities of paper required.
Material
prepared by the duplicator for the schools includes an
elementary reader, De Bello Gallico and Greek texts appearing
serially. Among other functions the FAU fulfils that of censor
and can be seen regularly in earnest consultation with the
white-haired ex-manager of papers in Ljubljana 110 .
More spectacular was the camp football league, but also more shortlived: the bursting beyond repair of the only football put an
end to what seemed likely to develop into an ugly international
situation.
It is inconsistent with the honour of a Balkan
people to lose a football match and, if heroic violence on the
field or bullying of the referee does not produce victory, every
effort must be made after the match to annul the result on some
obscure ground: in these diplomatic tussles the third team is
quite entitled to take part, because their chances of victory in
the league may be influenced by the award of the match to one or
other of the teams. The bewildered John Strachan had to act as
peacemaker at these sessions and, when all refugees available as
referees had been tried and denounced by one side or other as
biased, he undertook the thankless job.
His last match was
interrupted by spectators running onto the field to contest an
unwelcome award and a free fight was narrowly avoided, but the
match was followed by the providential bursting of the ball.
Refugees are continually getting on the wrong side of the civil or
military police for one reason or other, and the cases are too
many to allow of one investigating them all personally: so, most
appropriately, the FAU man responsible (an articled clerk to a
solicitor, of one year's standing) avails himself of the help of
a Slovene High Court judge to "devil" the cases for him.
Much
time was spent on one case where five refugees from the camp
were arrested for a serious assault on some alleged partisan of
which it was reasonably clear they were not guilty, but our
efforts were eventually crowned with success when they were
released after two sessions in the local Military Government
court.
Another effort of which we are proud is the reconstruction of the
110

. Dr Kremzar, close friend of Franc Pernisek

165

local bridge over the Drau, half of which was swept away by
floods. We had an engineer and plenty of experienced carpenters
for the job, and pressure has at last resulted in tools and
material being released by the army. The second day a temporary
bridge was thrown across and already the permanent one is well
on its way to completion.
The

Slovenes' tailors' shop specialises in making women's and

children's clothing out of the most unlikely material.
Six
sacks of flannel stomach comforters which had been thoroughly
chewed over by Austrian rats have provided all our children with
one pair of winter pants: for this work the girls of the
domestic science school were used.
As straw has so far been
unobtainable through official channels for palliasses, parties
of school children have been sent up into the neighbouring hills
to gather moss: this has been used to fill palliasses for
invalids and old people without families to look after them.

Much time has been spent in devising plans for the most effective and
fool-proof distribution of supplies, of which we have had
painfully little, the whole problem being always complicated by
the communal divisions in the camp. Thus it had to be seen to
that the milk, special foods, blankets, palliasses, beds and
clothing reached those in the greatest need, and one did not lay
oneself open to the charge of favouritism to particular groups.*
Perhaps the school is the most remarkable activity for which the FAU
is responsible: there is compulsory education from 4 to 14, and
120 children attend the kindergarten and 350 the elementary
school, Slovene, Serb and Croat.
The secondary school is to
date the only one for any nationality operating in Carinthia,
and it caters for the children from all the camps in which there
are Slovenes (five in all) as well as for children from some
families not living in camps. Over 200 children attend, and a
comprehensive curriculum is taught including Latin, Greek,
German, Italian and music. The former headmaster of the senior
secondary school in Ljubljana is director and he has a fully
qualified team of teachers.
In addition, a domestic science school is attended by 130 girls, and
an agricultural school by 40 boys. The main difficulty is, of
course, text-books, but the FAU has managed to help in finding
some, and the rest have had to be covered by duplicating texts.
Some books have been smuggled on foot over the mountains. There
is also a school clinic staffed by a doctor and nurses which
undertakes regular examinations of the children.
One of the "major operations" of the FAU has been an attempt to
arrange for 90 undergraduates to start or continue their studies
at Graz University.
Detailed lists had to be collected from
three camps and the authorities pressed to realise that the
matter was urgent: the British Red Cross supervisor has done
valuable work pushing the project from the Graz end.
We are
also trying to get two thousand copies of an excellent SloveneEnglish reader and grammar printed. Valuable supplies of books
have been obtained from the store at Silberegg, from which it is
planned to start a school library and a general lending library.
166

The source of books was described in 1947 in the official history of the
FAU 111 :
... a vast underground store of confiscated Jewish property discovered
in the mountain village of Silberegg; it seemed to contain the
entire household belongings of several hundred Jewish families,
who could never be traced.
The store was handed over to the
BRCS for use among the DPs.
I remember driving Director Bajuk to the store. He referred to it in his
memoirs, and went on to describe other aspects of cultural life in the camp
which I did not have enough room to mention in my article:
We often went there and collected many German books for our grammar
school, including the entire 16 volumes of the Brockhaus
lexicon.
We also took numerous books for our university
medical, technical and law students.
I obtained three pianos
and a pianino, so we organised a music school. Piano was taught
by Mr Mihelic, violin by Dr Kalin, solo singing by a Russian
ballet dancer.
When I was picking up books from Silberegg I
came across the idea for a public library. We got a few Slovene
books from the countryside, among pupils, from families, and we
bought about 700 volumes from the estate of Vienna university
professor Dr Krek.
Soon our library grew to 1,000 Slovene
items, several German, Italian, French and others.
The
librarian was [my daughter] Marija, and she spent in it all her
hours from morning to evening, she only came home to sleep, and
in her free time she hand-wrote all the music scores for the
choir for all voices.
The communal life of the camp developed so that there wasn't a single
evening without a lecture for one of the courses.
We had
courses for all sorts of subjects, politics, social, philosophy,
theology, etc.
We barely managed to find space for all the
lectures and meetings.
People found it difficult to get hold of the more popular books, so I
thought about "reading evenings".
Because I expected a good
attendance I had the partition between two large classrooms redesigned so that it could be easily removed, and we got one very
large room out of two.
This proved very successful, people
loved to come, usually about 200 or more attended.
[My son]
Bozidar did the reading, by sections and chapters - one per week
- of selected novels. He explained literary points of interest,
parallel literary comparisons, language peculiarities, other
points of interest and the biography, or rather life-work, of
the author. After these readings Prof Dr Mihelcic talked about
a interesting topic from the past week, specially regarding
politics as far round the world as we could reach. The evenings
were very successful and indeed interesting. I would recommend
them anywhere where people don't have access to books.
My letter-diary:
111

. A Tegla Davies, Friends Ambulance Unit (London, 1947)

p.449
167

8th December.
I have left the Friends' Ambulance Unit and joined
UNRRA. * The FAU has announced officially that it will probably
wind up in Austria during the spring and I am not likely to be
demobbed 112 at least until the autumn. Elsewhere in Europe the
FAU may be winding up during the summer, and anyhow I look on
myself as a bit of a specialist by now in Austrian camp
conditions and don't particularly want to start all over again
elsewhere.
On top of this I feel that I am really useful in
this camp and have a most valuable understanding of the
Yugoslavs ... and I've got the job of assistant welfare officer
at this camp!
While the war in Europe and the Far East was on I don't think I would
have taken a paid job even if I had had the opportunity, but I
feel that the circumstances are now different, especially as any
Army man could now transfer to UNRRA. Certainly the financial
consideration has not been the least powerful one in balancing
the pros and cons.
I will at last be performing a different
function in the family economy - if only for a limited time. I
doubt somehow if I will ever achieve a "rise" of similar scale
again - something over 3,000% or from ,20 to ,645 a year!
I was accepted for UNRRA last Thursday, start work with them next
Monday, UNRRA takes over the camp on Tuesday and the Army leaves
on Thursday - quick work! I owe my very easy acceptance largely
to my FAU boss here David Pearson (I worked directly under him
at Rome for three months, and it was he who was responsible for
my being chosen to follow the Slovenes from Viktring to here) as
he recommended me to the UNRRA head in charge of all operations
in the British Zone of Austria.
When I went on Thursday for interview with the personnel officer it
was obvious she had orders from Major Chapman, the UNRRA head,
and was not in the slightest interested whether I was suitable,
but only for what price she could get me! A couple of weeks ago
a circular was sent round from BRC/FAU HQ inviting applications
for posts in UNRRA but did not mention any posts on the welfare
side, so I had to apply for an admin job.
However some welfare jobs were available. The admin job scale started
at ,450 and the welfare at ,550, so I was lucky getting ,600 by
stressing that UNRRA salaries were graded according to
qualifications and experience and I was pretty hot on both! As
to leave, I could have got home between leaving the FAU and
joining UNRRA, but that would have meant losing the chance of
staying on here and abandoning work which probably would fizzle
out if I left at the moment. March will see the camp through
the worst of the winter and the UNRRA team well established, and
I would be able to leave it much happier then - also UNRRA would
be quite likely to send me back here after my leave.* I have
already given you my impressions of the UNRRA welfare woman,
with whom I will be working: it is partly because I feel sure I
will be able to work satisfactorily under her that I am keen to
stay here - going elsewhere would be a shot in the dark.
So the Army handed over to UNRRA in the middle of December and I moved from
112

. demobilised
168

my independent humanitarian agency to UNRRA, which two years later was to be

succeeded by the International Refugee Organisation and after that by UNHCR,
the present Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
My letter-diary:
undated. I am gradually handing over some of my work to other members
of the staff and have hopes of working at a reasonable pressure
by about a week from now; it would have been impossible to have
got through the last month of chaotic rush if I hadn't got half
a dozen helpers in key jobs on whose work I could rely without
close supervision. My co-welfare officer is turning out to be
pretty ineffectual, getting almost nothing at all done.
He
contributes very little good to the camp but thank goodness he
can't do much harm in the job he's on - education and
recreation.
My snag is that all the refugees flock to my office when they want
something done, while at the same time the other team members
are taking a frantically long time to settle in. The director,
his secretary, the distribution officer and the warehouse
officer all speak no language but English and we have a great
shortage of competent interpreters, which complicates matters.
Also the director still shows little signs of really assuming
the leadership of the team - we have no one to do the job of
coordination. But things are slowly improving.

169

C H A P T E R

1 January - 9 May 1946

Previously critical of the Army's standard of camp

management, I now criticise UNRRA.
Spring arrives and Pernisek recalls the yearning of
the Slovene farmers to till their own fields, and the
bitterness between those who decide to return home
and the majority who oppose this.
He goes on to
describe the consolation the Slovenes find in their
religion, and their celebration of Easter.
A week
later the Army raids the camp and Pernisek finds
himself in the local prison, held by the British
Field Security Service (FSS).
After a night
terrified
that
he
is
about
to
be
forcibly
repatriated, he discovers he is not a prisoner at
all.
The FSS only wants to question him about the
inner workings of the refugee leadership and has
nowhere else to put him.
The Pernisek diary:
New Year 1946. This is our first new year abroad. A cold
and dreary morning, no sun and the mountains wrapped
in thick fog. Our rooms are well heated and we meet
in the long barrack corridors and wish each other a
happy new year.
May God give us health, peace and
daily bread, but our deepest desire is to be able to
return home. We've no idea what 1946 will bring us,
what joys, disappointments and suffering.
The
Christian must hold himself straight, trusting in
God's providence and goodness.
We must recognise
that God's ways are not our ways, rest our faith in
Him and pray Him to lead us into the promised land,
wherever that may be. In every sense we're only here
in transit.
May God's will be done, but whatever
happens we're every day a day nearer eternity!
My letter-diary:
1st January 1946.
We had a quiet but pleasant Christmas
here.
To my great disappointment the American
director and welfare officer who took over have left
- posted to a Polish Jewish camp where they'll
certainly have a tough enough job to satisfy even
170

them. I got to know them both well and developed a

great respect for them, especially the welfare
officer: I was really looking forward to working
under her.
In her forties, she had had a wide
welfare experience in America and held a big and
responsible job.
Though thus highly qualified she
remained completely open to new ideas, willing and
anxious to learn and very easy to work with.
The director was of Lithuanian Jewish origin, younger, had
done some refugee camp work in the American army and
took advice and criticism very well.
They had very
advanced ideas on camp organisation and oh! it was
refreshing to work with people with good brains, who
approached the job intelligently and made some
attempt at defining their objective and deciding upon
the best means of reaching it. Unfortunately they'd
applied for a really "tough" Jewish camp, and after
taking over only a week they've been sent to the
other end of Austria. So have been wasted many hours
of explanations and deliberations - once we conferred
to one in the morning!
Our team now consists of a Tasmanian major as director: a
very quiet, pleasant and able Dutchman as supply
officer, an Australian army veteran as warehouse
officer, an incompetent Pole also on stores, a
competent Dutch girl as nurse, a conscientious Welsh
girl as secretary who runs the whole admin office, an
American woman as catering officer, a Dutch ex-sailor
as transport officer, an ex-Paris taxi-driver as
driver, a Polish welfare officer113 and yours truly,
who is classified as assistant welfare officer but to
date has done virtually all the work of a deputy
director.
The Pole is classified as principal welfare officer and
when he arrived I naturally imagined he was sent to
take the post i/c welfare. Things didn't begin very
fortunately, because when I tried to get an idea of
which branches of welfare he was more interested and
experienced in, he just glanced through the list of
responsibilities and without more ado pointed to one
column and said, "I'll do these jobs", and pointed to
the second column, "You'll do these" - the jobs
listed in the columns not at all necessarily hanging
together! He then placed his hand in a fatherly way
on my shoulder and told me if I found any
113

. Paul Mzyk
171

difficulties in coming to a decision I should consult

him.
The same afternoon it occurred to the director to read us
the letter that the Welfare HQ had sent with the
Pole, saying for the time being there'd be no senior
welfare officer in the camp, but we'd each carry
equal authority and responsibility until the Area
Welfare Officer visited the camp - all rather
embarrassing!
The Pole is 40, friendly and wellmeaning, was a welfare officer pre-war in a part of
Poland with heavy unemployment, but is not keen,
strongly-concerned or imaginative, has a civil
service mind and not much initiative.
In every job
I've handed over he's continually referred back to me
unnecessarily or done nothing, but he may improve
when he settles in ...
Meanwhile the new director is taking an unconscionable
time taking over properly and, till he does,
everything necessarily remains in disorder, as the
division of responsibility between the various team
workers remains far too vague.
When the UNRRA team
took over on the 12th I was doing two people's jobs,
and every day something else is referred to me
"because I know what was being done before", until
the person whose job it really is "has had time to
settle down". This morning (Sunday) I had a two hour
conference on housing with a Slovene who only spoke
Serbo-Croat and Italian, a Latvian who only spoke
Russian and German [plus their mother tongues] and a
Russian who only spoke Russian and Serbo-Croat, and
while I understand most of what's said in Serbo-Croat
I can only speak satisfactorily in Italian and
German.
The aim of the conference was to attain a
compromise whereby both the Slovenes and the Russians
would accept a proportion of Latvians in their camp
zones!
I've a good-sized and pleasant room now and a stove that
burns away cheerfully of an evening.
My Polish cowelfare officer is turning out innocuous and very
friendly but without any strong capability for the
work, lacking imagination, grip or drive.
The
director of the team fell ill just before Christmas,
was sent to hospital and has not yet returned, which
means
that
the
camp
organisation
remains
unsatisfactory; but from what little I saw of him at
work I doubt if things will be much better when he
returns. He seems to lack any strong organisational
172

ability.
Meanwhile after wearing diplomacy I think I've managed to
get through two vital bits of reorganisation - of the
camp workshops and transport.
Both have been in
chaos, but I've got a really competent refugee placed
in the key admin job in each field and we should
start
to
see
improvements
in
control
and
organisation. For this the absence of the major has
been a help, as I've only had to "sell" the project
to the Dutch supply officer, with whom I get on very
well, and the Dutch temporary director who was happy
as long as it was only provisional, subject to the
major's confirmation when he returns.
The difficulty is that if the new UNRRA people are left to
their own devices, while to start with they were
loudly critical of the old lack of organisation, when
they get down to the job they've little idea of how
to remould the system and are almost certain to
choose the plausible, pushing, unreliable refugees as
departmental leaders, just not finding the quiet,
competent ones that have too much self-respect to
besiege the offices for jobs.
The frustrating thing is that there are plenty of honest
and able men in the camp, often considerably more
capable than the UNRRA personnel. The latter are in
fact in some cases doing damage by interfering
tactlessly
in
well-established
departments.
Surprisingly pervasive in UNRRA is the idea that
refugees are inferior beings that can be patronised
or ordered about, while in many cases they are
superior
to
UNRRA
personnel
in
capability,
intelligence, manners, civilisation and honesty and
morality. Well, after the above weighty discourse I
must to bed!
2nd

January.
Recently I've handed over all the
recreational, sports, gym, theatre, concerts etc side
to my colleague, of which I'm glad as I hadn't time
for it. Also I've handed over the whole school side,
which I'm sorry to give up although again I'd no time
to deal with it properly.
The regular schools are
already well established, and the same problem and
opening now lies in developing apprentice schools, in
e.g. carpentry, shoemaking, hairdressing etc, in
which I'm still free to interest myself if I've the
time.
173

On the other hand I've been landed with some new jobs.
First the distribution of blankets, which is quite a
job in a camp of 3,500 people. We've already seen to
it that everyone has two blankets, either camp ones
or their own, but we haven't enough to raise it to
three all round so we're now devising the best system
for seeing that priority groups get the third
blanket, e.g. expectant mothers, people sleeping
singly, old people etc. My second new responsibility
is registration, which shouldn't involve too much
work once one has got the office satisfactorily
staffed and organised. The third is accommodation, a
ticklish job as I'll have to try to even out the
scandalously unfair distribution of housing space,
while causing the smallest disturbance and illfeeling possible.
So I've the two most delicate
spheres in the camp: clothing and housing!
As long
as I can retain a sense of humour it'll be all right!
20th January. After three days of snow it has been lovely
and sunny today, and I went out for a walk this
morning with Joze Jancar, the medical student with
whom I worked on hygiene in Viktring and later here
had much to do with on the Graz project. I got very
good background on the refugee outlook on some events
in the camp: also interesting details on the Italian
occupation of Slovenia - Joze himself escaped by the
skin of his teeth from being executed with six other
students as hostages after an Italian had been killed
in Ljubljana. This he told me in the most matter-offact way for the first time today.
In the afternoon I went for a walk with the group of
university students on holiday here until February as
there is not enough wood in Graz; actually they are
studying here pretty hard. A pleasant crowd. We had
some vigorous snow-balling en route.
The mountains
around did look lovely when occasionally the sun
picked out the peaks and snowy folds.
30th January. The team is settling down a bit better but
only two or three show signs of appreciating the
technique of camp work, which demands an imaginative
outlook and the approach to all problems with a
definite aim in view: that of solving it in a manner
suited to the state of development and the standards
of the refugees.
One basic flaw is that our director is a very weak man.
His ideas are mostly sound but he hasn't the strength
174

or imagination to lead his team of twelve members,

let alone a camp of 3,500.
Owing to lack of
leadership
and
clarity
in
division
of
responsibilities, frictions are continually arising
between different members of the team or difficulties
in their relations with the refugees: and nearly
everyone has decided I am a convenient person to
bring their woes to! I've had embarrassing occasions
when on the same day both parties have come with
their versions, and I had to try to make sympathetic
but uncompromising remarks and point out that the
other fellow wasn't too bad after all! All of which
reduces one's time and patience for the refugees, for
whose troubles one is supposed to cater!
We've just had two excellent additions to the team -a pair
of very human nurses: unfortunately it's probable we
won't keep more than one, if one.
One is Belgian,
black-haired, very cheerful and bright, speaking
English but also French which is just what I was
needing.
The other is an aristocratic Russian
emigree, trained I think at Thomas's 114 with a superb
Slav face and a characteristic slight cast in the
eyes.
Both are refreshingly quick and intelligent,
so that at last we've some UNRRA staff who will stand
comparison with the best of the refugees!
I
especially hope the Russian stays, as I've hopes my
German will be strongly enough established to allow
my having a go at Russian.
The nurses brighten up
our mess life a lot - we were a pretty dumb crowd.
The work itself is very rewarding and satisfying. It was
fun to take over the chaotic registration office,
reduce the bloated staff to a small team of good,
conscientious workers with a capable chief, and get a
satisfactory routine going and clear up the inherited
tangle of papers. In a couple of weeks I should be
able to hand over an office that will run in spite of
having an UNRRA officer responsible for it!
Our
accommodation here is good solid houses, double
glazing and all. We're very lucky they are so near,
less than ten minutes walk from the camp.
8th

February.
The Russian nurse is turning out
excellently, as is the new deputy director, a Scotch
colonel, young and open-minded, completely lacking in
self-importance, quick, intelligent and interested in
youth welfare: a very pleasant man to work with.
114

. St. Thomas's Hospital in London

175

Recently the Zone UNRRA chiefs visited the camp and

expressed themselves satisfied.
I get on well with
my chief, the Chief Welfare Officer, a wellconcerned, pleasant and youngish American woman with
limited camps experience.
Fortunately I met her
first when she was inspecting the camp and I was
still in the FAU.
I took her in fatherly fashion
under my wing and, showing her round, gave her long
lectures on camp welfare background, not dreaming
she'd later be my boss! So I have a moral advantage
over her as she knows I have a much wider experience
than she.
We get on very well together.
I was
impressed by Major Chapman, the Australian Mission
Chief: he seemed competent, human and firm.
16th February. The deputy director - the Scotch colonel is turning out very well, with a strong interest in
youth welfare, but the director gets worse and worse;
he's afraid the whole time. He knows he's no leader
and not big enough for the job, and doesn't trust or
support properly any member of his team because he's
afraid, if he gives them too much authority, they'll
make a success of their job and overshadow him. He's
very shifty and it's impossible to know where one
stands with him.
He's alienated every member of the team, even the deputy
director who's only been at work a few days.
The
latter is now in bed with flu and I've had long chats
with him. He's been in the army fourteen years. His
main interest lies in youth welfare, boys' club,
hostel or scout work, and he thinks he might try to
get onto longer-term refugee work later, if he could
get a job covering youth welfare.
Pressure of work
is at last easing somewhat and I'm getting a little
more opportunity to get to know more of the people in
the camp. I look forward to telling you of the many
and varied "characters".
24th February. Every week UNRRA sends a new member to the
team, which is becoming quite unnecessarily large.
If we were worth our salt we should by now be
reducing numbers as we trained refugees to take over
our jobs.
Yesterday evening the senior Slovene
priest here (quite a figure back in Slovenia) who
lives in a village a quarter of an hour from the
camp, had his birthday and the male choir went to
serenade him, as their custom at home is.
I went
along; they sang five songs outside his house, he
appeared and said a few words, and then the choir
176

went into the village square

songs. It was very pleasant.

and

sang

more

folk

The senior priest was Dean Matija Skrbec, for me a "figure out
of Trollope".
Director Bajuk, writing a few years later,
described him as
the representative of the [Slovene] Social Committee in
Rome and a sort of leader of the entire community in
Austria.
We have to be very grateful to him.
He
lived outside the camp but regularly visited us, led
all the spiritual life, took interest in every aspect
of work and was actively or passively part of it. He
was very experienced in the ways of the world,
unselfish and hard-working.
He gave my work solid
support.
It is appropriate to consider here the contribution the priests
made to the life of the camp.
In ultimate charge was Dr
Jagodic. He had been appointed Papal Delegate a month earlier,
"with responsibility for the spiritual and moral support of all
Slovene, Croat and other Yugoslav catholic refugees in Germany
and Austria". He described his job in his memoirs: 115
I started work at once. First I presented myself to the
camp commandant at Peggetz, a morose Englishman 116 .
He showed very little interest in my appointment.
But he did allocate me my own office in the first
barrack as you entered the camp, where there were a
number of offices, and also authorised me some
petrol. I looked around to see where I could find a
car and driver as I didn't have one of my own.
My
always inventive cousin Leon Kristanc came to my aid;
he knew there was a young man in the camp with a car,
and brought him to me.
Franc Skvarca, who was a
business man, at once agreed to work for me, and
looked after me loyally for four years, after which
he emigrated to South America with his whole family.
Then I had to get a travel permit for Austria. At the end
of the war the country was divided into four zones:
American, English, French and Russian. I applied to
the English major in Lienz and he gave me the
necessary permit for myself and my driver, but of
course only for Austria. I couldn't get a permit or
visa for Germany even through the Vatican.
So I
115

. Jagodic, op. cit., pp. 260 - 276.

. He was in fact an Australian from Tasmania, Major Noel
Simmonds. See pages 00-00.
116

177

wasn't able to get to Germany, or of course to the

Russian zone of Austria.
I never got to Vienna to
see my immediate superior, the Apostolic Nuncio, and
had to write to him.
Once I had great difficulty
arranging for the Nuncio to send me a large sum of
money the Holy See had allocated for the refugees in
my care. Thank the Lord it turned out well!
I also needed help with my office work and appointed prof.
Martin Starce as my secretary in the camp.
When I
was away visiting other camps for some days I'd
return to find a mountain of letters on my desk. It
was my practice when chancellor to deal with letters
the day they arrived.
So I sometimes found myself
writing and typing almost the whole night. The vicar
of Anras was amazed at what I got through. But I was
quite young then. I couldn't manage it today.
We got on really well with the local priests and they made
us welcome: quite different to what happened in
Carinthia. The dean of Lienz was in truth our good
father, and supplied us sacramental wine free,
although there were certainly 40 priests in the camp
and some 20 in houses in the village.
There

were
exactly
200
refugee-priests
under
my
jurisdiction: 132 Slovenes - 98 parish priests and 14
Salesian, 9 Cistercian, 5 Franciscan, 2 Jesuit, 2
Lazarist, 1 Capuchin and 1 Dominican brothers: 30
Croats and Bosnians; and 38 from the German ethnic
minority communities.
To start with most of them
were living in the camps, with a few outside in
various local parishes and other duties. In Germany
my representative was Franc Seskar, who was living in
Munich, where he returned after the Americans rescued
him from Dachau concentration camp.
Ferdinand
Babnik 117 was another of my representatives, first in
the Netherlands and then in Switzerland.
The
refugees in all the zones of Austria with whom I was
concerned came to about:

Slovenes
Croats
Ethnic Germans
Hungarians

8,000: 6,750 in camp 1,250 outside

8,000: 6,450
1,550
85,000: 50,000
35,000
2,000

To this total of about 100,000 were later added a further

80,000 ethnic Germans, making a final total of about
117

. Nande Babnik.

See pp. 00 and 00.

178

180,000 catholic refugees from Yugoslavia for whom I

had to care.
The camp at Lienz had its own branch of Caritas [Catholic
social welfare organisation] but the British closed
it down, so I opened a social welfare office under
church auspices. Dean Matija Skrbec ran it to start
with, and later Dr Edward Vracko. It was called the
Social Committee, but it came under me. I should add
that we didn't have happy relations with the
institutions
NCWC
[National
Catholic
Welfare
Conference] and UNRRA.
Although both these bodies
were set up in the first instance for refugees 118 we
didn't derive distinct benefits from them. Sometimes
it seemed as if those who ran them were the people
who benefitted from them. No refugee ever succeeded
in being appointed to help run them although there
were enough capable people among their ranks. 119
On
the other hand the London Cardinal Bernhard Griffin
readily supported us: he felt for us and we turned to
him several times. I have preserved a number of his
letters in my archives, in which he responded
benevolently to our different requests.
Our refugees at Lienz had everything they needed, even
more than they had at home. So they found it easier
to bear the pain of exile, and particularly of
homesickness.
The children became so much at home
that they refused to return home when their parents
decided to go.
The English marvelled at the good
order in which the camp was run, and gathered from
far and wide to wonder at the marvel.
Sadly it
didn't last long. By orders from on high after two
years the camp was - disbanded.
So this fine
creation of our people abroad was destroyed in a
trice. Those who had demanded its disbandment and
118

. A popular misconception.
UNRRA was established, in
November 1943, with a much wider remit, its name indicates:
relief and rehabilitation. A.J.P.Taylor (1965) English History
1914-1945 (London OUP) p. 594, makes this clear: UNRRA saved
Europeans from starvation. Refugees were only one, albeit very
important, category of its beneficiaries.
119
.
Not entirely true.
As Jagodic would have known, my
colleague Paul Mzyk, UNRRA Welfare Officer at Lienz camp who
was later promoted to a more senior UNRRA post in Salzburg, was
himself a Polish refugee and a catholic, as he repeatedly told
the Slovenes.
Dara Lieven, UNRRA nurse at Lienz who later
worked on emigration with IRO, was also a refugee. See pp. 00
and 00.
179

removal
rubbed
their
hands,
experiencing
this
satisfaction when our people were not prepared to be
taken in by their propaganda of persuasion to return
home, whither they incessantly tried to lure or force
them.
Their presence outside was a thorn in their
flesh.
The last paragraph anticipates the closing of Lienz camp, which
did not happen until November.
While Yugoslav government
claims that the allegedly clerico-fascist leadership of the
Slovenes in Lienz was hindering repatriation may have had some
influence on the closure, UNRRA would anyhow have had to reduce
the number of its camps, and Lienz was an obvious candidate.
One result was that UNRRA shortened its lines of communication
and its transportation costs.
The Pernisek diary:
9th April 1946.
It's long since I've written my diary.
Life in our barrack has been proceeding in a routine
way
without
significant
disturbances.
We've
organised and settled our lives; we're all busy, our
workshops are developing nicely and increasing in
number, our schools are full; our young people are so
fully occupied I can say truthfully life wasn't so
good or pleasant for the young even at home!
The
last couple of months we've had enough bread and an
adequate
amount
of
pleasant
food
and
warm
accommodation.
We've partitioned the barracks and
every family has its own comfortable room.
A

But

beautiful Tyrolean spring summons us out of our

barracks, with a clear blue cloudless sky and
powerful sun.
On the green hills that surround us
hundreds of bushes sparkle with white blossom and the
fruit trees are covered with buds. The peaceful and
mighty mountains tower above all this beauty.
The
Drau has risen and its emerald green water changed to
a greyish white, as the sun melts the snow which has
clothed the peaks all winter and closed off our
Puster Valley.
The earth breathes again, warms up
and calls the people to plough and sow.
As the
bridegroom answers the call of his bride, so the
farmer responds to the earth's summons.
The fields
come alive, the stubble is ploughed in, people are
happy to be at work.
our good, hardworking farmers from Gorenjska and
Dolenjska suffer greatly. They go to the local farms
as day-labourers to find some outlet for their
180

yearning to till the land, and in the evening sit

resting in front of the barracks.
But they're sad.
They hear the call of their own fields, pastureland
and meadows, needing to be cleared of weeds, their
own orchards and vineyards crying for attention.
It's hard to resist the call, to suppress the feeling
of deep-rooted love for one's native soil and the
green vine-shoots on the sunny hill-side.
Many succumb, unable to hold out, and prepare to leave for
home. But they're worried what'll happen. Will they
be left in peace or will the journey lead to prison
and suffering?
If spared that, how will their
neighbours treat them?
Will they be received as
neighbours or with hatred and abuse, spat upon and
taunted as happened to some who returned earlier? A
number have members of their family at home; maybe
daughters stayed or a son has returned from the army
or prisoner-of-war camp. They tell them to come home
as they can't manage the work on their own. Thus are
they torn between a passionate longing for their
homes and families, and bitter feelings of utter
uncertainty and forebodings of evil and fear.
From

our barrack a few are returning.

Many can't
understand their decision, treat them with contempt,
accuse them of betrayal, say they're victims of the
communists' propaganda of promises and enticements.
Poor people! They don't deserve the scornful glances
and sarcastic comments of their fellows. The barrack
leader is going back and is the first target of spite
and bitter reproaches, but he was very wise and
scrupulously fair.
Some elderly women are going as
well: honest, devout, thoroughly good women, who walk
around with tear-stained faces because of the
spiteful remarks.
It's not the other farmers that
are hostile, but insensitive, selfish townspeople,
civil servants, private employees and labourers.

It's incredible the loathing and hatred some of our people

still feel towards any they suspect of being in
contact with the communists back home.
It's
impossible to get them to understand that in the
spring country people feel a powerful call to return
to their fields. We should understand this deep and
mysterious inner process.
Dear Lord, you will
chastise us more because we haven't rooted out hatred
from our hearts and don't fully grasp the allforgiving love, not even towards those who today
think as we do and risk much by deciding to return
181

home.
There is a deep call of the earth the city
dweller cannot understand.
Many prayed for a long
time before they made the decision.
19th April 1946.
Last year I'd no idea I'd live to see
Good Friday under such terrible circumstances.
All
of us are worried, asking where we'll be next year on
Good Friday, under what conditions? Our "Way of the
Cross" is hard as we don't know yet if we've reached
our Good Friday and passed through Calvary.
It's a most gloomy and bleak day: dirty-looking greyish
mist covers the mountains and a cold and violent wind
blows down in the valleys.
In camp it's a public
holiday, and we're visiting nearby churches to see
their holy sepulchres. Our refugee chapel is simple
and unpretentious, yet inviting and a true expression
of our love for the dead Saviour and Redeemer. The
panels were not produced by a well-known painter; a
modest youngster has used his natural gift for
painting.
The candle-sticks shine, made with
elegance and true taste from the outer layers of gunshells and tinned food cans.
The sepulchre is like a garden in full flower, encircled
by a throng of people gathered in devout prayer, and
barrack succeeds barrack from early morning to late
at night. *Interspersed among the prayers are hymns
conveying sadness at the memory of Christ's death and
our love for Christ who out of His love for us gave
Himself as a sacrifice so that we could live in
happiness eternally. Therefore let us bear the heavy
cross of the refugee and exile with patience and
resignation: we wish to be crucified with Him so that
with Him we will rise up to new life.*
20th

The whole camp is

April 1946 - Holy Saturday.
preparing for the feast of the Resurrection. The men
sweep and cleanse the paths and areas round the
barracks, the young lads set up maypoles in front.
The women clean and tidy the family rooms so that all
will be spick and span as for a feast at home, and
run from the barracks to the kitchens to bake simple
potice 120 , without which there can be no feast.

The chapel is decorated with flowers and votive lamps, as

for a great festival.
The Easter fare is blessed,
and children with their mothers carry the Easter food
120

. Slovene festive cakes

182

in simple baskets made in the camp.

Strong winds
swept down the valley during the afternoon so that
the sky was washed clean, clean as the eye of a fish.
The rattles fall silent, rattles with which the
children had been "frightening God" the last three
days, and the lads are ringing the bells for the
Resurrection.
At seven there were solemn vespers: the priest in white
vestments, the altar boys in white surplices,
the
people in their Sunday clothes - their best dresses
or suits, so far unworn in the camp, taken from
suitcases or trunks. The saying at home was that you
must wear something new for Easter; these outfits are
not all new but are all fine, festive.
The words
echo joyfully from before the altar, Surrexit Dominus
Vere, Alleluia!
Christ is risen indeed, Alleluia!
sung with passionate zeal in a beautiful, clear,
strong voice by the parish priest Gregor Mali.
The
priests' choir sings psalms while the people pray and
await the moment of the Resurrection.
The

threefold Alleluias resound from before the Holy

Sepulchre, the choir responds mightily.
"Our
Redeemer rose from the tomb" chants Dean Matija
Skerbec: "Oh Christian, sing joyfully" the people
answer, and the Risen Saviour starts on his first
triumphant procession through the camp. Paths which
for many years heard only the harsh tramp of
soldiers, the clatter of their weapons, curses and
profanity, today resound with mighty hymns of
Christian resurrection and triumph.
Even in this
place the Spirit has conquered the force of earthly
matter.
The magnificent Easter procession encircles
the camp with devout prayer, harmonious chimes and
victorious Slovene Easter hymns.
Surely for the
first time today the Lord Jesus walks through this
camp in triumph and majesty. Was it for this that we
were sent here on our journey of exile to our own
Promised Land?

The procession was a majestic expression of our living

faith: if only there had been an Easter Banner it
would have been just like home.
I saw men crying
from emotion.
Afterwards we all wished each other
"Happy Easter" with the same words, "and God grant
that we celebrate it next year at home!"
Director Bajuk's memoirs added:
We had everything superbly organised at Peggetz for the
183

life of the spirit.

We had a lovely chapel and a
tall bell tower next it, from which hung lengths of
railway track which gave a most harmonious ringing
sound. The lads rang the "bells" so well, really in
tune (Gaber even had a bell-ringing course under his
belt) that it was a great pleasure to listen to them
on Slivnica - you could hear their beautiful strong
booming sound even up there.
The Pernisek diary:
21st April - Easter Sunday.
Today we also can proclaim,
"this is the day the Lord has made". The weather is
superb, the mountain peaks as if washed in the blue
of the sky.
At ten Monsignor Jagodic, Apostolic
Delegate
to
the
Slovene
refugees
in
Austria,
celebrated solemn mass.
In the evening bonfires
glowed all over the surrounding hills, twinkling down
on us in the valley like friendly stars. God knows
where we'll celebrate next year's Easter, a thought
that turns over and over in my head: surely not here.
27th April. A most unpleasant surprise! The British army
has surrounded the camp from all sides to check the
inmates. They started at 4.30 in the morning when we
heard strange steps in the barrack corridor and
foreign voices under our window.
What's happening?
I get up, look out and see English soldiers holding
guns. We're surrounded. I go into the corridor and
to the exit door. A soldier motions me to return and
points his gun to say, "if you don't, you know what
this means!" I understand this language, we got used
to it in Ljubljana during Italian blockades. So it's
a raid.
Soon there's an announcement over the
loudspeaker in poor Serbo-Croat that the English
military police have surrounded the camp and everyone
should stay in their rooms because the military
police are searching for "war criminals, political
criminals,
collaborationists,
quislings
and
absconding members of the SS". So now we know where
we are!
28th April. I'm sitting in the FSS 121 prison in Millstatt
where they brought me during yesterday's raid. I was
searched by an English sergeant, short, black-haired,
stocky build.
Jewish in appearance, he spoke a
little Serbo-Croat and was accompanied by an Austrian
gendarme.
When he searched my cupboard he took two
121

. Field Security Service: British military and political

police
184

maps, some papers and two copies of the Black Book 122 .
He stopped his search when he found the decree of the
Slovene National Committee on the establishment of
the Slovene High School at Vetrinje, gathered up the
two books, the decree and some other papers and told
me, "bring a blanket, shaving kit and towel because
we have to interrogate you.
You'll be back in two
days."
So that's how I'm here in a middle-sized room with an oldfashioned vaulted ceiling and walls covered with
scrawlings. I read them again and again: a litany of
swear
words
in
English
and
every
conceivable
language, German, Polish, Serb, Croat, Italian.
I
don't find anything in Slovene.
From the grossest
obscenities to the most refined sarcasms and mockery
of the English. For a number I don't understand or
know the language they're written in.
Interesting
reading!
My companions are not unpleasant.
Two young Austrians,
both Hitler Youth members and one the son a nearby
textile factory owner, a butcher from Seeboden, a
young doctor from Klagenfurt and a headmaster from
Spittal, a pleasant, unpretentious man. In spite of
knowing that Hitlerism and Nazism are done for ever
they're still enthusiastic Nazis. They consider the
English
incompetent
fools
and
predict
the
breakthrough and advance of communism.
A

Slovene called Rupnik also keeps me company, an

unassuming young farm worker who's only here because
his surname is Rupnik 123 . He's very worried about what
they'll do to him. There's also a former member of
the Croatian Domobrani or National Guard who's very
calm.
The doctor paces up and down anxiously, sits
at the table, looks at family photographs and his
eyes fill with tears.
He then he stares at the
ceiling
and
cries
horror-stricken,
"panische
124
Angst!" . Yes, in truth, fear is close to panic.

They were searching for war criminals and pick on me alone

out of the whole camp. Never, ever did I even in my
thoughts toy with anything like committing a war
crime, yet I'm sitting now in prison.
A thousand
122

. a record of communist war-time atrocities in Slovenia

. A general of the same name was commander-in-chief of
the domobranci or Slovenian National Guard
124
. panic fear
123

185

possibilities of what they might do to me cross my

mind like in a film, and not for a moment does the
terrible thought leave me that they might send me
back.
"But that's not possible!" I tell myself to
calm down, "wait till they interrogate you, so you'll
know what you're accused of. Trust in God, you're in
his hands!" Whatever I was thinking about during the
day, I was dreaming at night.
29th April. At ten I was summoned for interrogation by a
gendarme called Benedikta and questioned by a young
air force sergeant who told me he was an English law
student.
Before he started I asked if I'd be sent
back to Tito and he at once said categorically no.
He assured me I wasn't a prisoner at all, wasn't even
suspected of a war crime.
They had very favourable
reports on me and my character and work, and I was
well respected by my fellow countrymen and the
military command at Lienz camp.
I was in a cell because they'd nowhere else to put me, but
I'd nothing to be afraid of: there was absolutely no
question of being handed back. He wanted to find out
some things that interested them and asked me to
speak as someone responsible who knows what he's
talking about: and that if I didn't know something,
then I simply didn't know about it.
With this he
gave me a clear indication of how to speak. He added
I should speak without fear because he was English.
But I should be very cautious, even mistrustful, if I
were interrogated by a Jew, and there were many
serving with the English military police.
At once I felt reassured.
We spoke the whole time in
German and I felt I wasn't being interrogated at all
but discussing things he found new and interesting not a police interrogation but a calm and courteous
conversation.
He started off asking why we fled.
Then we got on to conditions during the war and the
communist revolution, and our self-defence against
communist bands which later developed into organised
and
systematic
military
defence,
because
the
communists were organised in the same way.
He was most surprised at our disappointment at the British
government's actions at and after the end of the war,
and the hand-over at Viktring of our disarmed troops
to Tito's bands.
We talked about our political
restraint during the war and the establishment and
composition of the National Committee for Slovenia,
186

which interested him a lot.

He didn't write down
what I said, only made notes on what interested him.
It took two and a half hours and will continue
tomorrow.
30th April.
I was summoned again and we discussed
conditions in the camp, our internal organisation,
relationships among ourselves and what connections we
had with the homeland.
He wanted to know where the
soldiers, who didn't want to go back, were and what
they were doing: where the senior officers were and
what they were doing; who were the coaches training
our young people in sports and how many there were.
I began to understand better why I'd been brought
there and what they wanted from me.
The

sergeant said all I was telling him was very

interesting and I'd be taken to the FSS headquarters
in the Jesuitenkaserne 125 in Klagenfurt.
I'd be
completely free but would be interrogated again on
the same things as here. They'll then let me go back
at once to my family in the camp.
During the two
days our fairly large cell got so full we were
overcrowded.
The newcomers were all "important
people".

1st May.
The old detainees are having an exercise break
in the courtyard and a huge white poster with red
lettering is displayed on the opposite fire-wall,
with the slogan: Erste Mai, wieder frei 126 , as if to
mock me personally! The Croat Brindl reads it, spits
on the ground and says "devil take it!" obviously
feeling as I do.
Today they've taken some of our fraternity to
3rd May.
the Wolfsberg camp for Nazi war criminals - guilty or
innocent - and collaborators, where it's hoped
they'll cool their enthusiasm, but I doubt if even
one of them will sober up: when people of the same
ideology are put together, their solidarity of belief
is only strengthened. They're all glad to be going:
they couldn't stand our prison cell and look forward
to meeting up with old friends and comrades.
But
they'll soon be out.
**The newcomers are at first sight unattractive: haughty
German officers and renegade German women. Among the
new arrivals are two German doctors, majors in the
125
126

. Jesuits' barracks
. First of May, again free
187

SS.
Dr Schacht, Austrian-born from Vienna, selfconfident, arrogant and insolently impertinent: and
Dr Oberer, also Austrian, from Linz; sentimental and
a womaniser, he's for ever washing himself like a
cat.
In spite of being in prison he has a healthy
appetite and never stops eating and chewing the cud.
It takes him a quarter of an hour to get ready for a
meal: he washes his hands twice as if preparing for a
surgical operation, spreads a small cloth over his
quarter of the table and then places a spoon to the
right and a knife and fork to the left. Yes, a knife
in prison, he has one. Dr Schacht hasn't. Then he
starts eating his hors d'oeuvres, ham and hard boiled
eggs, wherever he gets them from, and bread; and when
the camp food ration appears, he gobbles it down
promptly.
The third is a teacher, a regular Cankar 127 in appearance,
tall as Jacob's ladder, awkward as a bear, without a
will of his own or a thought in his head.
Without
asking anyone he took the best palliasse and settled
into the quietest corner of the cell.
Dr Schacht
eyes him askance.
Then there's the Sudeten-German
Pucek, an industrial lawyer, a good soul, always
polite and smiling, and Captain Arnold, a Yugoslav
fifth columnist from Zemun and the priggish Prussian
von Bieberstein.**
5th May. **Pandur128 Benedikta is in a good mood today, and
managed to get permission for us to attend the
service in the local parish church. Drs Schacht and
Oberer are atheists but went.
Dr Oberer had an
assignation in the church with his girl friend who's
prodigiously persistent; she comes to see him every
day, appears at the cell window, once even got as far
as the cell door.
Today at church they had a chat
non-stop right through Mass.
Now I know where he
gets his snacks from. No doubt Pandur gets his share
from the same source.**
**Dr Oberer is married but doesn't talk about his wife or
family. After each visit he reads a new letter again
and again with devout reverence and savours the
perfume emanating from the scented missive.
Thrice
he passes it solemnly under his nose and then under
Dr Schacht's nose. He doesn't worry like Dr Schacht
127

. famous Slovene writer

. 18th century Croat infantryman in Austrian service,
robber, constable
128

188

does. Dr Schacht is afraid he'll get a long term of

imprisonment, because he was an "illegal" 129 before
Austria was annexed. He is a violinist as well as a
surgeon, and if he doesn't play regularly his fingers
will grow stiff and numb: after some months without
work a surgeon shouldn't take up a scalpel in his
hand.
Dr Schacht is overwhelmed by fear he'll lose
his profession. They play bridge every evening while
telling each other ghost stories which make my hair
stand on end.**
6th May.
**I'm sawing logs with Captain Arnold: since I
arrived here I've cut enough firewood to earn the ham
and egg I get for breakfast each morning. Today is
the last log.
The Captain has no idea how to saw.
We aren't paid or hired for it so we work very slowly
- it's better than just sitting in the cell. Pandur
Benedikta is looking at us and then he suddenly puts
his long nose into the shed and says: "if I look at
the two of you any longer it'll make me ill". But I
was thinking: "if I have to look at the faces around
me much longer I'll go insane".
At around 5 the crafty Croat Brindl returns from his job
at a hotel nearby and tells us von Bieberstein has
escaped.
The English don't make a fuss but calmly
ask what he was wearing. Next morning they had him
in a single cell.**
9th May.
Today our cell is cleared.
Rupnik and Brindl
were returned to the camp they came from, the rest
loaded onto a large armoured truck and carried off to
Klagenfurt; I was put into the Jesuitenkaserne and
the others taken to Wolfsberg. The man in charge of
the transport delivered me to the RIP.
What these
initials mean I don't know, other than "requiescat in
pace" 130 . I'll survive - I always have up till now.
When I got to the office I was surrounded by Jews who
eagerly grabbed the papers sent with me.
What a
group!
Thank goodness I was warned about them in
advance!
There were a large number of British Jews serving with the FSS,
because so many were excellent linguists and already familiar
with conditions on the continent.
Pernisek was not alone in
fearing them. The Slovenes knew how many Jews were in leading
positions in the communist parties of the Soviet Union and
129
130

. member of the Austrian Nazi Party

. rest in peace, in latin.
189

elsewhere in central and eastern Europe. Also many members of

the FSS had extreme left-wing sympathies and had friendly
contacts with the local Austrian communists, who were naturally
strongly hostile towards all anti-communist refugees in
Austria.
Pernisek's diary continues:
I'm

a little uneasy, although completely free to move

around as I like. I've been asked for three o'clock
for "a chat". They've given me a room in a building
where there are some refugee families and they've
arranged some food for me.
At the Millstatt prison
the food was very good and enough, but here it's
poor. I turned up, but they told me they hadn't had
time to look at the papers and asked me to return
tomorrow.

11th May. The interrogation finished midday. One soldier

on his own, I've no idea what rank, questioned me
calmly and politely for a total of eleven hours today
and yesterday. He kept on apologising and asking me
to be patient because he'd so many questions that
needed answering.
During our conversation, for
that's what I'd call it, he gave me cigarettes and
liqueur.
I gathered, from the many questions on our
internal organisation and camp institutions and the
relationship between our priests and the people, that
the
Yugoslav
government
has
been
accusing
us
emigrants of having our own rebel federal government
and organising our own army.
Early on I was asked if I'd already visited Bishop Rozman.
That's what they were looking for, not for war
criminals at all.
And that's why they'd crawled
through the roof spaces above the barracks and torn
up the floors, to see if we had hidden weapons. They
found out from the papers they took from my cupboard
that there were no such things, rather the contrary,
and so they made the whole process easy for me. They
found nothing to corroborate the charges of Tito's
men. There's a great difference between the English
and the Jews, the latter at the very least
sympathising with communism and regimes favourably
disposed towards it.
I noticed that the English have completely changed their
attitude towards communism during the past twelve
months, though they still don't know what it's like.
For them it's just a political party which has at the
190

moment a favourable opportunity.

In some respects
they're really naive, in others they're badly
informed or don't want to know. I didn't see my two
black books either at Millstatt or in Klagenfurt the Jew probably kept them - and I'm sorry I've lost
them.
Prison and interrogations have exhausted me
completely and badly affected my nerves.
Meanwhile I had returned from leave and started writing again:
5th May. All the parcels have arrived except the one with
a small amount of old clothes, books and shoe
leather. The clothes have been a great success - I
gave them all to a few middle class families who had
lost everything, but as they hold responsible
positions in the camp don't like to ask for clothes
from UNRRA, because if they receive as much as they
need people are inclined to say unfairly, "oh, her
husband is an interpreter, or doctor, and she can get
what she likes out of UNRRA".

191

C H A P T E R

10 May - 3 September 1946

A new camp director arrives.

UNRRA HQ sends two
repatriation officers to persuade the refugees to
return home.
They tell them that the organisation
will soon be closing down and there is no present
prospect of any country being prepared to accept
large numbers of immigrants, and no known source of
money to pay for the camps and food.
Repatriation
pressure steadily increases, and the refugees become
more depressed and send UNRRA HQ a passionate letter
of appeal.
The new British Commander-in-Chief inspects the camp.
I attach myself to the one man in civilian clothes
and lobby discreetly for the Slovenes. I choose well
because he is in charge of the Austrian desk at the
Foreign Office and has been sent specially by the
Foreign Secretary to report on the refugee situation.
My efforts meet with some success, as I discover
forty
years
later
when
Sir
Michael
Cullis
thoughtfully sends me a copy of his report. I tell
him that the Slovenes are far advanced in arranging
their mass emigration to Argentina, their preferred
host country.
An article the Slovenes themselves
publish in Buenos two years later, with the details
still fresh in their memory, describes the process.

192

My letter-diary:
10th May.
Things have been happening pretty fast.
Our
director has at last been moved, thank God! I think
he's got the sack, he certainly deserved it. He got
the nice Dutch supply officer he disliked removed by
very underhand means, so I've no sympathy at all. He
tried to get him sacked but instead he's got a better
job in HQ in Vienna! Our new director is an ex-Group
Captain RAF and seems pretty good. I've got on with
him very well so far.
Director Bajuk included in his memoirs characteristically blunt
profiles of three of the UNRRA staff, three refugee leaders and
several teachers 131 . Here he is on the new camp director:
I

don't remember the first commandant but I'll never

forget the second - a tall Australian 132 called Young.
He was a bachelor, and all heart. It seems to me he
had a better heart towards us than Mersol by about as
much as he was taller than Mersol. He really was a
tall man. You saw him immediately, walking with long
strides between the barracks, always kind and with a
smile, while little Dr Mersol was dancing around him
like a little dwarf, because Young was always turning
round and Mersol wanted to be on his left side.
Raising his head, he was always on the lookout for
the camp inmates, returning greetings, greeting them
and disappearing between the barracks over to the
other side.
He liked us Slovenes specially because
we were so clean, he said, because we were
conscientious at our work and generally polite.

The grammar school was specially close to his heart. How

often he just stuck his head round my door, greeted
me, closed the door and walked off: but always
smiling like a naughty boy. When we had the schoolleaving exams I naturally invited him to the opening
ceremony, so that he could see how seriously and
conscientiously we approached them.
We were all
131

. In manuscript memoirs he wrote in Argentina after 1949,

a photocopy of which is in the possession of the author.
132
. He was in fact English, and not Australian.
Bajuk
disapproved of all Englishmen so vehemently because of the
forcible repatriations that his memory played him false, and he
persuaded himself a camp commandant as good as Group Captain
Ryder Young could not possibly be English.
He did however
concede that Colonel Baty, who inspected his school the
previous August, was English.
193

waiting for him, everyone was nervous.

On his desk
he had - we all saw it - a big piece of paper with
blue writing in large letters "exams 8 am".
He
didn't come. We sent for him, he wasn't at home.
His

He

secretary Sustersic suggested we should wait.

I
disagreed, "we let him know, he is aware of it, we
shan't wait.
Order is order, also for the
commanders", and we started.
No sooner did Jeglic
dictate the first mathematical questions than he
appeared with his long strides, knocked on the door
and, bending down as every door was too low for him,
rushed in.
He apologised to Dr Mersol explaining
he'd forgotten, and when Mersol told him we'd already
started, he thought that was good. Because I knew he
had a sense of humour I told the boys, "you know, the
commandant was afraid he might have to do the exams
with you, and that's why he came late".
When Dr
Mersol translated my remark, he burst out laughing,
came up to me, shook my hand until it hurt and left
with his people.
was a warm-hearted man.
He absolutely adored our
scouts and arranged a summer camp for them by Lake
Millstatt and would visit them every Saturday
together with Dr Mersol.
Director Young is for the
Slovenes certainly the dearest person who was sent to
us and was our leader in those difficult days.
I
shall never forget him.

Bajuk here refers slightingly to Dr Mersol.

very different:

His profile is

Dr Mersol was like St Barbara to us - our last resort in

all our greatest needs.
Only God knew the hundreds
pof hours he spent waiting outside the office of the
camp commandant, to mediate not only in all public
matters but also in private affairs.
When after the first transport at Vetrinj I heard the sad
news that they were being sent back, I ran at once
and told him all I'd heard.
As I talked his eyes
were like lightning in every direction.
Without
comment he hurried immediately to look for the people
in charge and went to Klagenfurt to talk to the
authorities and commanders. He was the one who saved
those of us who remained, and if he hadn't intervened
we'd have all shared the fate of the domobranci. We
all know that, although we like to forget it.
194

Our whole group must be grateful to him till death for all
he did. Particularly the children. It's true he had
four of his own and they benefitted as well, but in
whatever he did he was not motivated by selfinterest.
This was shown by the enormous amount of
work he did which was of no benefit to himself or his
family.
He must surely be our greatest man and
benefactor in our exile.
I'm convinced of this and
say it out aloud because I know well what he meant
for the school.
Our grammar school, our schools in
general and our cultural work would never have been
the
same
without
his
support
and
successful
mediation.
Bajuk's second refugee profile was of Monsignor Skrbec and his
third one was devoted to Dr Vracko, the judge. He had repeated
clashes with him and recorded them with relish.
His second
UNRRA official was Paul Mzyk, the welfare officer: "he was
himself a refugee and understood our position.
He was also
very devout." I was his third UNRRA official:
John Corsellis was a young, apparently not yet qualified
academic, who had a lot to do with us on school
matters. He spoke some Croatian, but his German was
good enough for all purposes.
He was young and
inexperienced and openly recognised the fact in our
relationship.
If he wanted to interfere in any way
in my school work I took the position firmly that he
didn't understand our rules and I continued to do
things my way. He would smile and give up.
When

He

an order came from Klagenfurt to investigate

"clerical fascism", of which our camp was charged by
our dear brothers in Spittal, Monsignor Skrbec and Dr
Jagodic were summoned and it then came to my turn,
for they even involved the grammar school in this
affair.
When the commandant mentioned my name
Corsellis jumped up to say, "in no way, in no way.
Bajuk doesn't let anyone interfere in his sphere, not
even me." And that was the last I heard of it.
was honest and kindhearted, but he was English.
Whenever I was there to get anything from his school
supplies, he was so mean with every pencil that I
hardly managed to get anything from him. So when it
was time to move premises he had quite a sizeable
stock, which then went into other channels, when we
left for Spittal.
Otherwise he was good to us and
understood our circumstances.
He was on familiar
terms with our family - with Bozidar and myself - and
195

after the war wrote us a long letter about conditions

in London. I am grateful to him for many things, but
I cannot get rid of the feeling that he is English,
one of that "puffed-up rabble" 133 that betrayed us.
I return to my letter-diary:
They're carrying out big reductions in camp teams but I
have it on pretty good authority I'll be staying.
Already
our
deputy-director
(the
nice
Scotch
colonel), the blunt Australian warehouse officer and
our supply officer have been told they're being
transferred. I'm sorry to lose the Scot, but anyhow
he was leaving UNRRA almost at once to take a job as
development officer in Nigeria - he'll do it very
well. The Australian also was a good sort, although
at times difficult to work with. My opinion of UNRRA
HQ at Klagenfurt goes down and down - they
continually bungle things badly.
It will for
instance be extremely inconvenient losing our supply
and warehouse officers at the same time and they will
have to replace one of them. There seems no reason
at all why they should be changed.
I've

taken
back
responsibility
for
admittance
and
registration, housing and clothing and also am doing
quite a bit of work on workshops now, so I have
plenty to do. I'll probably take on a second fulltime personal assistant: one to specialise on
clothing and workshops, the other on housing and
admittance and registration. I've found an excellent
man who speaks good German, is quick and intelligent
and was a bank worker - head of a department - in
Slovenia. I'm reducing to a fine art the transfer of
all work possible to other people's shoulders, but
still find plenty to do!
However I'm carefully
confining myself to a 5 1/2 day week, 9-12.30 and 25.30 or even less.

Could you very kindly send me as much cotton thread as you

can lay your hands on? The simplest way would be to
buy a few large-size registered envelopes and stuff
in as many rolls as will fit; it will save the
trouble of packing parcels and will obviate the risk
of loss. The slightly higher cost won't matter. The
Oxford Woolworths had a plentiful supply of 1000m
rolls of black, green, blue and grey machine thread
133

. "sodrge
translate.

napihnjene"

in
196

Slovene,

and

difficult

to

at 10 pence a roll, which is ideal.

It will be a
real service to the refugees if you can send as many
as you can buy. If you keep accounts at your end and
let me know the cost of individual consignments I'll
get paid here immediately - I charge cost price +
transport costs!
If you're not likely to be in Oxford for some time perhaps
you could ring or send a note to the St Michaels
Street needlework supply shop and they could send me
thread direct. I can use as much as they can send me
of all colours, and perhaps you could arrange for
them to send me so many envelopes-full weekly.
In
the unlikely event of my receiving more than I can
use, other camps are in equally urgent need.
The
only coloured thread we have in our tailors' shops
here is the small quantity I brought back!
If you
could also buy some sewing machine needles it would
be a great help; at least two machines would be idle
if I hadn't brought some back with me! We use 20 a
month, so 40 or more needles sizes 17, 18 and 19
would be a godsend.
Our other main urgent need is
six
cut-throat
razors
and
three
hairdressers'
scissors as we're about to open a camp barbers' shop;
there's a shop at the end of the Broad that sells
them.
All the parcels have now safely arrived and are a great
success.
We've been able to help some really
deserving people with the clothing, the school was
very pleased with the books and the three people
overjoyed at being able to buy good dictionaries at
what was to them a ridiculous price. So far as the
cotton etc. is concerned, I'm quite willing to spend
,20 to ,30 if necessary, as I need draw no pay here
(I haven't been able to yet!) and so will be able to
live here on the repayments.
28th May. * All the team members due to depart have gone
and the team is settling down excellently; I continue
to have too much to do, but this should be only
temporary until the new members settle in and I'm
able to reorganise my part of the job.*
The main
drawback of the new director is that he's a bit too
fussy over details, wanting to know exactly the
reason for this or that - and always expecting me to
find it for him! This means consuming a lot of time
on inessentials.
Last Saturday we had a gymnastic display together with an
197

arts and crafts exhibition (very impressive) and a

concert: it all went off well, but the two main
visitors failed to turn up, blast them!
Several of
the camp sewing machines would be useless now if it
weren't for the needles I brought back with me. Also
the only coloured cotton thread we've left in the
camp is the rolls you bought for me. Do let me know
if you have managed to get some more cotton and sent
it off, as I can then let the workshops use what
we've got slightly more generously.
16th June.
Last Saturday I had to work in the camp so
I've been able to take off all Saturday and Sunday
this weekend.
I had to go down to Klagenfurt on
Friday as I had various jobs to do there, so I left
Lienz at 5 am, had a pretty busy day in Klagenfurt
and on the return journey got dropped off about half
way at a place called Feffernitz, where there's a
Hungarian DP camp at which John Strachan, my old FAU
Lienz colleague, works.
I'm staying here over
Saturday and Sunday and will return to Lienz by train
on Sunday evening.
It's very pleasant getting away
from the camp for three whole days, as it's the only
way of getting a real break.
The new director is
perhaps a bit too keen, never stopping talking shop.
John

Strachan is doing a very good job and is now

responsible singlehanded for the welfare of this big
camp with over 2,000 DPs. It's very valuable seeing
round someone else's camp - it puts everything better
into proportion and gives one some useful ideas.
Last night I went to a Hungarian concert in the camp,
which was very well produced and acted.
In the
afternoon I greatly enjoyed an hour's fencing with a
Hungarian captain. Later I had a long chat with two
Slovene doctors 134 from a neighbouring camp I knew at
Viktring and at Lienz. They are both single and hope
to take up mission medical work somewhere.

Many thanks for the marvellous supplies of cotton, needles

and books. The needles arrived in the nick of time
as we were down to our last one. The camp tailors'
shops, with about fifty people working, would have
had to close down almost completely if we hadn't
received your cotton. The biggest parcel of clothing
arrived and I only finished giving it out a week ago.
I gave it all to families with a large number of
children (two had four and one had six) and to people
134

. One was Dr Janez Janez, for whom see page 00.

198

who had very little indeed but whose past life and
present responsible jobs in the camp made it very
hard for them to ask for clothes at official
distributions. I feel confident it will all be well
used.
1st

July.
During the last fortnight we've had an
intolerable number of visitors from Klagenfurt
needing entertaining, a fantastic number of new
monthly or weekly reports and returns to prepare and
then they decide to "borrow" our welfare officer at
the same time as our doctor is away on compassionate
leave. I sometimes lack the strength of mind to sit
down to a letter in the evening, especially when
someone says "come for a walk - you need some fresh
air".

The Pernisek diary:

2nd July. Two officers from UNRRA HQ Vienna came today to
discuss the repatriation of Slovene refugees.
One
was called Graf and spoke good German. Both were of
pleasing appearance and spoke most politely and
calmly.
They talked with Dr Mersol first, and then
with Dr Blatnik and director Bajuk - naturally with
each separately.
They told them openly the reason
why they were visiting the camp and that they wanted
to know our feelings and views about the possibility
of repatriating Slovene refugees. They asked why we
didn't go home and what were the obstacles to return
-political, economic or religious?
Mr Graf said they understood the intelligentsia couldn't
go back but not why the small people, farmers and
workers couldn't. They certainly weren't politically
active and didn't present a danger to the present
regime.
And why didn't the old people go?
Would
there be any sense in a commission composed of UNRRA
representatives and refugees visiting Yugoslavia and
calling on refugees who'd returned to find out how
they lived, whether they'd been left in peace, how
they'd been received and the present situation in
Yugoslavia? Were we carrying out propaganda against
repatriation, and were we aware of the difficulties
we would face as emigrants?
UNRRA has no money to
pay for transport.
Where would we get money for
travel and working capital? They then told us UNRRA
didn't have long to live and the establishment of a
new body to look after refugees was a long way off.
199

We hadn't agreed among ourselves how we'd respond, being

unable to because the visit took us by surprise and
the camp commandant had dealt with this kind of visit
in the past.
As it turned out we all answered in
much the same way, giving the same main reason for
the failure to return and the condition for any
return: let the Yugoslav government tell us where our
lads and menfolk are, who were returned in May 1945.
That was the core issue.
After I'd answered all
their questions, they stated - Mr Graf speaking for
them both - that it was difficult to get a precise
idea on that issue and that both of them were only
carrying out their official duties.
They wished me
the best of luck, thanked me most politely and
departed.
12th July.
The UNRRA Repatriation Commission is in the
camp today, led by Dr Bedo, Hungarian by birth, who's
the principal director of the Commission's European
section.
He speaks German well and is very polite,
concise and clear. UNRRA, the organisation of the UN
for help to refugees, divides them into three groups.
First those who left their homelands before the 1st
January 1945, under which category come prisoners-ofwar and forced workers. UNRRA maintains there are no
war criminals or collaborators amongst them because
Hitler needed them at home.
The second group are
those who left home between the 1st January and the
8th May 1945, predominantly political refugees; it's
possible there are some war criminals concealed
amongst them. The Commission stated it hadn't found
any among our people.
In the third group fall all
those who left home either of their own free will or
were ordered to by the government.
Everyone above the age of eighteen has to report
personally to the commission.
Dr Bedo asked me and
my wife whether we believed in God and Jesus
crucified.
When we answered yes, he asked if we'd
been members of any German organisation and if we'd
fought against the British and the Americans.
When
we answered no, he gave us a certificate to that
effect and the matter was ended.
My letter-diary:
9th July.
I'm sorry I've been so long giving you any
answer in detail about the cotton - the stuff you've
sent has been absolutely marvellous and I'll do my
200

best to let you know within a week how much would be

welcome regularly.
I still can't believe it's
possible to receive stuff regularly, it's beyond my
wildest dreams!
I'm having an analysis made of the
amount our various work places use and will be able
to see from that how much we need in total weekly.
The

question is complex because cotton goes to five

different recipients (all through the camp central
stores)
(1) two shifts of tailors in the main
workshops (run in two shifts because we are very
short of machines and have to get all the work out of
them we can)
(2) a special shop salvaging clothes
and making slippers out of rags - we made our 1,200th
pair recently: they are most useful as they make it
possible for the people to save their precious shoes
(3) an "arts and crafts" shop, where they make
children's toys, knit, embroider, make lace, etc.,
etc. (4) the cobblers' shop and (5) the hospital,
where a sewing machine is used full-time mending
hospital linen and making baby clothes.

Before I went on leave we received our last official

supply of cotton and shortly after I returned we had
completely run out, except for white thread.
We've
been "living on" the thread you've sent ever since.
We managed to get a small supply of razors and
scissors from Italy, enough to open our barbers'
shop.
I hadn't realised the importance of barbers:
they have a very real function in the maintenance of
self-respect, and even office efficiency.
No one
obeys an unshaven clerk, and the latter only works
half as well as his tidier colleague.
The Pernisek diary:
*It's a glorious summer Sunday, the mountain
14th July.
peaks glitter in their white covering bathed in the
hot July sun and the sky appears washed clean.
Skylarks sing their praises to God above the golden
wheat fields, as the Slovene camp community moves
slowly in a penitential procession, praying aloud
against a background music of chirping swallows and
quails. A simple wooden cross made by a peasant is
carried at the head of the procession followed by the
elementary and middle school children, their faces
glowing like red poppies in contentment and delight.
After them march the young lads and men praying
devoutly with bowed heads and rosaries in their
hands.
201

Everyone sends his own prayer to heaven but all are united
in one petition: good God, shorten our days of exile,
send Your holy angels to take us home! The girls and
women sing Marian hymns following a banner of Our
Lady of Fatima. The people halt on the hill by the
chapel of Our Lady and gather round an outdoor altar
under the blue sky to hear Mass.
While

the hungry camp community was asking for God's

mercy, there was a huge demonstration in Lienz
demanding that the refugees be expelled because of
the shortage of food.
My letter-diary:

17th July. Last weekend I did a good vigorous climb with

a visiting female welfare officer: I hit things off
with her pretty well (she was English, progressiveschooly, Nursery School Association, socialist and a
bit overpowering, but I survived) which was a good
thing as it transpired later that she was a personal
friend of the head welfare officer for all Austria.
I'm sorry to sound so worldly, but in UNRRA one has
to in self-defence.
If I hadn't established
excellent personal relationships with my Zone Chief
Welfare Officer 135 (a hard-faced American woman who
has a disconcerting way of winking as she converses,
is reported to have the Zone Director in her pocket,
but who can be quite human) I'd have been moved from
this camp by now and probably dropped two grades
owing to reductions in staff.
Since the reductions, when we lost deputy director, admin.
officer
and
full-time
secretary,
I've
been
responsible for all admin. as well as part of
welfare.
I've been steadily building up the
interpreter who used to be a hospital administrator 136
as chief of camp admin with great success - I'm most
lucky having such a first-class reliable man.
My realm now covers (1) finance office, which deals with
pay, health insurance, taxes etc.
(2) labour
exchange and employment office - we've three or four
hundred workers in local farms and Austrian firms.
We find them their jobs, see they're properly fed and
treated, and also find all workers for inside the
camp
(3) judicial office which tries internal camp
135
136

. Miss Madsen
. Mr. 00 Sustersic.
202

"police court" cases and sees that refugees before

the civil and military courts are properly defended
(4) camp police force and jail
(5) fire brigade,
full-time and volunteer sections
(6) registration
office
(7) filing office
(8) central admin and
registration office which also controls admissions to
and departures from the camp (9) translation office.
On top of this, the director quite rightly tries to keep
as free as possible of office work so that he can
really direct the camp, and so usually leaves to me
the drafting of special letters.
I manage to get
through only because I've a very conscientious and
faithful staff, and have known them long enough to
know what they can and what they can't do.
I give below a sample of the special letters the camp director,
Group Captain Ryder Young, left to me to draft, this time as
staff member responsible for the employment office. It didn't
matter how hard-hitting I was: so long as I got my facts right
and didn't "drop him in it" he'd sign anything and engage in as
many fights with headquarters as were necessary. Sadly he was
only with us a few months, but during them we enjoyed vigorous
and dynamic management:
Subject:
To:

Employment of D.Ps in Camps

Zone Director, UNRRA HQ

I am in receipt of your letter requesting the views of

Camp Directors on a further reduction of payroll
staff.
My view is that any such reduction would be in effect a
penalisation of those teams that have energetically
developed their camps, and as such is deplorable. A
camp that is in an elementary stage of development
can without difficulty be administered with a DP
staff well below the minimum laid down, but the
number of staff required increases sharply with every
new project that is undertaken.
In circulars from Klagenfurt and personal visits the Zone
supervisory staff have repeatedly made it clear that
they are in agreement with the official UNRRA policy
of regarding UNRRA's responsibility as not being
limited to the provision of food, clothing and
shelter: measures to maintain the morale of the D.Ps,
to further their education and in general to assist
with their rehabilitation and repatriation have
repeatedly been suggested and warmly praised by Zone
203

H.Q.; some camps, owing to fortunate circumstances

and the hard work of their teams have advanced
particularly far in this direction.
For

example one's educational responsibilities can be

interpreted as meaning school for children between
six and fourteen: on the other hand it may mean the
vigorous attempt to provide all those youths capable
of benefiting from it a training in some trade, such
as carpentry, tailoring, cobbling etc. etc. and thus
providing
them
with
the
opportunity
of
later
supporting themselves and their families.

Equally one may rest satisfied when one has distributed

such clothing & footwear as the UNRRA supply section
sends one: alternatively one may energetically
collect all kinds of salvage material from every
source and make it into clothing for the D.Ps, as
well as repairing and adapting as much as possible of
the clothing already in their possession.
There are many other similar projects.
None of them are
possible without an increase of staff. If such work
is undertaken but inadequately controlled it is worse
than useless, as it only encourages abuses and black
market.
More advanced camps are already finding difficulties in
administration with the present minimum.
This will
increase as the quantity of cigarettes [used to pay
staff] we receive decreases.
Any further reduction
would either involve cutting staff to an extent at
which control would be inadequate, or the closing
down of valuable activities.
This whole question is of great importance to Lienz camp,
and if it is proposed to proceed with the reduction,
I would be obliged if I could be given the
opportunity of stating my point of view at greater
length.
I return to my letter-diary:
20th July. I'm off today to Klagenfurt and Graz with the
director on business.
I'll get my first chance of
visiting the students' camp in Graz, which I'm
looking forward to.
27th July.
We had poor weather on the way to Graz, but
very fine on the way back. I was able to visit the
204

students' camp twice.

It was very pleasant meeting
so many old friends again.
Many were still busy
studying in the evening and there was an atmosphere
of industry. The Austrian university professors have
spoken highly of the standard of their work.
Next
day we paid an "official visit" to the camp. All the
students from Lienz were there.
The Pernisek diary:
31st July. A time of intense and cruel pressure to return
home begins.
Our protectors know very well how we
long to return, and our feelings towards communism
which holds our enslaved homeland in its grip on the
other hand.
What they can't achieve by fair means,
they may perhaps by foul!
Food rations have deteriorated drastically.
The food is
very poor: in the morning unsweetened black slush,
presumably coffee, even for children.
At midday
watery soup with a few morsels of macaroni, beans or
potato or meat fibres in it, the midday meal having
380 calories according to the official statement.
For supper unsweetened blackish coffee again.
The
bread is very poor and is made from a mixture of
grains. There's no fixed daily quantity, but one day
a loaf between five people, the next between ten or
even more.
People are really hungry, especially
those who don't earn any money because they can't
work. If one can pay enough one gets bread, so now
we know why there's such a shortage.
Things were never as bad when we were looked after by the
military, when we got at least 850 calories a day.
If UNRRA really wanted to help us, they could easily
do so in spite of the equal treatment with the
Austrians, which is a bluff as they're anyhow already
helping them. Even during the worst times of the war
we always had good and sufficient food; even when the
railways were smashed to pieces and bridges down,
food supplies functioned.
This starving of the
refugee serfs has a transparent design - to get as
many people as possible to go home. They don't dare
use forced repatriation, hence the ferocity towards
helpless rightless people. We're very worried about
this UNRRA policy aimed at getting as many as
possible to go back and letting only 10% remain.
People are desperate and so are returning, saying
that if they have to die they prefer to die and be
buried at home. The ordeal of our journey across the
205

post-war desert is hard!

Day after day we're disillusioned anew by the "allies".
In place of compassion and respect for human rights
we see the repulsive selfishness of petty tradesmen.
They'd sell their own souls to the devil for profit,
so why not their friends and allies? All the talk of
humanitarian ideals is a cover-up for the most
loathsome selfishness.
And we risked our lives for
these allies, lost everything we had and are now
about to be robbed of our basic human rights.
The
young Englishman was right when he told me on the
field at Viktring that when we were given the status
of displaced persons, thenceforth we were DPs people without any rights, people who can't demand
anything but can only beg.
We're often overwhelmed by despair and doubts. Dear Lord,
in the midst of all disappointments and disillusion
help me to continue to trust in Your limitless love,
faithfulness and justice. With Your grace prevent me
from sinking into despair.
I ask this not only for
myself but for all my fellow Slovenes.
I ask also
that You don't count it as sin when I feel full of
doubts and despair. I'm only a human being, judging
and thinking in a human way. Have regard to my daily
promise to strive to put my trust and reliance in You
steadfastly and love You, in spite of the suffering
and trials that almost overwhelm me.
May the
suffering of spirit and body not lead me into
despair, but to consecration and reconciliation with
You and Your Sacred Heart.
The Slovenes wrote to the camp director in July 1946:
The Social Committee of Slovene Migrants in Austria
To: Group Captain Ryder Young
The Slovene refugees in Camp Peggez send you this petition
asking you kindly to support and forward it to the
UNRRA headquarters in Klagenfurt.
By the news we are getting from home we come to the
conclusion that every day there is less possibility
for most of us to return home soon.
In spite of
that, whoever can, should return home if only he has
the moral guarantee that no misfortune would happen
to him, that no danger to his life awaits him, that
he will stay in freedom and that he will be able to
work of his own free will and dispose of his
206

possessions. We are also of opinion that old people

and such with ill health have nothing to fear in
returning home. Even if the conditions at home will
not be the best and much disagreeable things will
happen, it will be the lesser evil, as the life of
emigres also requires much patience, sacrifices and
inner discipline.
At our meetings and councils we uttered these opinions
often and advised everyone to decide for himself
about returning home.
No one is bound to our
community, we will not dissuade or hinder any one.
Who has decided by himself to go home, gets our best
wishes for his welfare and our blessings. But as the
number of those returning is very low in comparison
with the number of refugees, it is possible that
suspicion arises that the leaders of the Slovene
nationality group make propaganda against returning.
We can assure you there is no such propaganda from
our side. But also there is no propaganda to return.
The decision must be free, independent from any one.
Everyone must after his own dispassionate and coolheaded reflection decide, weighing all circumstances.
Our refugees are disheartened by many letters they get
from their own country. The tenor of all of them is
the same: "do not go home - stay where you are and be
patient.
The circumstances are not such that you
could return, on the contrary thousands would like to
emigrate if they could.
Here is no equality, but
every non-communist is without rights, he has no
possibility to exist, as his property is confiscated,
he can not get decent work and he is arrested.
To
let go a good property is no great sacrifice today,
as property values have no stability.
Thousands at
home are in daily peril that the authorities
confiscate their property and so make them beggars
overnight.
That would not yet be the worst, if it
would not be preceded by prison, degrading trials and
judgement by the 'peoples' court' - and the sentence
is forced labour for many years."
People who returned home from here write the same and
repent this step as having been too early and not
thoroughly reflected upon. This are letters written
by simple people, who certainly are not guided by
speculative political thoughts, but only by facts.
These letters receive, on the main, also only simple
people, small farmers and workers, which are the
majority of our refugees.
All such letters are
207

always at your disposal for inspection, so that you

can convince yourself about the truth of our
statement.
We

think that emigration of the Slovene refugees is

becoming every day more urgent. But we Slovenes have
in this matter our own wishes, which we ask you
kindly to support.
All Slovene refugees living now
in Austria and Italy wish to emigrate as a unit.
Therefore we should not be torn asunder to many
groups.
On the contrary, we beg to be concentrated
in purely Slovene camps and allowed to gather and to
take counsel, so that we will be able to organise a
joint emigration.
The Anglo-American authorities
ought to consider us as an ethnical group of emigres
for which Dr. Miha Krek, former minister of the
Jugoslav Royal Government in Belgrade and London, now
Roma, Via Paganini 24/int.3, is the representative
for all Slovenians in emigration.
For those living
in Austria we have the Social Committee of Slovene
emigrants in Austria with the seat in Peggez-Lienz.

You, dear Sir, as well as your predecessors at your post,

have had the best opportunity to become thoroughly
acquainted with our good and bad sides. We hope that
your opinion of the Slovene emigres is not such, that
you could not support and explain this our petition
at the superior department.
Kindly allow us, dear
Sir, to express also now and in this place our
heartfelt gratitude and regard for you.
Yours very faithfully
Pernisek Franc

Secretary

Skerbec Matija

Chairman

Ryder Young forwarded their letter to the UNRRA Zone director

in Klagenfurt with a covering letter I drafted for him:
Repatriation and Immigration.
The enclosed letter was handed to me by the secretary of
Slovene Social Committee.
As it gives a clear
picture of the Slovenes' attitude to repatriation, I
am sending you two copies, and would be glad if you
would perhaps send one to Vienna.
So far as my own observations go, I would say that their
remarks on repatriation propaganda are accurate:
while propaganda hostile to repatriation undoubtedly
occurs in this, as in every camp, I have no reason to
believe that it is widespread or virulent, and I am
208

satisfied that responsible D.P. camp officials are

conscientiously following the principle, that each
individual should decide for himself, whether to
return
or
not.
*I
enclose
my
more
recent
repatriation statistics.
Ryder Young
Director, Team 331
25th July 1946
REPATRIATION STATISTICS FOR UNRRA DP Center, LIENZ
Slovenes to Yugoslavia
children
adults
total
Month
0-6
6-14
male
female
March
6
5
25
36
April
3
6
22
46
77
May
3
6
24
23
56
June
8
16
12
36
July
3
12
18
33*
I now return to my letter-diary:
2nd August.
Yesterday the director and I mixed business
with pleasure very pleasantly.
We had five or six
packages to collect from a village just over the
Italian border of clothes, books, ping-pong balls,
lantern slides and projectors, etc, etc, for welfare
for the camp children, which had been got near the
frontier by Slovene priests and left with the local
parish priest. It was up to us to do the rest.
Monday, 5th August.
The C-in-C has come and been and a
good time was had by all.
Everything went off
gratifyingly smoothly, and Lieut. General Sir James
Steele expressed himself pleased with the camp and
his reception. As soon as we had been introduced and
moved off to tour the camp I gravitated towards the
only member of the party in civilian clothes, who
turned out to be an observer from the Foreign Office
sent, as he said, "by Bevin to report on the refugee
position in Austria". He was youngish, pleasant and
obviously alert and intelligent.
We soon got left
behind with me trying to tell him in five minutes
what would have needed two hours - the people's
attitude to repatriation, migration etc, etc. He had
to leave after about twenty minutes but said he'd be
interested to see a sketch of the position in
writing. I intend to take him at his word and send
him a report - it might do some good and at the worst
he can light his pipe with it!
Colonel Hall, the 2nd i/c for the DP Section of Military
Government Austria, was also in the party.
I think
I've already mentioned he takes a fatherly interest
209

in me.
He was the MG officer concerned with the
opening of the students' camp in Graz and I've seen
him several times since then. After seeing the most
interesting parts of the camp and a small display by
the boy scouts, we came back for tea and then went
down by jeep to the station to see them off.
The civilian whose ear I so eagerly bent was M.F. (later Sir
Michael) Cullis, then head of the Foreign Office's Austrian
Section. Years later he gave me a copy of the 19-page "Report
on Visit to Displaced Persons Camps in British Zone of Austria"
he prepared for Mr Bevin 137 , in which he described the week-end
of 3-6 August he spent on a tour of four camps with the
Commander-in-Chief, General Steele, and the Deputy Director of
the PW and DP Division, Colonel Hall, referring to the latter
as being exceptionally helpful. He started with the subject of
Jewish refugees, who were "by far the most difficult and
troublesome group of DPs inside camps in Styria (Steiermark)".
When I worked with them a few months later I found them
amenable and cooperative with a camp staff that listened to
them with understanding rather than adopting a rigidly
authoritarian approach.
He went on to discuss the problem of
"some
Poles
and
Ukrainians"
who
were
terrorising
the
countryside, and then commented on the refugees in the second
camp they visited:
They were fairly dejected at their lot, and most had no
idea of what their future would be. Some nursed rosy
ideas about eventually emigrating to America - ideas
which I did my best to pour cold water on whenever
possible.
Their main preoccupation was that they
should not be sent back to the countries or
conditions from which they had fled. They were also,
if
less
emphatically,
opposed
to
remaining
permanently in Austria, where they believed the local
population would always be hostile and they would
have little chance of becoming assimilated and
starting a new life.
We drove in the afternoon to Lienz to inspect the UNRRA
camp there. The camp .. has the advantage of better
and more substantial buildings than any of the three
MG camps we had seen during the morning. Altogether
things were on a somewhat grander scale and one
seemed to meet many more administrative personnel
than the very limited members running our own camps.
It has a population of just over 3,000, consisting
mainly of Yugoslav nationals, and the divisions of
137

. F.O. reference Number 010370 of 30 August 1946.

210

the camp between Slovenes, Croats and Serbs seemed

fairly rigid.
I do not think any such efforts had
been made to observe national distinctions in the
other camps we had seen .. .
The fact that it had
been adjudged necessary at Lienz was striking
evidence of the lack of sympathy existing between the
constituent nationalities of Yugoslavia whom even
their recent misfortunes do not seem to have brought
together into anything like harmony.
General Steele had a more organised reception in this camp
than in the others, and everything was clearly
looking at its best.
Nevertheless it was evident
that it was an extremely well-run camp, and one could
not fail to be impressed by such features as the
hospital wards and the school rooms.
I was also
encouraged by what one of the officers told me
regarding the prospects of settlement for at least
part of the population.
He said that negotiations
were quite far advanced with one or two South
American countries - where there are apparently
already appreciable Slovene immigrant communities for the settlement of several thousands of the
Slovene DPs.
These negotiations were being carried
on through Dr Krek of the Slovene Committee in Rome.
I was promised further and more specific information
on the subject if I wanted it.
This brought my visit, somewhat abruptly, to an end.
I
had seen enough however of camps which I presume to
be representative at least of those in the British
Zone for certain conclusions to emerge, although I
cannot claim to be nearer to seeing a solution of the
problem: indeed, just as the problem itself had been
created by external circumstances, so a real solution
can likewise only come from outside. This is not to
deny that the problem is, intrinsically, a real and
difficult one.
But - so far at any rate as the
British Zone is concerned - it would not be of major
importance but for the external pressure that has
rendered it so.
First-hand experience resulted in any case in two clear
impressions. One, that there is no single, straightforward solution to the problem that can really be
regarded as satisfactory.
Secondly, that, whatever
its political and economic aspects, the problem is
essentially a human one, and demands a human
solution.
This
latter
fact
has
nevertheless
political bearings.
Thanks to the good treatment
211

they have received at our hands, these DPs form a

potentially pro-British and pro-Western element.
Quite

It

apart from humanitarian considerations, which in

this case seem to me strong, I venture to suggest
that we should not readily abandon these people to
their fate in return for hypothetical political
advantages.
For this reason, and because the
Austrian Government, if they were left in sole
charge, could hardly be trusted not to yield to
outside pressure and hand the dissidents over to the
claimant countries, we should continue - as we are
authorised to do under the new Control Agreement, and
as
I
believe
we
intend
doing
-to
retain
responsibility for all DPs in our Zone, so long as we
are in Austria. ..

cannot be said that the prospects of settling any

appreciable number of DPs in Austria itself - except
perhaps for some of the Germans - are even as
encouraging as one had hoped, if, that is to say, any
weight is to be given to the wishes of either the DPs
themselves or the Austrian population.
For the
majority of them, an ultimate home will have to be
found elsewhere. But there is no magic wand that can
be waved, and I understand that facilities are
unlikely to be offered on a suitable scale by any of
the American countries, or the British Dominions. In
any case if, as seems agreed, we are to take
seriously the fact that the Soviet have made the
presence of these DPs in Austria a pretext for
refusing to consider an Austrian Treaty, some steps
have presumably got to be taken soon, without waiting
for the normal machinery for emigration to function
in regard to all these countries.

Thus,

while we should continue to encourage genuine

voluntary repatriation wherever this is possible, and
should also not neglect any openings there may be in
Western European countries, it does look as though
the proposal to send the bulk of them to the Western
Zones of Germany constitutes the only practicable
step at the present time.
I would add only one
qualification. I believe that we ought to do what we
can to keep these communities together, and should
abandon the idea of dispersing them amongst an alien
and probably unsympathetic population.
This would
apply whether they are moved abroad in large groups
or small.
It is one of the chief and most natural
preoccupations of the DPs themselves, so far as one
212

can gather, and I cannot see that their satisfactory

re-settlement in countries far removed from those of
their origin would be feasible on any other basis.
The Cullis report could not have been more helpful to the
Slovenes, *urging as it did that "we should not readily abandon
these people to their fate", emphasising that only genuine
voluntary repatriation should be encouraged, recording the
possibility of Slovene emigration to "one or two South American
countries" and recommending that they should be kept together
as communities - "one of the chief and most natural
preoccupations of the DPs themselves".*
The Slovenes, by
sharing their fears and aspirations with me over the months,
had "empowered themselves" through me when I grasped the
opportunity and bent the ear of the civilian in the Commanderin-Chief's party. I followed this up with a report 138 putting
the case for the Slovenes in more detail, though not until the
following March.
Its arrival was timely: just before Cullis
departed for inter-governmental negotiations in Moscow, at
which refugees were on the agenda.
Two years later the Slovenes gave their own account of the
negotiation
of
their
own
emigration,
an
outstandingly
successful exercise in self-help and a classic example of
refugee "self-empowerment". I reproduce a shortened version of
the article which appeared in the first Almanac they published
after their arrival in Argentina:
The

Slovene Social
emigration 139

Committee

paved

the

way

for

our

The agonizing days that followed the Viktring tragedy left

our people ready to go anywhere, to any peaceful spot
under God's sun.
Our eyes were all turned towards
Rome and Dr Krek, who was already devoting his time
to planning, conferring, searching for contacts,
lobbying and sending out letters in every direction.
He was convinced we had to find a new homeland for
our people where they could earn an existence through
the work of their own hands and live in peace, if
possible staying together so as to preserve their way
of life towards the day they returned home.
He endlessly scanned the atlas, collected intelligence and
explored the situation in: Australia - Australian
bishops in Rome promised to do everything to enable
138

. See page 00.

. article signed D.R.F. in Koledar Svobodne Slovenije
1949 (Buenos Aires, 1949) pp.162-165
139

213

us to emigrate to Australia, but the problem of

transport arose, and having got nowhere after three
whole years the situation was now urgent: South
Africa - a rich and cultured country, but only
willing to accept skilled personnel: France - not
willing to consider receiving a single refugee in
spite of empty and unpopulated areas in its south:
Ecuador - an obviously rich country, but culturally
and economically underdeveloped and unable to offer
people anything other than uncultivated land.
How
would people live for the first months, before the
fields were tilled for the first time? Peru - no one
showing any interest in emigration, the same applying
to Brazil.
Venezuela - prepared to accept refugees
but would send them to climatically difficult regions
and pay them poorly. There remained only Argentina,
which of all countries was most ready to receive
refugees, under-stood their situation and offered the
best conditions.
We had already for some decades had a number of our people
in
Argentina
(specially
from
Primorska
and
140
Prekmurje ), including a tireless idealist, Mr.
Janez Hladnik. Minister Krek appealed to him and he
took up our case with such wholehearted enthusiasm
that by November 1946 General Peron had received him
and agreed to take 10,000 Slovene refugees with
families and children. This was our salvation!
Mr. Joze Kosicek at once visited all the camps in Italy
where we had people, on behalf of the Slovene Social
Committee (SSC) in Rome of which he was the
secretary, and explained the situation and suggested
they should apply for Argentina.
The response was
unexpected with over 95% applying, and a special
emigration committee within the SSC was set up in
Rome to be responsible for detailed organisation: to
collect emigration applications, compile a card index
of all refugees (we were the only nation in exile to
have a complete card index of all its people!),
provide everyone with movement permits and passports,
negotiate visa issue procedures with the Argentinean
consulates,
cut
down
the
consulates'
document
requirements to a minimum (they always demanded the
least documentation from us!) and finally supply
everyone with the wherewithal to travel overseas.
140

. Two regions of Slovenia, the first on the south coast,

adjacent to Italy, the second in the extreme north-east,
squeezed between Austria and Hungary.
214

These tasks were not easy for refugees without rights,

legal representation, friends in the world or enough
money, although we did have Dr Krek, former
ambassador with the Allied Commission for Italy,
intervening on our behalf whenever necessary.
Mr. Hladnik persuaded the Direccion de Migraciones 141 to
recognise the Slovene Emigration Committee in Rome as
the sole authority through which our refugees could
obtain travel permits, and a special subcommittee
under his chairmanship was set up in Buenos Aires to
settle all procedures there and make the necessary
representations.
Finally the first list of 500
Slovene refugees was certified on 6 February 1947,
soon to be followed by others.
The consuls could not reconcile themselves to almost all
our refugees being without any personal documents,
and we for our part would never have been able to
produce the documentation they required, so it was
essential to reduce the requirements.
We were in
fact the first to be granted group movement permits
and thus everywhere we had to break fresh ground.
Eventually
Mr.
Krek's
diplomacy
succeeded
in
persuading the consular department to reduce the
number of documents required from eight to three and
to recognise the International Red Cross passport.
Other national groups did not have the same
difficulties because Krek, in his fight for our
refugees, opened up the route for them.
When the issue of visas was sorted out - the consular
department did not want to issue more than five a day
- the ice had to be broken with the IGCR 142 , as it had
a representative of Tito among its members and did
not want to listen when asked to finance the
transport of the refugees across the ocean.
Its
first priority was forcing people home, as it was
later for UNRRA and the PCIRO 143 , their slogan being
repatriation at all costs. Our refugees in the camps
had suffered heavily under that slogan and the
inhumanity of the staff of those organisations.

141

. Directorate of Migration
. Inter-Governmental Committee on Refugees (1938-47)
which was succeeded by UNRRA (1943-47)
143
. Preparatory Commission for the International Refugee
Organization, (1947) succeeded by the IRO itself (1947-51)
142

215

IGCR, UNRRA and later PCIRO sent commissions to the camps,

which interrogated everyone individually, trying to
persuade them to return home and searching for
"criminals".
The methods they used made our people
feel they were appearing before a criminal court and
being condemned only because they had recognised the
evil of the communist beasts too soon.
I return to my letter-diary:
11th August. This morning I bathed at Tristachersee, the
lake half an hour's walk from the camp in the hills,
pleasantly warm and very nice.
Our students from
Graz University are on holiday now and the scouts
among them are camping by the lake in the woods. I
bathed with the leader of the students from this
camp 144 and heard all their news.
26th August.
The director and I went down to Klagenfurt
about a Soviet Mission that is visiting the camp.
They wanted to have access to DP records we didn't
consider they had any right to see.
The DPs are
terrified that (a) they will be sent home
(b)
reprisals will be taken against their relatives still
in Russia. We had a long session with Colonel Hall
and came to a satisfactory compromise.

144

. Joze Jancar
216

C H A P T E R

4 September - 31 December 1946

Things are going well for the Slovenes when tragedy

strikes with the sudden death of their beloved
protector, the camp director, Group Captain Ryder
Young. He is succeeded by a pale shadow in the form
of the deskbound Wing Commander Chalmers.
My diary
explores an unattractive feature of refugee camps,
the mutual jealousies, suspicions and mistrust that
fester between individuals.
Pernisek celebrates the loving care the refugees
lavish on their church and the consolation they draw
from its services, and bemoans the debilitating
starvation from which they are suffering more and
more severely.
I complain of UNRRA bureaucracy and
inefficiency, and we both express our anger at
UNRRA's choice of a bitterly cold November to close
Lienz camp and transfer the Slovenes to the worse
housed and equipped and more overcrowded camp at
Spittal, which does however have the advantage of
being closer to UNRRA's regional HQ in Klagenfurt and
so
reduces
lines
of
communication.
Pernisek
describes the first days in the new camp while I
report my transfer to the other end of Austria, away
from the Slovenes.

217

My letter-diary:
4th September.
We've had a tragedy here and a terrible
loss to the team. Last Saturday the director had a
serious crash driving his jeep and died in hospital
next day. The DPs in the camp were very deeply and
sincerely distressed by his death, as he had worked
wholeheartedly for and was much loved by them.
In
the months he was here I got to know the him very
closely. The relationship between us was peculiarly
close, with him a senior RAF officer of 32 years in
the service and me a very youthful and junior camp
worker.
From the start he recognised my adequate
experience in camp administration and specialised
knowledge of the subject, and time and again would
change a decision he'd made if he saw I was unhappy
about it. I was continually amazed at the readiness
with which he'd take advice from his juniors; at the
same time he held very decided views and had strong
principles.
Being

in charge of admin I inevitably came much more

regularly in contact with him than anyone else in the
team and he took me almost unreservedly in his
confidence on every subject, including personal team
problems.
One failing of his was a somewhat hasty
temper and very forthright manner, and the humorous
situation
often
arose
of
the
youthful
John
counselling a less fiery letter to HQ (and he did
send some snorters!) or pressing for a less extreme
form of action in the camp.

Director Bajuk added a paragraph to the end of his profile of

Ryder Young:
Young died but Dr Mersol survived with bad concussion and
shock and minor injuries. They were kindred spirits
who came together for our benefit: people called them
two parsleys - because parsley goes well in any dish.
He is buried in Klagenfurt.
I couldn't go to his
funeral.
I was too upset.
So I sent a deputy
instead, and we gave him a wreath with a message.
After his death I wrote to his sister, who lived in
Klagenfurt, to express my condolences.
She thanked
me warmly and added, "my brother wrote to me almost
daily, and every letter he reported the good things
he was able to do for the Slovenes that day. If he
didn't have any such news to report, he always added,
'Today the Slovenes didn't get anything from me or
from elsewhere by my intercession'".
218

My letter-diary:
10th September. Sunday was nice and fine and I went for a
walk in the hills in the morning, meeting two
Russians from our camp with whom I walked and chatted
for an hour and a half in English, which one of them
spoke - she used to attend my English class.
I do
admire the courage of these people.
The women had
left the camp at six in the morning and didn't get
back till ten in the evening.
The English-speaking
one had been living since May 1945 on a very low
diet.
Her companion was going for a day's mountain
hike wearing our camp slippers 145 made of scrap
salvage material and canvas soles!
We're using a lot of salvage material in small pieces now,
which uses a lot of cotton. I'm sorry to trouble you
further, but cotton does mean so much to the refugees
warmth, dryness and comfort, as without it they
can neither alter nor mend their own clothes or make
new clothes.
28th September.
I don't know if I told you the new
director has arrived: a Wing Commander with thirty
years service in the RAF on the administration side,
a pleasant and friendly man but much more limited and
less imaginative than the Group Captain. He's worked
so long at HQs, in the RAF and UNRRA, that he's
completely developed the HQ point of view and looks
on himself more as a man sent to carry out HQ policy
than as a director responsible for the wellbeing of
the camp inmates.
He has a distressingly red tape
and legalistic mind and thinks he knows considerably
more than he does. But he's settling down reasonably
well and may mellow.
It's wearying having to tame
him!
His

reverence for the instructions and "policy" of HQ

wouldn't be quite such a drawback if it weren't for
the fact that HQ is so phenomenally ill-informed
about conditions in camps, so ignorant about the
elements of camp administration and so complacent in
their ignorance!
There are two, perhaps three,
conscientious, intelligent and efficient officers at
HQ
(they
happen
to
be
English!)
but
they
unfortunately don't have a say in the more important
decisions, but as for the rest ... !
145

. produced in the camp workshops

219

One of the depressing effects of continued camp life on

refugees is that personal relationships become very
strained
and
they
become
ultra-sensitive
and
suspicious of their neighbours and colleagues. They
are continually overcome by jealousies, scandalmongering and mistrusts.
Administratively these
animosities have their advantages, as if there are
two DPs in the same department hostile to each other
you don't have to check them so carefully and
continuously, because if one was guilty of some act
of
favouritism,
oppression
or
dishonesty
his
suspicious colleague would lose no time in letting
one know! But it also has its more trying side. One
has to be very guarded and careful in one's remarks,
and sometimes you'll find me acting as a glorified
father confessor to a man twice my age, trying to
persuade him that so-and-so is not such a bad fellow
after all, and probably is not in fact intriguing
against him.
8th October.
Those stockings you sent me as packing for
the chocolate and said you thought might do as rags
if they were too bad to repair, delighted my female
office staff, amongst whom I distributed them. There
were thirteen pairs, and I distributed them among
nine interpreters, clerks and typists. When I asked
if they could repair them, they laughed and said they
were in much better condition than the ones they were
using up till now: they will be their best stockings!
That black material you sent was much appreciated
too.
The new director is very friendly and pleasant, but rather
an old woman and a quibbler. He takes ten minutes to
take a decision that only needs thirty seconds,
insists on unnecessary letters and generally wastes
my precious time in a most exasperating way! I call
it precious because I'm doing two full-time jobs and
am responsible for a good third of the camp
activities.
He has plenty he should be doing, but
hasn't the imagination to see what is necessary and
so sits too long in his office worrying about
footling points and asking my views on trifling
questions.
It's impossible to make him grasp that
while he may be able to spend a quarter of an hour on
an unimportant point I've got to deal with six or
seven people in that time. It needs self-control at
times to avoid being too frank!
220

Thank goodness I've got a first-class team in the most

important jobs in the offices that come under me,
having robbed every other department in the camp
without conscience!
It's nice being able to help
them occasionally, as with the stockings and the
razor blades, for which they were most grateful.
I
drive them hard at times and demand a high standard,
but when they see I'm interested in their welfare
they work any hours. Most of them have a real pride
in their work, which makes all the difference.
The ex-bank clerk 146 who runs the filing office and does
all the correspondence for the director and me is
particularly nice and reliable and saves me a lot of
routine work through a judicious use of the rubber
stamp facsimile signature I got made in Oxford.
The Pernisek diary:
13th October. * Today is Harvest Festival Sunday. At home
this was a joyful festival of thanks to the Good Lord
for all the graces we received on each visit to his
temple.
Today God's hut is especially dear to me;
only here do I find peace and solace for my
bewildered soul in speaking with an all-bountiful
God. When attacked by doubts and anxiety and feeling
all but wholly crushed, this simple wooden church is
my place of consolation.
How poor-looking is this church of ours! A barrack built
of rough planks with rickety walls and ill-fitting
windows, it has no magnificent artistic altar, only
candlesticks and votive lamps beaten out of tin cans
by refugee hands. Somebody picked up from a pile of
rubbish some glass chandeliers, cleaned and mended
them and now they serve their old purpose well; a
refugee, self-taught but artistically gifted, painted
a copy of Our Lady Help of Christians of Brezje.
Each item is witness to the utter poverty of the
refugees and their love for God's house. The sacred
vessels were bought with their last pennies.
And our bell tower! Till not so long ago people who found
concentration camp life intolerable and tried to
escape were shot at from it, often fatally.
Now
three times daily, its bells are tolled. They have a
lovely sound, but are just lengths of railway lines!
Certainly the local people have never heard such
harmonious and solemn peals before. We are bound to
146

. Mr. Sfiligoi.
221

this humble church by all the fibres of our hearts

and today especially we are grateful to God for it.
Only in this wooden place lives a heart which truly
loves, understands and helps us.
Within this
beggarly poor wooden place lives Jesus, our only true
friend and ally.
All the rest is hypocrisy and
deceitful selfishness.*
16th

October. * Today we start four weeks of harsh

starvation when we'll only get 50 grams of bread a
day. So far we've received very scant food, but from
now on it'll be even worse; in the morning
unsweetened black coffee, at midday a soup mainly of
dried vegetables - recently cabbage and spinach, both
from left-over German army stores. For supper again
black unsweetened coffee. It's impossible to live or
work on such rations and I can't understand this
planned
starvation
of
the
Austrians
and
us.
According to news from relatives in Yugoslavia the
country has recovered a lot already and life is
reasonable from the economic point of view, yet UNRRA
keeps on sending food there: while it gives no food
to Austria, which doesn't have a lot of agricultural
land and is starving.

I can't believe there's a great shortage of food in the

world: I read in the newspapers that last year and
this year there were good harvests globally. They're
forecasting severe famine all the same.
The
newspapers aren't consistent.
One day they say
famine in Europe is conquered, the next day that the
severest famine is still to come. My aunt in Canada
wrote they cannot get wheat flour, and sugar is
rationed. What does it all mean? Is it really true
there isn't enough food, or is it only economic
blackmail to achieve some political and other
concessions?
I think a situation like this can't
last too long. People can bear a lot of things, but
not systematic starvation.*
Last night I heard that Ludvik Pus is in prison.
One
after another our first class and influential people
are making the pilgrimage to gaol; so far they are
picking up only those living outside camps.
Father
147
has been in prison in Klagenfurt since the
Basaj
6th September and is in great danger of being handed
back: engineer Remec 148 has been there since the 7th
147
148

. See page 00.

. Father of Peter Remec, who later married Marija Vracko.
222

September, and Bishop Rozman 149 is in great danger of

being shut up. We are indeed people without rights,
as good Mr. Corsellis told me frankly.
They don't
recognise even our human rights; if they say they do
in words, they deny it in their actions.
We feel
like hunted wild animals, with death incessantly
lying in wait for us.
The communist regime grows
more firmly entrenched every day, and the door for
our return is closed ever more tightly and everything
indicates it'll never again be opened. Of course the
prison doors are open to us at home day and night!
My letter-diary:
17th October.
Many thanks for your letters and cards.
Your last letter was over half full of "business" you
had done for me.
You can't imagine what a help it
is.
Some three thousand people are substantially
better clothed here than they would have been without
us, and if we had not done it I am satisfied that, so
far as this camp is concerned, no one would have.
When our present director arrived I stressed to him the
urgent need for cotton, and he said he would write to
a friend who had contacts on the wholesale cotton
trade.
The friend has now written back that export
permits made it too difficult to arrange.
The
director has thereupon apparently lost interest.
Meanwhile people in the camp are being clothed by our
less ambitious but laborious and steady system!
A
few days ago I sold the razor blades to seventeen
members of the office staff who come more directly
under me, and at the same time let the nine women
staff have a small slice of soap that I'd saved from
the generous NAAFI soap ration. Were they pleased!
The "case history" I enclose was prepared because UNRRA
has opened a special small children's camp for
"unaccompanied children".
The real idea is that
those children whose parents or closest relatives are
in Yugoslavia should be sent to the camp, where they
should wait until the parents can be contacted and
their agreement obtained for them to be sent home.
The idea is very good but the man at HQ responsible
for the scheme is a careerist American without the
slightest interest in the children's welfare, who is
only out to get impressive "results". So he has said
See pages 00 and 00.
149
. See pages 00 and 00.
223

that all "unaccompanied children" must be transferred

to this camp, defined by him as any child that has
neither father nor mother in the camp.
The ridiculous result has been that orphans living for
years with sisters or aunts are now being separated
from them and sent to a special camp.
You can
imagine the effect on already nervous people.
If
anyone had told me the story I wouldn't have believed
it could be true.
In one case a 16 year old
foundling, who had been looked after eight years by
one family, has been parted from them!
This gives
you some idea what kind of an HQ one has to deal
with. Any results we get in the camp are in spite of
HQ!
Ryder Young would never have allowed this case
to happen, but would have fought it in Klagenfurt and
Vienna.
But the present director hasn't got much
stuffing
and
has
an
overpowering
respect
for
"official channels", however much he may grumble at
times!
So much for UNRRA! I'm naturally doing all I can to put
the matter right, but when one can't expect any help
from one's director one's hands are naturally
somewhat tied.
Mr. Mzyk, our welfare officer whose
job I'm doing while he's absent on special duty,
visited the camp last weekend and I told him the
whole story and armed him with detailed lists and
notes.
He's going to Vienna next week and I hope
he'll be able to see the welfare chief there who is
quite human, and she may clean up the whole matter.
Meanwhile the DPs can suffer, and does UNRRA care? I
can fully understand the army being incompetent in DP
matters as they make no pretence at being experts,
but I cannot stand the smug and self-satisfied
blunderings of these highly-paid UNRRA specialists.
There are many excellent people in UNRRA but
unfortunately it's the lazy, the fools and the
careerists who occupy most of the key posts.
So
that's a bit off my chest!
The Pernisek diary:
In Tristach the girls are dressing the
24th October.
flax. I watch them from a distance and don't dare go
close, as flax-dressers are always up to tricks.
I
feel as if I'm at home; here in the Tyrol they're
just as cheeky, insatiable gossips always taunting
men, but they don't sing.
When Dr. Jagodic, the
Papal Delegate, and Monsignor Skrbec went too close
they caught them and wrapped them in flax; but they
224

didn't fill their trouser pockets with wood splinters

or paint them with soot.
All the same they were
caught and had to pay ransom.
And lo and behold!
they didn't have even a penny in their pockets, and
you're for it if you can't pay the flax-dressers! We
don't know how they escaped: they wouldn't tell us.
25th October.
The news has hit us like a bolt from the
blue: by the end of November the camp has to be
cleared and we'll be moved.
The Russians will be
sent to St. Martin, the expellees to Treffling and
the rest to Spittal and Bistrico.
Today they took
150
Dr. Blatnik and Janko Mernik
off to prison.
Sunday 27th October. The feast of Christ the King. Today
it snowed, the first snow of autumn. In the morning
we had a beautiful Solemn Mass.
The choral recital
composed by the parish priest Gregor Mali was
particularly successful, and France Kremzar delivered
a fine and uplifting sermon to a packed congregation.
In the evening the people really enjoyed Mr.
Vomberger's comedy. It was good to break the circle
of these worrying days and make people laugh and
forget their troubles at least for a while.
1st November 1946. The Feast of All Saints. God has once
again handled us roughly, moving us into worse
conditions from all points of view. First Friday of
the month - a new trial, a new cross: this is a
recurring pattern in our lives as refugees, and we
dread these days of trials. How long, Lord, will you
keep choosing your feastdays for fresh tribulations?
The

weather is grey, mist covers the valley and it

drizzles all day. My thoughts are at home. Father
is alone in the cemetery of St. Peter in Radece and
there's no one to light a candle on his grave.
Mother wrote she won't visit it until I return home,
so I don't know if she'll ever see it again. Joze,
unhappy brother, where do you sleep your eternal
sleep? Is your grave in Sava's cold waters or do you
await the day of resurrection in our beautiful but
blood-soaked Slovene soil?
Today my heart feels a
profound grief but you have already passed through
your own suffering.
God knows what's awaiting us,
what dreadful trials and suffering He is preparing
for us.
Fear of the unknown future is worse than
death itself.
150

. Salesian priest and youth worker

225

I look for consolation in prayer for you, dear martyred

brother, and prayer for myself; I can't light a
candle for you, I have none and nowhere to get one
from. I lit many "lights" before the Sacred Heart of
Jesus asking him to have mercy on you if you still
need it. I'll pray a lot for you and for our father
during these days. He was taken by the first world
war, you by the second, the last worse than the
first. This year the "field of exiles" here in Lienz
has also received forty of our people into its bosom,
half children. May God have mercy on them all!
11th November.
They are clearing the camp stores and
giving out all the clothing to the people, and a real
war has started for these old pieces of cloth.
They're not bad: on the contrary, most - especially
those for women - are very nice and well preserved.
There's no logic in the distribution, only greed and
envy. Everyone wants as much as possible and grudges
his neighbour the merest rag. The women are made ill
by these pieces of cloth.
Those who already have
enough want even more, saying, "I don't really need
more, but if others are getting more, why shouldn't
I?" and "the gentry and the chosen few will get the
best, and only the worst pieces will be left for us".
Most people would like to grab as much as possible, but
those who really have nothing are quiet and calm.
There's no difference in greed and envy between the
country people and the intelligentsia; if anything
the latter are worse.
Greed and envy assumes other
forms such as: everyone would like to claim a
position of as much authority as possible so that he
can accuse of selfishness those who really do
exercise responsibility, blame them for unfairness,
proclaim their complete unfitness.
Those who take
most pains are attacked most.
Surely the best
respected people in the camp are those models of
altruism and self-sacrifice Dr. Valentin Mersol and
his wife. They both dress very simply, as do their
children, yet even they are slandered by the people.
No wonder many capable men willing to serve in the camp
don't take up positions of responsibility, but would
rather
preserve
their
peace
and
good
names.
Naturally if they're not willing to offer themselves
as victims then the black marketeers, profiteers and
self-styled "men of honour" take over and come to the
surface. Moses, you really were a great man to lead
226

and subdue such a rabble for forty years! But what

can we do? It's all a matter of "camp psychology"!
I can't say everyone is as greedy as that: it's only a
minority, but they're so aggressive and irrepressible
they upset the whole camp. Eventually the ill-humour
they spread seeps into the crowd and there's no
peace.
Reasonable people are unable to stop the
unrest.
In July a highly educated man filed a
complaint against the camp committee about the
distribution of clothes and shoes, and there was
unrest for three months.
He went on spreading
slander even after the matter was settled, so that it
went to higher authority in Klagenfurt, and as a
result we Slovenes were all smeared, and the priests
in particular.
They actually were the only people
who had nothing to do with it. The same greed which
was the driving force behind the communist revolution
is the force behind various shadowy characters here.
My letter-diary:
10th November. Today is Monday. On Thursday, Friday and
Saturday we're sending our 2,000 Yugoslavs by train
to
a
camp
three
hours'
journey
away.
The
organisational side of the transfer is exacting and
the director is excelling himself in stupidity.
He
is an ex-Wing Commander of the RAF with over 30 years
service, knows virtually nothing of refugee work,
treats the refugees as if they were raw recruits and
is surprised when they don't respond well to such
treatment.
Up till now he hasn't done too much damage as the team (a
charming Belgian messing officer, a Canadian supply
officer who is very intelligent and humane and with
whom I get on very well although we have little in
common except our views on the director and our
interest in the DPs, and a Dutch nurse who doesn't
count!) got to know his ways in the first fortnight
and realised the way to deal with him was to refer to
him as many trivial and unimportant things as
possible so as to keep him busy and out of mischief
on matters on which it didn't much matter if he made
a silly decision, but avoid so far as possible
mentioning to him any points of real importance. If
one had to mention an important matter, the technique
was to do so that the real point at issue would
appear to be already decided, while he was left to
decide a minor side issue. This worked excellently,
227

particularly as half his energies were directed to

keeping contact, visiting and arranging visits from
his Danish girlfriend, who was working in UNRRA HQ
Vienna.
The DPs are being transported with all luggage, furniture,
stoves, beds etc., 700 at a time, in twenty covered
and twenty open goods wagons on three consecutive
days and will arrive at the other camp in the dark.
There is a 50% chance at least that it will rain or
snow and we will have little over six hours each day
to load the train, which will be no small feat,
demanding careful organisation and all our transport
resources.
We were just getting everything nicely arranged when our
bright director has to go down to another camp that
is taking 200 of our DPs and arrange to send down a
proportion of them by truck on the middle day, when
the big move takes place. Not only could this matter
be left over easily till next week, but it will mean
two of our ten big trucks on the day when all our
trucks will be most urgently needed.
He has also
made a second quite unnecessary alteration in the
plans too complex to describe here, the result of
which will be to put an intolerable strain on our
transport and turn what could be a comparatively
smooth and efficient operation into probable chaos.
One feels like expressing one's own opinion gently but
clearly, declaring that one considers his plan
mistaken, but he is the director and of course if he
wishes to take the matter out of one's hands he is
free to do so, but in that case one cannot oneself be
expected
to
take
any
responsibility
for
the
operation,
and
then
simply
ask
for
detailed
instructions, carry them out implicitly and watch the
resultant chaos that should serve to shake his
staggering complacency.
I'd like to do that, but unfortunately he'd be the last
person to suffer, and the people who would suffer
would be the unfortunate DPs. If UNRRA or the army
makes a blunder, as they frequently do, the only
people to suffer seriously are the DPs. So tomorrow
will be another day of tact and diplomacy, trying to
salvage what is possible from our old plan and so to
word compromise suggestions that it will seem that it
was the director's idea the whole time.
Thank
goodness I work well together with the supply and
228

messing officers and have a first class refugee

staff. It certainly is wearing having to keep one's
temper
and
be
tactful
with
a
difficult
and
incompetent man in charge: the play acting and
insincerity and deceit are so distasteful, but
unfortunately so necessary.
I expect you think I take the whole matter too seriously!
A mood of exasperation like this does not last long
and I can always escape in a good novel.
But the
good planning of a move like this will mean a lot to
these 2,000 wretches - it is anyhow criminal to move
them in November, and the least we can do is try to
avoid as much suffering as possible.
If properly
packed, there will be room in the wagons for all the
little furniture they have, but if loading is done in
a hurry the family may have to leave behind the one
small cupboard they have had up till now.
I've received a grand supply of cotton during the last two
weeks, and at last managed to achieve a reserve large
enough to justify issuing 100 yards per child to
every family with two or more children - you can
imagine how far 100 yards of cotton goes for a
growing child always tearing his clothes or growing
out of them, but this is the first issue they've had
all the eighteen months they've been away from home.
Cotton on the black market is rare, and prohibitive
in price for 90% of DP families.
The Pernisek diary:
14th November. We're moving today. We had to empty and
leave the barracks by 11 and then wait on the lawn
outside the barrack till 4, the women and children
suffering greatly from the cold.
At around 4.30 we
were loaded into railway goods wagons after which we
were taken to Lienz and then left around 6.
I'll
miss Lienz: it's a friendly place with good people
and the camp was well organised with comfortable
rooms.
We'll not have such rooms anywhere ever
again! We reached Spittal at about 8 in the evening,
and luckily found all our luggage quickly and lost
nothing except the planks for one bed.
15th November. We're fixing up our living quarters. For
the time being we're crammed ten to a room and it's
difficult to put things in order in such a crush.
I'm walking by the railway line; luggage and
furniture are scattered around in all directions. To
229

find one's belongings one has to rummage and search

everywhere. We won't be looking for our own bones at
the day of judgement as eagerly as we're searching
today. It'll be difficult to adapt ourselves to the
new circumstances, but we'll have to get used to it.
My letter-diary:
19th November. I'm in Lienz and expect to be here until
early in December: there is still a lot of work to do
closing down the camp.
All the Yugoslavs have gone
except office staff and essential workers, and we are
now starting on the Russian "old emigres".
The
Yugoslavs were sent by cattle truck on three
successive days, and thank goodness the weather was
reasonably good and the movement went off quite
smoothly.
Office and loading staff worked incredibly hard: I was
particularly pleased with "my" office staff who
worked on exacting tasks till midnight and after for
days at a time, and then volunteered to accompany the
train to the other camp to make the organisation
smoother, and returned the same night here to work
further. I doubt if I'll ever again find such people
to work with, so willing and uncomplaining, although
they have plenty to complain about.
Unfortunately
conditions in the camp they are being transferred to
are much worse than here, where they have the
"luxury" of closets and washrooms in the hut in which
they live, while at the other camp there is quite a
walk to the nearest lavatory or water point.
The Pernisek diary:
22nd November. Mr. France Kremzar, Professor Janez Sever
and I called on the camp director 151 today and thanked
him for the friendly way the Lienz people were
received and all the help and understanding shown us
by him and his immediate staff.
He was taken by
surprise by our visit, thanked us for it and promised
his continued support.
At the same time he took
advantage of the opportunity to express some of his
own particular wishes.
First, he said he wasn't
specific nationality,

referring to people of any

but to the unsatisfactory

151

. The former Australian politician and UNRRA director

Major M.L.F.Jarvie.
230

conditions that prevail in today's world; in these

circumstances it was necessary for all DPs to abstain
from any kind of political activity or criticism of
the situation in whatever country.
If people are
found engaging in such activities he won't be able to
help them further.
He was a politician himself and
knew how dirty politics were, so it was appropriate
for DPs to abstain from them.
His second explicit request concerned repatriation.
He
asked that no one should harass or show resentment
towards those who had decided to return home.
Let
everyone be free to come to their own decision. Mr.
Kremzar answered that we were well aware we were
refugees, dependent on the goodwill of others and it
was totally inappropriate for us to meddle in
political activities.
He therefore promised we'd
abstain from anything which might disturb our
relationship with the camp authorities and UNRRA in
general; and we'd do our best to integrate with the
existing community. The director shook us warmly by
the hand and wished us a pleasant stay here.
The food is poor here as well: this morning unsweetened
black coffee with a little bread of very poor
quality.
Just at this moment a scandal has been
uncovered, it being alleged the bakers have been
mixing even glass in the flour.
The police are
investigating.
At midday we get a thick soup which
is
appetizing but thin and the portions are small.
We get the same in the evening. There are no special
supplements and they don't issue any tinned food
here.
So the Slovenes from Lienz had to adjust from their life in the
model camp they had built up over 18 months to the unexpected
role of poor relations to their fellow Slovenes in Spittal.
There had been friction between the two camps for some time.
This was partly because the Slovenes themselves had decided in
June 1945 that people who already knew each other should when
possible stick together, so that those from Dolenjska and
Notranjska, the regions south of Ljubljana, all went together
to Spittal camp, while those from Gorenjska, the region north
west of Ljubljana, and from the capital itself went to Lienz.
In addition Lienz, as the largest camp, was considered from the
start as the central or principal Slovene camp.
So the
Slovenes' pride and joy, the grammar school, went there
together with a high proportion of the intelligentsia, the kind
of people to continue and develop the community's newspapers
and other publishing; and also the Slovene Social Committee,
231

their government-in-exile and generally recognised spokesmen

for the whole of the Slovene political emigration in Austria.
Not surprisingly, this led to a growing feeling of resentment
and jealousy towards the, in their view, underprivileged
residents of Spittal to their lordships in Lienz.
Director
Bajuk is as usual forthright in his highly charged and
subjective account, writing in his memoirs:
When we got the official announcement about the move I was
anxious about how the grammar school would manage in
the new circumstances. I went at once to Spittal to
get my bearings and introduce myself to the new
commandant. I first went to see "head and professor"
Fr. Novak [the Slovene in charge of schools in
Spittal] who received me in a very unfriendly way.
He told me to my face brusquely and bitterly, "but
there'll be no grammar school here. If there is, it
won't be like it used to be. I am what I am and I'm
not giving up my place to anyone". It was clear to
me immediately and I answered, "Mr. Colleague, don't
worry.
Our spheres of work cannot touch each other
in any way, let alone cross over each other.
You
couldn't have my place, and I don't want yours".
The camp director Jarvie told me, "grammar school studies
take too long.
We'll teach the youth to read and
write and then send them out to work". I had found
out enough.
Our camp director let us take away the camp chapel, two
scout huts and one large barrack, which would be
large enough for both the grammar school and for
living accommodation for the teachers.
All the
material was stacked in Spittal camp by the police
station, so that it should be safe until we got
there.
But they moved it all to the bottom of the
camp in a dark spot behind some barracks, where it
was ideally placed for them to steal it for wood.
And they took it all: partly for fuel and partly to
improve and make their own barracks more beautiful.
I complained to the camp director at Lienz, and he gave us
ten more cubic metres of wood.
We brought it over
and they took that too, using it for different
purposes.
This behaviour of our compatriots was so
despicable as to go beyond all boundaries and to be
seen as a crime.
When after seven weeks they gave us the go-ahead for our
232

lessons, we started to put up the barrack.

The
workers were shamelessly sabotaging this work,
stealing material and sawing up wood for logs. Most
of the work was done by the pupils (Jerman and
others), myself and our Marko [Director Bajuk's son,
engineer Marko Bajuk].
But there was not enough
material, and at the other end of the camp there was
an empty abandoned Russian stable, and we agreed with
the pupils to go there.
By the end of January the
work progressed well enough for us to start planning
to move in.
In

mid-January Miss Michell [the UNRRA camp welfare

officer] summoned me and ordered me to produce
overnight a plan for a secondary technical school, as
the grammar school was to be converted into a school
of that type.
I told her it was impossible and I
would need at least three days.
The "gracious
patroness" conceded this.
At the teachers' meeting
we decided to play a trick on her. We sketched out
an elaborate plan which covered everything but in
fact said nothing. I took it to her two days later.
She read it through, her face shone with triumphant
glory and she nodded, "excellent, excellent!"
I
heroically restrained myself from bursting out
laughing.

I think it was the 29th January that the institute was

going to change its name and the new school was
opened.
All our work in remained unchanged, we
didn't even alter the time-table; only a little, to
make room for a new subject that was requested,
descriptive geometry, which we adopted on our own
initiative for two hours a week in classes 5, 6 and
7.
It was taught by my son Marko.
A few months
later Jarvie and Michell left, but before then I
obtained a ruling that lessons were again to follow
the grammar school plan.
My letter-diary:
6th December. I expect to remain here [Lienz] till about
the end of December and then be transferred to a camp
called Judenburg 152 , about 200 miles from here.
152

. Camp with 2,300 Jewish, Slovene and Croat refugees,

taken over by UNRRA from the British army in November 1945.
Stieber, Gabriela (1997) Nachkriegsfluechtlinge in Kaernten und
der Steiermark (Graz, Leykam), p.258.
233

The Pernisek diary:

18th December. Today it's appallingly cold, -19 C. in the
morning and all day, with no sun as it's hidden
behind Goldeck. There's a shortage of fire-wood, so
we're cold all day. We don't dare use much wood in
case we run out by the end of the month.
19th December.
Last night at 11 they brought Russian
They'd loaded them onto
emigres into the camp 153 .
cattle trucks at about midday: old people, sick
people, children, mothers with new-born babies,
absolutely everyone.
Their train stopped at every
station, sometimes for as long as an hour and a half.
This is ruthless torture: cattle would have been
better treated!
The UNRRA welfare officer Katinka
rightly remarked that they wouldn't have treated
their enemies worse in the Soviet Union.
And UNRRA
treats the neediest people in this fashion: the
humanitarian aid agency of the 20th century!
This
isn't UNRRA any more, it's a machine for goading
people into repatriation.
O dear family home, the one real happiness in our life! A
man recognises your priceless worth when he loses
you!
I desire nothing more than to possess the
smallest and humblest home of my own, and every day I
pray God to grant me this. I'll forgo my profession
and take on hard labour to become a free man again
and to be delivered from this appalling welfare!
I've had enough reproachful charity reminding me I'm
a DP, a being without rights, a number: DP A
01533419.
25th December. Our second Christmas in exile. Worse than
last year, when we celebrated it as a family in our
own room. This year we don't experience that joyful
feeling of togetherness, and on Christmas Eve we were
even out of humour.
We're crammed together in a
smoke-filled room. Yesterday the barrack elder spent
all day handing out and handing out soap, combs, used
ties, cigarettes, rum for the workers and so on.
In the afternoon we made a crib, but without moss, because
the snow fell too early and was too high.
Around
eight we went round the barrack blessing the rooms;
153

. Their transport is also mentioned in my diary entry for

29 December below, page 00, although I must in fact have got
the date wrong
234

grandfather Cepin sprinkled holy water, Mr. Urbanija

swung the censer, my little daughter carried a
statuette of Mary, I led the rosary prayers and the
people followed from room to room, singing, blessing,
censing.
They were happy to experience at least
something of the traditional Christmas celebrations
and feel it's Holy Night.
We wished each other
heart-felt good wishes for a blessed and happy
Christmas.
Then good Mr. Corsellis came to wish us a happy Christmas.
This lad doesn't forget us.
He told us that Lienz
had been the best run and kept camp not only in the
British zone, but in the whole of Austria, and they
closed it down for the one and only reason that
refugees shouldn't have too comfortable a life. The
most cheerful and happy part of Christmas we
experienced in the chapel, especially Midnight Mass
and the solemn mid-morning Christmas Day Mass. There
we felt in our hearts the real joy, happiness and
blessed peace of the Holy Night.
My letter-diary:
29th December. *Many, many thanks for the lovely Christmas
card.
I was most amused to read that you had also
had the "Biro" idea.
If you should manage to lay
your hands on one, I shouldn't imagine that refilling
should present any problem, as I don't expect I'll
write the 300,000 words in a hurry!* We spent a very
quiet Christmas here; in the evening three of the DPs
came and had supper with us.
I think it was the 16th December that our last trainload
of people left the camp. Over 400 people, 70 of them
over sixty years old, Russian emigres, weak and
miserable, they had to spend some eleven hours
exposed, either in the open or in cattle trucks: we
had a stove in each truck, but it only heated some
eight out of the thirty people in the truck. And the
people knew that they were going to very bad
accommodation - they were supposed to be sent to a
camp where there was enough room, but then Klagenfurt
changed its mind and they were sent to the same camp
as the Slovenes went, which was already full.
So
they got the very leavings of the accommodation.
It certainly made one bitter - this was UNRRA's idea of
"relief and rehabilitation".
I still think it was
criminal transferring the people gratuitously in mid235

winter.
The official reason was that UNRRA had no
money left and had to cut down camps to economise and
reduce staff. But HQ should have tumbled to that in
the autumn, or if they could not see beyond the ends
of their noses, should have waited till the spring.
The move was made largely from the cynical point of
view that the DPs were so comfortable they didn't
want to go home and a little discomfort would do them
a world of good and encourage repatriation. How I'd
like to make someone from HQ live in a DP camp for
even a fortnight under average DP rations and
conditions.
Then perhaps they'd revise their ideas
of DPs living in comfort.
The

courage and patience of the refugees continually

astonishes me. Everyone in the camp must have spent
hours upon hours of work getting their rooms livablein for the winter, saving a reserve of food and fuel.
And then just at the start of the most difficult
three months of the year they were uprooted and
dumped in a camp, of which the best rooms available
were worse than the worst in Lienz; and they were
dumped there when it was already too late to do much
in the way of preparation against the cold.
And
still they remain not too uncheerful.

There were about two feet of snow on the ground on the

16th.
We left Lienz at 1.30 in the afternoon and
were told we'd get into Spittal soon after 6 - we
arrived eventually at 10, 8 1/2 hours for a trip that
should take 1 1/2 hours. It wasn't the fault of the
Austrians, but of the person at HQ who decided we
were to be taken not by a special train, but hitched
to the daily goods train.
At every station we
stopped, the engine was uncoupled and proceeded to do
half an hour's shunting.
Old people and women and
children meanwhile were shivering in the trucks,
taking turns to stand round the stoves until the coal
ran out.
I was well dressed, swathed myself in a blanket and sat in
my famous canvas chair (my Christmas present from you
of last year!) and was reasonably comfortable, except
that one of my feet froze, and stamp as I did for a
half hour solidly, I could not restore circulation.
Later on we stopped for a long time at a station, so
I got out and waded through the snow to see what was
the matter: it was pitch dark and I was somewhat
perturbed that the train might suddenly start and I'd
have no choice but jump on to the nearest open goods
236

truck and stay on it to the next station! Eventually

I got to the station master's office to find that we
had a further 3/4 of an hour to wait, but the room
was warm and at last that foot thawed!
Everything
was unloaded from the train and in the camp by two
o'clock next morning.
Next day I woke up with the hell of a headache and nausea,
which wasn't too bad as long as I lay down. It was
almost OK by midday, but the doctor examined me and
told me I had a stomach chill. I stayed two days in
bed feeling quite alright and enjoying the rest, and
then went carefully for a week - I'm still wearing a
scarf round my tummy! The thought of our DPs didn't
make for a particularly cheerful Christmas, but on
Christmas evening we had three come over who were
still in the camp as part of our rearguard party, and
had pork and tinned turkey and a bottle of Spumante
I'd saved, and afterwards played games that made our
sides ache with laughing.
I expect to be going within the next week to St. Marein 154 ,
a camp in Steiermark near Graz, the other end of the
British zone, but am told that the job should not
last long - presumably they'll be closing down the
camp. The DPs are Jews, the nationality that has the
almost universal reputation among UNRRA relief
circles
as
the
most
difficult
to
handle,
undisciplined etc., so I'm quite looking forward to
some first-hand experience.
The Pernisek diary:
There are a few hours of 1946 left, and
31st December.
it'll soon slip into eternity, and with it our
unfulfilled hopes and expectations!
It brought us
many sufferings and disappointments.
We watched
UNRRA change from a humanitarian aid agency into a
premeditated institution for pushing repatriation.
They bargained with us, using the poorest of the poor
as small change to pay for their political deals,
frustrating our initiatives and industriousness as
much as and whenever they could.
For this they
starved us and dislodged us from a well-organised
154

. camp 6, one of 7 sub-camps for slave labour employed in

the important Boehlerwerk munition factory at Kapfenberg.
Situated close to St Marein, outside Kapfenberg, it held Jewish
refugees on their way to Palestine.
Stieber op. cit., pp.
262/3.
237

camp where some people could have achieved selfsufficiency in caring for themselves and their
families.
But the order from above was to persuade
as many as possible to return home and reduce the
number of refugees to a minimum.
This fury for repatriation claimed a victim on the 24th
December: Cerarja, the father of four young children,
caught a severe chill in his unheated and otherwise
totally inadequate room and died from an infection of
the inner ear brought on by hypothermia.
When our
people asked the supply officer why there wasn't
enough fuel for heating he answered briskly: "And
what are you Yugoslavs doing, staying on here,
anyway?"
In spite of all these difficulties we didn't despair. May
God be thanked even for sending us suffering!
It
gave us the opportunity to purify our souls, to do
reparation to God for our offences and to learn from
it for our hopefully better future.
Every day we
thanked God for our sufferings and offered them up to
the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Let us accept UNRRA as it
is, thank God for it, for what would have happened to
us without it!
Its staff who looked after us,
understood us and helped us whenever they could; but
they couldn't, and didn't dare to, go against the
orders and rules of their superiors.
Now the words
and warnings of the camp director Major Jarvie made
more sense to us: that politics are a dirty business
and we should keep ourselves well clear of them.
*None

of the disasters foretold by the prophets and

fortune tellers took place either.
There were no
three days of total darkness in the whole world
starting on the 13th December, a further world war
didn't break out and poisonous fumes didn't appear
and kill millions of people.*

So our ways are not God's ways.

We learnt this to the
utmost during the year which will tonight slip into
eternity, and with it the suffering we underwent.
We'll remember only the happy days and the fruits of
our overcoming difficulties by trying to live good
lives, which most of our people did.
We take our
present situation as a spiritual preparation for our
unknown future.
We've grown through suffering, and
may God grant us that we continue to do so.

238

C H A P T E R

10

1 January - 24 March 1947

Pernisek starts the New Year with "a tiny, shining

ray of hope" - news from Buenos Aires that mass
emigration to Argentina may put an end to the
Slovenes' current misery, and a second letter with
more details. Meanwhile, after five weeks at a
temporary camp for Jews, I am sent back to the
Slovenes in Spittal to set up a 120-bed TB sanatorium
for patients of all nationalities.
My diary reflects exhilaration at the opportunity to
put into practice a doctrine taught by the Quakers in
1944 and recently rediscovered, that the overriding
priority of aid agencies should be to empower the
refugees. I had already commented that the Slovenes
were more capable and competent than most of the camp
administrators looking after them.
Now I can start
up a new organisation, choosing the best individual
for each job based on informed Slovene advice and
giving the resulting team the maximum of support.
The outcome is evident from my two "narrative
reports" to UNRRA, which I use as vehicles to press
the arguments in favour of empowering or enabling the
refugees.
Pernisek reports UNRRA's dismissal of the camp
director and welfare officer for alleged softness on
repatriation, and the increased harassment of the
Slovenes by the "British police". Talk of Argentina
continues,
but
when?
A
Yugoslav
Government
Repatriation Commission adds to the repatriation
pressure. I complete and send to the British Foreign
Office the "Notes on Slovene Refugees" I had
promised, with copies to everyone who might influence
refugee policy, including the then Leader of the
Opposition at Westminster, Mr Winston Churchill.

239

The Pernisek diary:

1st January 1947.
We said good-bye to the old year in a
Christian
manner,
with
prayer
and
a
happy
celebration.
As the first stars appeared and the
bells tolled, calling us to lift our hearts up to
God, we carried out the ritual blessing of our rooms
as on Christmas Eve and said the rosary. By 8 pm we
were already seated in the "White Horse" hall where
our devoted company of actors presented us with a
really lovely and happy evening.
There were mainly
comic
sketches
showing
wit
and
imagination,
interspersed with cheerful songs and recitals.
During the interval the camp choir sang happy folk songs
with a musical accompaniment. Many were restless in
their seats, itching to get up and dance. A couple
of hours passed, the lights were dimmed and out of
the darkness came the voice of the camp director
Major Jarvie wishing us a happy New Year and good
health. Then the choir sang the "Triglav March" and
everyone joined in, thus passing from the old to the
New Year 1947, and everyone wished each other health,
happiness, God's protection and above all peace and
again peace.
We don't know what the new year is hiding. We expect to
be faced with new trials. God is among us. We can,
and must, trust Him alone and abandon ourselves to
His will, and only this will bring peace to our
souls.
But I do have a secret wish.
God, you are
very good to me. Grant that I be delivered from this
camp life, give me ever so small a place I can call
my home, where there will be Christian warmth and a
Christian spirit. This will be my daily prayer.
There's no let up in the cold weather,
2nd January.
rather it continues relentlessly and a truly Siberian
wind blows day after day.
Freezing storms attack
without respite, each one more bitter than the last.
The temperature keeps at about -20 C., yesterday
reaching the lowest temperature so far of -25 C. The
locals say this winter is like that of 1922. We've
very little heating so the room is never warm enough.
Early in the New Year I moved to what was in effect a temporary
transit camp for Jewish refugees at St. Marein, 36 miles north
of Graz at the other end of Austria. My letter-diary:
Beginning of January.

I am now at my new team, team 332.

240

We were very busy the last few days at Lienz, packing

and disposing of camp records that had accumulated
for 1/2 years.
I took hours on the single task of
writing references for the more responsible DP camp
staff. There were so many I had to do and one had to
be so careful in the wording, particularly to make
sure that one had not made one too warm as compared
to another who deserved a stronger recommendation! I
am glad to say that several of my staff already have
actual jobs or offers of jobs in other camps. They
certainly deserved it. I've done what I can to get
them well settled.
25th

January.
Yesterday an urgent letter arrived
instructing me to travel today, Sunday, to Vienna to
see the Director of Medical Services for the UNRRA
Austrian Mission there - absolutely no mention of
why! So this afternoon I depart for Vienna.

It will be impossible to do anything much to put any order

into the chaos of [St. Marein] camp so long as the
officer from the Allied Commission (British Military
Government) remains there. It is supposed to be run
by UNRRA and his being in it is completely anomalous:
he is not under the control of UNRRA but has the
position of deputy director on the staff. It is an
impossible position as it is essential that only one
person be in charge of a camp and that he have
complete control of his staff.
The man is quite
friendly, but has an entirely disciplinarian outlook
and no understanding of the psychology of the DPs.
The

disciplinarian approach relies largely on bluff

because, if the DPs do not want to do what you order
them to, there is precious little you can do about
it!
And while some nationalities will allow
themselves to be bluffed, it's not much use trying
that on the Jews!
The only sound technique is to
gain the DPs' confidence and cooperation and guide
them so that they run their own camp.
But this is
only possible if the staff have a real understanding
of the DPs and a common technique of dealing with
them.
This can't happen here until the Allied
Commission officer goes.

The Pernisek diary:

28th January. A tiny, tiny shining and warm ray of hope
lit up the cold darkness today.
Dr. Blatnik has
received a letter from the emigre Slovene priest in
241

Argentina Rev. Janez Hladnik 155 which is of interest

to us.
It's dated the 14th January 1947, and it's
clear they're well informed about us and our
difficult situation.
And more still, there are
people in the world who want to help us, not with
words, but doing something practical to rescue us.
Father Hladnik writes he's had an audience with the
President of Argentina, General Peron, about the
settlement of Slovene refugees in the country, and
the President has promised to receive all the Slovene
refugees.
Dr. Krek in Rome will be our officially
recognised representative and will compile a list of
those wishing to emigrate to Argentina.
Soon after
that the government there will issue permits and the
appropriate authority will take an interest in the
Slovene
refugees
and
help
them.
They
have
agricultural settlements in mind.
In Argentina our people would find their second homeland.
Only trained workers would get jobs in industry and
the rest should work on the land. Peron has clipped
the capitalists' wings and found a good solution to
the needs of the workers and thus disarmed the
communists.
It's true the communist party is now
permitted, but a brake has been put on its future.
Father Hladnik wrote, "tell the people not to be
discouraged. The diplomatic side will soon be sorted
out and I hope transport across the ocean will then
be solved and so we'll, God willing, be able to shake
hands this year". A ray of sunshine doesn't make a
fine day, but it does herald daylight. Important and
encouraging is the fact there's a concrete plan to
move us out and, as is clear from the letter, this is
Dr. Krek's work.
May God hear his pleas and help
him!
A second letter arrived in February, this time from Father
Kosicek 156 . In view of its importance I quote it in full:
155

. Dean Janez Hladnik, born 1902, consecrated priest 1927,

served in local parish and then the Slovene catholic community
in Zagreb.
Moved to Argentina as assistant to the Slovene
priest there, and succeeded him on his untimely death.
As
immigrants' priest travelled the length of Argentina several
times.
Edited and largely wrote Duhovno Zivljenje [The
Spiritual Life], the journal which was later to serialise the
Pernisek diaries.
Svobodna Slovenija (1952), (Buenos Aires) p. 215.
156

. see pp. 00 and 00.

242

Rev. Janez Hladnik

assistant I am
mix his answer
as far as I
(greenhorn).

received your letter today.

As his
answering you in his name.
I shall
with my own observations and advice,
can give them now as a "gringo"

1.
The Argentinean Government issued permission in
principle for the settlement of 10,000 Slovenes in
Argentina. This is the merit of Mr. Hladnik who has
excellent connections with the men of the Government
and with the Church authorities.
Some days ago
special permission was issued to 500 refugees in
Italy that they can emigrate at once.
As soon as
further lists arrive, others will receive permission.
2.
The Slovene Social Committee in Rome is
authorized by the Government of this country,
exclusively to propose Slovene emigrants to the
Consulate.
Immigration other than through this
Committee is impossible.
3. The International Welfare Organization, where the
American
Catholics
and
Vatican
are
especially
collaborating, has enough means at its disposal for
the transport of the refugees over the ocean, for the
present only to South America.
Msgr. O'Gradi, the
representative of this organization, is now in Buenos
Aires.
We have already had some conferences with
him.
He assures us - and especially us - of all
help.
4. Argentina is a very rich country. The climate is
hot, but not insupportable.
The fertility of the
soil is three times better than in the Banat 157 .
Everything can be sold.
Anyone who is prepared to
work cannot starve.
The Government is looking for
settlers.
Do not worry about the payment of the
assigned land. Should anyone want to return home and
be able to do so, he will receive the money for the
investments and work. People who ten years ago paid
10,000 pesos in instalments for the land assigned by
the State can sell it today for 40,000 pesos.
No
manure is needed. After lunch the farmers sleep here
for some hours. One cannot imagine how easy the work
is. Certainly the first months will be bad. It will
be necessary to plough fresh land. I am only afraid
that the refugees will not want to return home, if
157

. the richest agricultural area of Yugoslavia

243

the possibility will come.

I regret very much to
state that today there are no indications for return.
5. The great difficulties you have with the post and
connections with Rome are known to me. Therefore it
is right that you yourself are preparing everything
necessary for the emigration.
Prepare the lists of
people who are unconditionally determined to go over
the ocean.
Hundred and hundred together!
Do not
forget to put among the first persons those who are
in direct danger there.
It seems that the Allied
authorities want to solve the question of refugees in
Italy first, and then will be your turn in Kaernten.
Nevertheless it is all right that for this case you
have everything prepared.
To the people who cannot
decide on emigration you may give the advice to
return home as soon as possible.
Whoever thinks he
will go only through purgatory if he returns home,
should return. A special problem is the small number
of bad people among the refugees. You have to think
well if you ought to take them with you when
emigrating.
6. I am concerned about the intelligentsia: there is
no possibility here that they would all be occupied
in their professions.
All kinds of intelligentsia
are in abundance in Argentina.
There are for
instance 5,000 students in the medical faculty at
Buenos Aires. Rich farmers - and that is all of them
- are pushing their children to different schools,
and the country remains empty.
The intelligentsia
must be prepared for manual work, as must the
students.
If somebody has some exams, he has to
repeat them here, in good Spanish language.
They
look with mistrust at foreigners: they see in them
either scamps (there are many) or people who are more
diligent and capable than the general population.
7.
Argentine is a Christian country, at least
according to their feelings, although, because of the
superficial instruction, in many places morals and
the practical Christian life are not very high. All
evil - together with Communism - was brought into the
country by foreigners.
8.
Prices are high, wages also.
The peso has the
value of the Swiss franc.
For one American dollar
one has to pay 4.10 pesos. There is no black market.
Clothing is twice as expensive as in Italy, as are
typewriters, photo apparatus etc. Anyone who brings
something like that to Argentina can get good money.
244

There is a great demand for workers, especially

masons.
Today there are for instance in the
newspaper "La Prensa" about 2,500 advertisements
asking for workers and less than 100 offers.
There
is an especially great demand for cooks, housemaids,
seamstresses etc., and foreigners are welcome.
9. We are now setting up a small office here because
the Mr. Hladnik, a saint and extremely unselfish
soul, cannot do everything himself. Please ask your
people to pray for him, because it will probably be
due only to him if we in our misery get in a place of
the world a modest home and a piece of bread. I am
sending my greetings to all informed about my letter.
In future I shall write regularly to inform you about
the most important events.
My letter-diary:
In Vienna I saw Colonel Cottrell, the UNRRA Director of
Medical Services.
He told me the Zone Director had
submitted my name as the most suitable for the post
of welfare officer-admin officer of the DP TB
hospital that is being developed. Up to now it has
been attached to the DP camp close by, but it is
thought that the camp director and staff are too busy
with the camp to take much interest in it. So they
are now detaching it from the camp and putting it
under a nurse and a welfare-admin officer.
I
explained I had to return home in April, but Colonel
Cottrell said he wished me anyhow to get the job
organised.
The camp where the hospital is, is Spittal, which is the
camp to which all the refugees from Lienz were sent.
The job is one at which I can be usefully employed
for two months or so, as against work at the camp
here which has become more and more unsatisfactory.
The director, while very pleasant personally, is too
weak and vacillating, and the presence of the Allied
Commission officer makes the position intolerable.
The refugees are difficult but could be handled by a
team that worked together following a clear policy
consciously carried out, but the conditions are
lacking.
This is a shame as two of the workers on
welfare are most capable and some of the best camp
workers I have met.
I shall be glad to leave the
camp, where the chaos is hopeless but unnecessary,
but sorry to leave the mess which is a very happy one
- two British, two Dutch, one Belgian, one charming
245

Stateless ex-Austrian Jew (male!).

I have met more than once the nurse who will probably work
with me in Spittal and she is pleasant, capable and
easy to get on with, and I don't think she will try
to be too bossy if handled firmly! The UNRRA doctor
in charge of the district is English, quiet and very
nice.
I have been told confidentially that the
director and welfare officer who are running the camp
in Spittal will shortly be replaced.
If I arrive
before the new director and so know the ropes, I have
a certain moral advantage over him!
Before starting in at Spittal (which by the way is much
pleasanter and healthier country than here) I am
going to visit Salzburg where there is a similar
hospital for the American Zone of Austria.
I will
there
be
able
to
study
their
methods
of
administration and treatment before starting up at
Spittal. So tomorrow I transfer by truck my kit to
Spittal, and on Tuesday proceed by train to Salzburg.
The Pernisek diary:
8th February.
Today a British parliamentary delegation
composed of three MPs and led by Frank Beswick,
Labour MP and Secretary of State for Air 158 , visited
the camp. The other members were the Conservative MP
T.V.Beamish 159 and the Labour MP C.R.Hobson, and they
were accompanied by Colonel Hall, Deputy Director of
the Refugees' Section in Vienna.
They reached the
camp at around ten and started work at once in
director Jarvie's office. After a brief introductory
session with the director they started hearing the
views of individual refugees from different national
groups who could tell them what they wanted.
Our
representative prof. Sever gave them a special
memorandum in which we spelt out our reasons for
becoming refugees and why we couldn't return home.
The memorandum stated briefly that there were currently
3,732 Slovenes in Spittal camp and about 3,000
outside scattered throughout Carinthia, where they
were living and working separately.
We left home
158

. he was in fact Parliamentary Private Secretary to the

Assistant Secretary of State for Air: later Lord Beswick, PC
and Labour Chief Whip in the House of Lords.
159
. Later Sir Tufton Beamish, long-serving MP, strong
supporter of European Union and author of books on Marxism in
East Europe, etc.
246

because the front was coming close, as were the

communist troops who were killing innocent people who
didn't collaborate with them; and because of the
threatening letters many people had received.
We
Slovenes were by an overwhelming majority pro the
Western democracies and had expected to be liberated
by the Anglo-Americans.
When we realised that we
were on the contrary going to be abandoned to the
mercy of Tito's partisan army, we withdrew in the
direction of the British army to secure asylum and
support from them.
Some Slovenes had come to
Carinthia already during the war, either taken as
forced labourers by the Germans or escaping from the
communists, and they don't want to return home now.
Every single refugee amongst us can decide for himself
whether he wants to return home or emigrate.
We
can't return because at home there is a totalitarian
communist regime which liquidates its ideological and
political opponents.
Many, or most, of the Slovene
DPs have members of their families who were killed by
the communists during the war.
Good Slovenes who
remained at home were persecuted, some even expelled
on the ground that they were ethnic Germans.
Even
those who returned from Dachau were put in prison at
home, sentenced to forced labour or shot.
Letters from people who had returned were full of bad news
and regret at having gone back.
The memorandum set
out some specific requests:
The Slovene DPs hope the Allies will intervene in
Yugoslavia so that the provisions of the Atlantic
Charter are implemented there.
We ask for help and
support in the future so that no Yugoslav will be
returned against his will and the Allies will insist
that Western-type democracy is introduced and that
rights under the Atlantic Charter are implemented.
We request help and protection so that no one is
returned by force, and the Allies insist that a true
democracy in the western sense with the Four Freedoms
be introduced in Yugoslavia.
The Slovene DPs ask
that they be enabled to find work outside Austria and
that emigration for those who want it be arranged as
early as possible.
We want all the Slovene DPs in
Austria and Italy to emigrate together.
The delegation then toured the camp.
They first saw the
kitchen and wanted to know what the refugees would
get for lunch. They were cooking turnips as usual 247

I'm sure the director wanted them to prepare a better

meal, but the messing officer Mr. Adler insisted on
turnips, so that they should see the kind of food on
which the poor people had to live. They then looked
at the workshops and saw the printing shop where the
Taboriscnik 160 was printed. They examined closely how
it operated and asked what kind of literature the
press was producing.
Then they visited the camp
church and went on to the theatre, Victory Hall,
where all the refugees were waiting. Everyone stood
up and greeted them, the orchestra played the Triglav
March and the people cheered enthusiastically. Then
the Slovene choir conducted by prof. Silvin Mihelic
sang one English and three Slovene songs, which the
guests greatly enjoyed.
The

camp chief Mr. Vertacnik then went up to the

delegation and saying, "please accept this souvenir
of your visit", presented them on behalf of the
Slovene community with beautifully decorated albums
containing photographs of camp life and activities,
the covers being finely embroidered by our girls with
Slovene national motifs and bound by Mr. Herman
Zupan, whose workshop the delegation also visited.

The leader of the delegation said, "thank you for your

kind reception, beautiful singing and souvenir gifts.
We must say we admire greatly that you've maintained
such high standards of conduct, order and discipline
in view of the circumstances in which you're living,
and we wish you every happiness".
After that
everyone stood up and sang the hymn of the Slovene
homeland "Father, mother, brothers and sisters". The
guests then went to see the children's kitchen and
some rooms in the barracks where they talked with the
people.
9th February. Today our theatre company gave a beautiful
performance of Mesko's play "Mother", which the
people followed enthralled. In the evening director
Jarvie invited ten leading members of the camp to his
room and thanked them for the order, discipline and
punctuality our people had shown during the British
parliamentarians' visit.
He was so moved he had
tears in his eyes. Miss Michell thanked us as well
and told us she wouldn't leave the unhappy Slovenes
until she could see us happy again, even if that
meant working without pay for months.
160

. the Camp Dweller

248

11th February.
Dr. V came from Klagenfurt this evening.
He'd visited Monsignor Podgorec and told him of our
plan
to
approach
the
Austrian
government
for
permission to remain in Austria. He warmly welcomed
this idea and said he was on very good terms with the
Provincial Governor Mr. Pirsch, who was well disposed
towards the Slovenes. He would therefore go and see
the Governor about it. Dr. V visited Dr. Bluemel as
well, and he said the Volkspartei was also well
disposed towards Slovene DPs.
It seems as if our
intentions might become reality. Mr. Bluemel thought
it'd be a good idea to involve the Bishop of
Klagenfurt Dr. Koestner and the Austrian Cardinal
Initzer also in these negotiations.
In Carinthia
there'd be enough bread and work for all the
Slovenes.
The Governor has intervened successfully
for Dr. Pus.
It seems to me the best of the
proposals
for
resettlement,
as
under
present
circumstances we mustn't be distracted by other
concerns but must concentrate on saving our own
lives.
14th February. Last night we had a lovely concert in the
assembly hall.
The choir, now combining those of
Peggetz and Spittal, has 70 male and female singers
who sing really beautifully.
Last night they
presented us with a new type of programme, folk songs
arranged by modern composers.
It was an evening of
aesthetic
and
artistic
delight.
What's
most
important about these performances is that they are
the best way of encouraging mutual respect, good
relations, cooperation and unity, and we must achieve
this.
So we must have as many stage plays and
celebrations of cultural events as possible.
Let
religion and culture act as unifying forces for us!
The mutual respect that was needed was between the Slovenes who
moved to Spittal already in July 1945 and those who were moved
there from Peggetz Lienz in November 1946. Eighteen months of
living apart were enough for powerful and bitter tensions,
suspicions and jealousies to grow between the two communities
and for them to develop separate distinctive identities, and it
took a year for the rift to heal - a typical refugee
phenomenon.
My letter-diary:
15th February.
Salzburg.

I am now back in Spittal after my trip to

At the Jewish camp in St Marein it was
249

clear one could not do work of any particular

usefulness - it was anyhow probably closing down in a
couple of months. But here the picture is different.
In the couple of months until April I feel I can make
a real contribution and flatter myself, or rate UNRRA
personnel in general so low, that there is no one
else with similar suitable qualifications available.
It is a matter of setting up an organisation,
establishing a routine, selecting a staff and getting
them to work harmoniously together, and finally so
strengthening the authority of the DP senior doctor
and chief of administration that they can take over.
The place is on a worth-while scale, having 120 beds
when complete. At present the camp hospital is also
here, but it's being transferred into the camp.
The

place will be entirely for TB cases, the great

majority non-infectious, the few infectious cases
being housed in a special isolation barrack.
The
establishment should continue to function after UNRRA
has finished, as long in fact as the DPs remain in
Austria. If it only were to operate for six months
it would be enormously worth-while, as it will give a
chance of recovery to many tubercular DPs and be an
opportunity to teach them how to look after
themselves and avoid being a danger to other people.

*My visit to Salzburg was from a work point of view most

worth-while and also at the same time very enjoyable.
I found the town much more attractive than I did on
my last visit.*
16th February.
The director and welfare officer here at
Spittal are Australian - very Australian; they are
not too difficult to handle (they are so blatantly
obvious) but demand considerable patience.
However
they should have very little to do with the day-today running of the sanatorium. The nurse is Dutch: I
worked with her many months at Lienz and get on with
her very well; unlike many UNRRA nurses, she knows
her job and gets on with it. The chief zone doctor,
Dr Barton, an Englishman, is very sensible and nice
and will leave me a very free hand, at the same time
supporting me up to the hilt: so it looks as if it
should be possible to do a really satisfactory job.
24th February. So far as staying on is concerned, things
do change so often it is difficult to say.
Anyhow
UNRRA closes down in June completely - that is quite
certain ... so far, but if this job develops
250

satisfactorily and there continues really useful work

to do, I might stay a month or two after April.
There were two big reasons why I was very glad to be
chosen for this job. First there is a real need for
the institution. So long as the TB cases remain in
the camps it is probable their physical condition
will deteriorate, so that a case easily and quickly
curable will become chronic. When we get them in the
hospital they can be under continuous medical
supervision, receive treatment and much better food,
live under better and less crowded conditions and be
taught how to look after themselves so that they will
remain healthy when they leave, will not relapse and
will not be a danger to those they live with.
We
expect to develop to 120 beds and could increase to
140, so the project is of a scale to be of some real
use.
The second point was that I'd remain in touch with the
Slovenes. I think they are the largest single group
of refugees in the British Zone of Austria, and a
group whose position is particularly difficult.
Being strong Catholics, they arouse the hostility of
the surprisingly large numbers of English and
Americans who have a strong prejudice against the
Catholic
church.
The
political
position
in
Yugoslavia that led them to leave their homes was
highly complex and intricate, and most people dislike
complexity and prefer a simplified answer to every
question; and the simplified answer to this question
is not to the advantage of the Slovenes.
It looks as if the next months will decide the fate of
these people and in fact official commissions are
visiting the camps to gather information as to what
the refugees deserve in the way of help. Hardly any
of the UNRRA field workers have the necessary
languages
or
the
intellectual
curiosity
to
investigate the true history of the people.
It is
pathetic how appreciative the people are when someone
does try to get to understand them.
I have got a capable and reliable DP 161 as deputy for
hospital administration, a very hard worker with
imagination and initiative; in Slovenia he was in
charge of the municipal undertakings of the second
161

. Mr Joze Lekan. He emigrated to Cleveland, Ohio, where

his son, daughter, son-in-law and grand-children still live.
251

largest town, Maribor or Marburg, having a general

responsibility for the gasworks, slaughterhouse,
orphans' home etc.
I intend to put all the
responsibility possible onto him for the internal
working of the place.
If one can secure a really
good staff the battle's won, and I'm taking great
care in finding the best available.
26th

February.
I'm feeling very pleased with myself.
After some days of patient enquiries and search I've
virtually secured what should prove a most successful
team for the TB hospital, that is for the six or so
key posts. The medical and nursing side are not my
concern, but come under the UNRRA Zone doctor and the
team nurse, although even here I've managed to find
them a good man for the dispensary. The present
dispenser is hopelessly and dangerously inefficient,
but the new man is an unemployed doctor who was glad
of the job; he should do it well and also be able to
help with the clinical work possibly. An additional
advantage is that he speaks some eight languages,
including English.

I mentioned the man I'd chosen as "lay superintendent".

I've also secured the best clerk and the best typist
we had in Lienz, so that once I've got the office in
order it should run very smoothly. The pair are used
to my somewhat exacting and strict standards.
But
the department that caused me the most trouble was
that of welfare, and with a hospital of 120 beds this
will be most important. The psychological side of TB
is as important, if not more so, than the physical
side, and it makes all the difference in the world if
the patients have the will to recover and the
confidence they're able to recover.
If they're
pessimistic and depressed or always worrying, or
simply bored and not interested, their recovery will
be slower.
The welfare officer will be responsible for preparing a
case sheet for each patient giving a full picture of
his social and general background, education and
former occupations and interests.
Then when the
doctor says he can have two or one hour's occupation
daily, the welfare officer will arrange him the work
in which he's most interested, sketching, painting,
music,
languages,
carpentry,
gardening,
sewing,
embroidery
etc,
etc.
It
will
also
be
his
responsibility to keep in touch continually with the
patients, acting as their "guide, philosopher and
252

friend".
A

pretty tall order!

After lengthy searches and
discussions, I came to the conclusion it'd be
impossible to find one person to cover the whole job.
The difficulty was that a considerable proportion of
the patients would come from the more educated
classes, and for these it was essential to have a man
with a university education.
People will rarely
listen to advice given by a person with an education
appreciably worse than their own - the snobs!
But
none of the people available with a university
education
was
practical
enough
to
organise
occupations for the working class majority!

The present plan is to take on a Latvian called Rasa as

principal
welfare
officer
to
look
after
the
"intellectuals".
You may remember he is the man I
spoke so highly of at Lienz - the representative for
the camp Baltic group who was a senior civil servant
in the Ministry of Health in Latvia and is also a
capable painter.
He has one of the best brains in
the camp - probably the best - is old enough and
married, energetic and capable, with plenty of ideas
and initiative. His main disadvantage is that while
he speaks Russian, German, English and some SerboCroat he doesn't speak any Slovene, and many of the
simpler patients will be able to speak only that
language.
Combined with him I'll have a very energetic Slovene
called Dolenc. At Lienz he ran our housing office, a
most difficult job, with great success and also
started a nail factory and a brush factory off his
own bat!
He gets on excellently with workers, is
practical and very resourceful.
But he would be
little use with the intellectuals, as he is a textile
factory worker and I doubt if he received more than
elementary school education.
He will be engaged
officially as foreman of our small party of 5, 6 or 7
workers who will cut and distribute wood fuel, do
minor repairs, porter etc, but will in fact spend
most of his time on the welfare side.
I'm still looking for a capable woman willing to work
part-time for the female patients, but I'm confident
I'll find someone in the end. If my plans develop as
I hope they will, the show should be able to run by
itself pretty soon.
My experience at Lienz of
working by picking other people's brains is standing
253

me in good stead. Find the right person, handle him

properly and he'll be able to do the job twice as
well as you could have done yourself, and will work
as hard as he can into the bargain.
The Pernisek diary:
1st March.
The news has hit us like a thunderbolt that
director Jarvie is being transferred and Miss Michell
made redundant. Already on the 10th January director
Jarvie received a warning from Klagenfurt that the
Yugoslav government had complained to the British
Foreign Office that he was the main obstacle to
repatriation, so we can now expect stronger pressure
than ever to return home.
Who will we now get as
director? There is talk of a Jew and a Jewess; these
wouldn't be well disposed towards us.
Whatever
happens we can't expect anything good, because the
repatriation screw is now sure to be turned tighter
and tighter.
But a Jew can easily be good,
considerate and wise, just as a Christian can be
depraved, as we've already experienced.
It'll be
interesting to see what Miss Michell does. Will she
continue with us without pay until she sees us happy?
I doubt it.
It certainly doesn't depend upon her
alone any more, unless she becomes a DP herself. We
shouldn't expect such heroism from anyone.
3rd March.
The hunt has begun.
As we were seated for
our lunch of corn mash and tea the English police
came for Mr. Kremzar, but luckily he wasn't at home.
They also asked where Pavle Masic was. What do they
want with these two elderly respectable family men?
They're doing nothing more than diligently looking
after their families, scrupulously conscientious in
their
professions,
selflessly
working
for
the
community with a passionate love for justice and
truth,
both
resolutely
rejecting
the
falsity,
criminality and treachery of communism and resisting
it openly!
Here we go again! We trusted the British unquestioningly,
believed their words and pinned our faith on the
Atlantic Charter, and so defied the communists who
boasted they'd throw into the Mediterranean any
British and American troops who tried to land on our
shores.
And now we get this treatment!
They
betrayed our King and his legitimate government, and
they betrayed us as well, after first assuring us of
political
asylum.
Through
their
premeditated
254

treachery and perfidy our Slovene National Guard was

handed over to the communists to be brutally
slaughtered. Thirteen thousand men and lads!
We,

the surviving civilians, were taken under their

protection and promised that no one would be
repatriated to Tito against their wishes.
But now
they're hunting our leaders and shutting them up in
jail, and softening us up with continual charges of
being collaborators, traitors and quislings; they're
forcing us home into the jaws of the Red Beast.
Because fair means have failed, they're now trying in
an underhand and sneaky manner to starve us
systematically and deliberately into submission.
We
don't feel in the slightest guilty for having openly
opposed and taken up arms against criminal communism:
we're only sorry we trusted the "Allies" so blindly
and naively.

9th March.
Since Thursday I've been ill in bed.
It's
Sunday, and I got up but I'm not feeling well.
I
listen to people and join in the discussion. People
don't reckon any more on a change in the political
situation at home and many have decided to return
home as the spring is calling them.
They won't go
across the ocean to foreign parts so long as land and
home are awaiting them. We have to understand them!
They've grown up with their farmlands and homesteads,
inherited from their forefathers, and the land calls
them powerfully.
We of the urban proletariat don't
feel this call, it isn't buried deep within us. Good
people, thank you for your wholly admirable example;
may God give you good fortune, may peace and God's
protection be with you!
But most talk about Argentina and are preparing themselves
for a long, long journey "to where the boat will
sail", but the boat isn't ready yet and God only
knows when it will be!
Meanwhile we'll rot in the
camp as the English won't let us leave Europe, but
will rather deport us home or carry us off somewhere
in their Empire where again we'll be doomed to live
in refugee camps.
In what way have we sinned so
grievously to deserve this fate? It's understandable
the Germans should suffer. Be done by as they did!
Yet the victors are interested in them, strive to get
them on their side and might even fight for them!
And they handle the Jews with kid gloves, even though
the Jews hate and detest them.
And they want to
provide the Balts with new, well-ordered lives as
255

quickly as possible.
It's only against us, who gave up everything for them,
trusting them blindly and believing their promises,
they discriminate, scold and obstruct.
It's true
it's only a few kilometres from here to our homes!
That's why they keep us here and urge us to return.
Miss Lieven 162 only recently said no Yugoslavs will be
allowed to emigrate across the ocean while there's a
possibility a single one will go home. She is from
the HQ for DPs in Vienna, and she certainly meant it.
11th

March.
The Yugoslav Repatriation Commission has
appeared again.
It consists of a young major whose
name I don't know and a prof. Kunc, who is very kind
and is doing everything he can to be friendly and is
asking our people what the Yugoslav government should
do in order for more people to return home.
He's
looked at everything in the camp, including the
school and the printing press: there he asked the
ever-imaginative Mr. Bucek, who answered, "you know
what, Mr. Professor? Open up the frontier! We'll go
to Ljubelj, and our relatives will meet us there.
We'll talk together and decide which way to turn.
We'll see which direction the majority will choose:
more for Austria or more for Yugoslavia". Prof. Kunc
could only smile.

12th March.
A lovely sunny day, I'm sitting at home
reading, it's quiet, the children at school.
The
wife coaxes me to go for a stroll in the sun.
All
right, but where? I don't like the snow and slush too many cars on the road and my poor clothes will
suffer, so I go into town. It's Wednesday, there's a
film on, only one cinema, so choice is no problem.
"Sports Parade in Moscow", in technicolour. Harasho!
[good]. No need to queue as the young lady urges me
in, and even pulls a fast one, charging 1.50
Schillings for the ninth row. I enter, the news is
on and for the first time in six years I see a
newsreel with war scenes, air and land battles, the
roar of guns.
There was an interruption during the show, a police raid,
the labour office carrying out a control, and we're
back in 1944 or 1945 as this was just what the Nazis
162

. Miss Dara Lieven, who had worked as a nurse at the camp

in Lienz (see page 00), had now transferred to UNRRA HQ working
on repatriation.
256

and Fascists did during the occupation.

Soon the
check reaches me, "where's your work permit?" it's an
official from the city labour office. I show him my
Beschaeftigungsnachweis 163 . The stout fellow takes it
and tells me to report tomorrow to the labour office
-I didn't have the authorization for the current
period.
The amiable young chief of the labour
exchange asked about my work. When I said I looked
after the theatre he laughed, "the fine is one
English cigarette".
I had one to give him and we
parted friendlily.
He returned me my work book
without any endorsement.
22nd

March.
This afternoon at five the former camp
director Jarvie and Miss Michell wanted to say
goodbye to everyone as they were leaving us for good.
We stood in front of our barrack and as they slowly
passed by in their jeep we waved to them and they
waved to us. Goodbye! God be with you, good people,
we'll not forget you; your sudden departure only
confirms your goodness. You were too good to us, you
were not to the taste of your superiors, our sworn
enemies, so you had to go.

Dr. V. heard the news from someone that we're all going to
be transferred to somewhere in Germany, which seems
to me the more credible as it comes from a government
source. Today we buried in the cemetery a young and
charming sixth form pupil, Erculj. TB. A number of
people will follow Erculj, as the food here is good
for nothing except for people to die of TB.
My letter-diary:
23rd March. On Wednesday the UNRRA chief medical officer
and chief nurse for Austria visited us, staying two
nights, to see what progress we'd made with the TB
Centre.
During our conference I started by
explaining the difficulties of being dependant on the
neighbouring camp for certain services and the
generally very difficult supply situation, and
Colonel Cottrell, interrupting me in the middle of a
sentence, expressed the impression I was resigning
myself to the difficulties, and if I was doing that
he'd have no use for me.
His remark was pretty strongly worded and got my goat. I
denied his assumption energetically and a little
163

. work permit
257

later, when he again cut in on me and again

complained he wasn't informed on what we were doing,
I was able to counter-attack on sure ground,
producing from the file my monthly report which dealt
clearly with the second point raised and gave full
information on the matter on which he complained he
was not informed.
Things cheered up then, and I
found he appreciated people who stood up to him. The
zone senior medical officer, my immediate chief, was
clearly pleased at the colonel's discomforture!
I preserved my copy of the monthly report referred to above
and, as it describes the workings of the TB sanatorium in some
detail, I reproduce it here:
*During the month all sections of the camp
Personnel
hospital were transferred from the centre to the
camp, and the personnel employed was finally divided
between the two establishments.
Further staff was
engaged to cover minimum requirements.
All staff
have been put on the pay roll and received payment
for the month of March.*
A card index has been
introduced to keep a check on the health of the
staff, in it being entered dates of inoculations,
results of quarterly medical examinations and monthly
screenings, and monthly weights.
*Supply
On the 19th March the centre was visited by
Colonel Cottrell and Miss Grant Glass, and many
supply problems were clarified during discussions.
The next day the Zone Supply Officer was visited and
proved most helpful: on the strength of a release
note for plates it has been possible to obtain a
variety of urgently needed kitchen, feeding and ward
equipment: we have a further quantity of goods to our
credit and will take further articles as soon as they
are produced by the factory.*
Food

By the middle of the month enough IRC 164 parcels had

been received to justify the issue of the full 3,500
calories to the patients: the increase has had a most
noticeable effect on their morale. Many patients are
unable to eat the full diet now provided, but it is
not anticipated that this situation will last for
long, as it is thought that their stomachs will soon
get used to the greater quantity of food. Meanwhile
variations in quantities given at the different meals
are being tried, to find the best way of service.

164

. Indian Red Cross

258

Owing to the generous help of the Camp Warehouse

Officer it has been possible to provide particularly
attractive meals over Easter.
Gardens An experienced kitchen gardener has been engaged
and will not only be responsible for the care of the
centre gardens, but will also provide employment and
instruction for as many patients as possible as soon
as the weather is warm enough for them to work outof-doors. It has been possible to secure a number of
plants free from the former camp gardens at Lienz.
Admin.
Case sheets, a patients' register and an
alphabetical
cross-reference
register
have
been
introduced, and a meeting held with the camp chief
registration clerk to effect the closest cooperation
between the two offices.
*Maintenance
and
construction
The
centre's
small
maintenance team has been very busy during the month
and received assistance from the camp construction
staff. The dispensary and Y-Ray department have been
transferred to the clinic and laboratory barrack, and
a light trap, waiting room and dark room installed.
Two further barracks have been partitioned, a
removable wall being erected in the dining-reading
room barrack, so as to allow of its use as concert
hall etc.
A boiler has been installed, making
possible the washing of all laundry in the centre.
Separate dining rooms for the medical and nursing
staff and the centre workers have been prepared and
are in use.
A scullery adjoining the kitchen will shortly be ready,
and it will not then be necessary for the nurses to
wash dirty plates in the side wards, and there will
be no reason for anyone other than kitchen personnel
to enter the kitchen. After extensive repairs water
is now running in all barracks and all closets
necessary are in working order. The camp maintenance
staff will start on the colour-washing of the
barracks directly after Easter.*
Welfare
and
occupations
Particularly
satisfactory
progress has been achieved. The welfare officer has
gained the confidence of both medical staff and
patients and shown great aptitude for his work.
Generous help with a variety of supplies has been
received from YMCA/YWCA Klagenfurt, and a reading
room and library have been opened. Contact has been
259

made with the Ukrainian community at Villach camp and

the Russian cultural centres at Parsch, Salzburg and
at the Red Cross Clinic at Lienz: they have promised
to
supply
us
regularly
with
periodicals
and
literature produced both locally and in Canada and
America.
A number of books in Slovene have been
bought from the camp printing office. A radio kindly
supplied by the camp has been repaired and now is in
regular use, being transferred from ward to ward. A
chess competition has aroused such interest that the
welfare officer has started a course on chess theory.
A set of bowls presented by YMCA is very popular,
being used every evening by patients.
The patients have shown great interest in the language
courses recently started, 12 attending the course in
English, 10 Italian, 10 German and 4 French.
The
German course is being given by a patient, the others
by a Slovene from the camp, who also is giving a
course in musical theory to 12 patients. He will be
engaged full-time, as it has been found that
occupations and welfare is too big a job to be
covered by one man, and further development will only
be possible if he has a part-time assistant. It is
anticipated that the number attending the courses
will fall as the first enthusiasm dies down, but it
is probable that sufficient will remain interested.
It has been possible to provide space and tools so that
two patients can work on their former jobs of wood
inlay and basket-making: it is hoped that the basketmaker will be able to teach two other interested
patients as soon as the doctor gives permission for
them to undertake such work.
It has been suggested to Zone HQ that
Repatriation
information
be
requested
from
the
Yugoslav
authorities as to the treatment for TB patients now
available in Yugoslavia, so that it would be possible
to discuss the matter of repatriation with the
patients more concretely.
A list of points to be
raised is being prepared for the use of Miss
Boester 165 in her coming visit to Yugoslavia. 9th
April 1947.
I now return to my letter-diary
inspection visit to the sanatorium:

165

. See pp. 00, 00.

260

on

Colonel

Cottrell's

They expressed themselves satisfied at the progress and

were really pleased, and provided us with solutions
to two or three of our most troublesome problems.
Our personnel will now definitely be paid and we have
enough supplies received and assured to give all
patients and staff who come directly in contact with
them 3,500 calories, which is far better than was
before possible.
I only hope they both fulfil their promise and return in
six weeks time, as we'll be able to show them
something really worth seeing - that'll teach them a
thing or two about what can be achieved if you pick a
first-class DP staff, treat them well, support them
through and through and give them a free hand. This
is a thing UNRRA has never really done before.
At last the camp hospital has been moved into the camp and
we've a free hand. Things are daily improving. The
weekly staff conference is a great success: it's
attended by the two doctors, chief nurse, lay
administrator, maintenance foreman, welfare officer
and kitchen chief - five Slovenes, one Croat, one
Latvian, plus two British UNRRA and one Dutch UNRRA
officer!
We leave it to the DPs as much as possible and it's held
in German with occasional lapses into Serbo-Croat.
Already a team spirit is developing and a real pride
and keenness in the organisation.
The two meetings
we've had so far both lasted four hours, which is too
long but certainly showed their interest.
By April
10th I'll be able to leave the place for a fortnight
in perfect confidence that things will carry on all
right.
Our Australian [camp] director and welfare officer have
both left - I knew they were going already in January
- and an American has taken over. Not brilliant, but
has quite an intelligent approach to the job and
might be much worse. I get on with him well and hope
to be able to influence him on the right paths! Our
new welfare officer is the American Miss Boester of
whom I wrote so warmly at Lienz in December 1945: she
is first-class and I get on with her excellently, so
the future looks pretty rosy.
The memo I enclosed last week was prepared at the request
of Zone HQ, although not quite in the form they
intended: I've had fifteen copies typed and sent them
261

to various influential people I've come across in the

refugee world.
"The memo I enclosed last week" was in fact also the one I had
promised the diplomat Michael Cullis when he visited the camp
at Lienz the previous August on his tour of inspection for
British Foreign Minister Ernest Bevin. It gave my conclusions
after two years of work with the Slovenes.
It may seem
patronising to the Slovenes of today, but it was not written
for their eyes, but to influence British policy-makers in
London and Vienna.
It is perhaps significant as an early
example of parliamentary lobbying, before the advent of today's
highly paid specialists. I sent copies not only to the Foreign
Office, UNRRA and IRO headquarters and the DP Branch of the
British High Commission in Austria, but also to Members of
Parliament in London who had shown an interest in the postwar
refugees, including the then Leader of the Opposition, Winston
Churchill, who acknowledged receipt.
I wrote the memo knowing I was returning home for good, and
anxious that there would then be no one on the spot to argue
the Slovenes' cause - they themselves of course didn't count as
they were "only DPs"!
Its context was the following:
(1)
UNRRA was closing in ten weeks, (2) the treaty setting up its
successor IRO, the International Refugee Organisation, hadn't
yet been ratified, and (3) control of domestic affairs was
being handed over to the Austrians, whose young government was
wide open to pressure from the Russians who still occupied a
quarter of their country, and from the Russians' friend and
ally Yugoslavia - the Moscow-Belgrade split only happening a
year later.
If one added to this (4) the vigorous left-wing
campaign then taking place in the Austrian press against the
thousands of right-wing refugees who were alleged to be
consuming the country's scarce food and other resources, and
the Slovenes had every reason to be fearful for their future.
Notes on Slovene refugees in Austria and Italy
Introduction
Discussions are now taking place, and plans are being
made, concerning the future of the several groups of
refugees that have failed as yet to return home.
Their present position is difficult, as they have no
means of submitting their own case for consideration
nor are they able to defend themselves against the
many attacks made against them by persons who are
often partial, prejudiced and ill-informed.
Even so impartial a body as the 'Manchester Guardian' news
262

service, for instance, recently published a statement

that
the majority of Yugoslavs in Carinthia do not wish to
go overseas.
They have rather the intention to
return to Yugoslavia and fight against the regime of
Marshal Tito.
This may be true of the 1,800 Yugoslavs, mainly Serbs, in
camps in the American Zone of Austria, but it
certainly is false so far as all except a small
minority of the 7,500 in camps in the British Zone
are concerned.
Three-quarters of the latter are
Slovenes, very few of whom had any such aspirations
even before the execution of General Mihailovic.
Such misleading statements, repeated and exaggerated by
less responsible papers, give the completely false
impression that the Yugoslav DPs are war-criminals
and fascists.
It would seem that there is a great
lack of reliable information on this subject, and the
following notes are aimed at meeting this need so far
as Slovenes are concerned.
The latter are of
particular interest to England as they form the
largest group of DPs in the zone of Austria for which
Britain is responsible.
Qualifications of writer.
The writer is British and is at present working as an
Admin. Officer with UNRRA.
His law studies were
interrupted by the war, and three years of service in
different countries with the Friends' Ambulance Unit
further developed an interest in the objective and
cautious study of controversial subjects.
He has
followed Yugoslav affairs closely since September
1944, when he worked in El Shatt DP camp for 25,000
"partisan" Croats from Dalmatia: he had there good
opportunity to appreciate the quality, energy and
idealism of the original partisan movement.
He started work with Slovene refugees in May 1945 shortly
after their flight into Austria, and has lived in the
closest contact with them for 21 months. He can thus
claim to have a more detailed knowledge of their
nature and background than perhaps any other allied
officer in Austria except Major Sharp of the British
Information Service, Klagenfurt.
He has a limited
knowledge of Serbo-Croat, but has conducted most of
his conversations with Slovenes in German or Italian.
263

General background
It

is common practice to discuss the problem of the

"Yugoslav" DPs.
This leads readily to confusion as
there are in reality three separate problems - those
of the Serb, Croat and Slovene DPs.
The historical
background to the three groups is different, their
social composition is different and the outlook on
their future is different.
The differences in
temperament, habits and character between a Slovene
and a Serb are as great as those between an
Englishman and a Frenchman.
The writer claims to
speak with authority only on Slovene problems.

One of the smallest peoples of Europe, composed of one and

a half million inhabitants, pre-war Slovenia was
intensely proud and conscious of its nationality,
language and culture, although it realised that it
could only hope to survive by remaining united with
the larger unit of Yugoslavia.
The continual
pressure brought to bear on Slovenia by the Germans
and Italians would, if successful, have resulted in
their national extinction and therefore hostility to
these two countries was traditional.
This hatred,
aroused by the fear of extinction, was greatly
increased by the sufferings they underwent at the
hands of the German, Austrian and Italian occupation
troops during the war.
Under

the Italians these took the form of pillage,

looting, burning of villages and the wholesale
indiscriminate deportation of Slovene youth to
internment
and
concentration
camps
in
Italy:
conditions in some of these camps were very bad, and
of 50,000 persons deported, 5,000 died in internment.
The Germans deported from their zone almost all the
intelligentsia and leading farmers to Serbia, Croatia
and Germany, and killed over 20,000 Slovenes in mass
reprisal hostage executions.
The hatred remains
still so strong that a mother will be ostracised by
the peasant families for teaching her children the
German language.

Political background
Superimposed upon these hatreds came the enmity between
catholic and communist. Slovene politics since 1941
have been extremely complicated, and no simplified
statement can give a true picture. It can however be
264

said with confidence that the Slovene DPs are no more

collaborators than were the Royalists or ELAS in
Greece, or any civilian population under occupation.
There is certainly a very small number of war
criminals among them, and possibly 1% could be
described as collaborators: but the great majority
are in no way guilty and many were faithful and
energetic workers for the allies during the war.
They left their country as a result of the unfortunate
Balkan
political
system,
which
shows
neither
tolerance nor mercy to the defeated political
opponent. All parties are alike in this respect and
between the wars communists were thrown into prison
and maltreated by the Royal Yugoslav government. To
refer again to the example of Greece, if the civil
war in that country had ended differently and the
forces of EAM had gained power, it is probable that
most of the leading officials in that country would
have fled: they would have been DPs and would have
been told that the fact that they were not willing to
return home was proof that they were war criminals
and collaborators.
As it happened they were not
defeated in the political struggle and instead of
being DPs without rights they are the recognised and
respected government officials, mayors, teachers and
farmers of their country.
It is stressed that in the above paragraphs no judgment is
intended on the merits or claims of either party in
Greece or Yugoslavia. The point to be established is
this: that while it is a justifiable assumption that
a Dutch or Norwegian DP who refuses to return home
was a collaborator, this assumption is not justified
in the case of a Slovene any more than it is
justified in the case of a Balt.
Political
conditions and methods are radically different in the
two pairs of countries mentioned.
Origin of DPs
In the next paragraphs are given some notes on the origin
and present distribution of Slovene DPs. The figures
given are approximate and probably to some extent
inaccurate, because the writer has not access to all
official records and because such statistics as are
available deal with "Yugoslavs", not subdividing the
totals between Serbs, Croats and Slovenes.
However
as ignorance on the subject is so general even a
rough survey should be of use.
265

Slovene refugees can be divided into three main groups:

1. a few hundred of the refugees, who were sent on
forced labour to Austria and Germany during the war,
have failed to return home.
Some 300 of them, who
were formerly housed in a camp at Wolfsberg, Styria,
are now at Judenburg camp, Styria.
2. several thousand Slovenes left their country and
entered Austria or Italy between May 5th and 10th
1945, when the Yugoslav government troops were
advancing towards the Austrian frontier.
Some fled
because they had relatives in General Mihailovic's
army 166 and feared reprisals, some because they had
previously been outspoken in their condemnation and
opposition to the communist system, some because they
were not willing to remain in Yugoslavia under the
authoritarian regime and many because they were
panicked into flight by wild and exaggerated reports
of the treatment of the civilian population at the
hands of the advancing army.
Over 1,000 of the
latter group have returned home and it is expected
that many more will do so during the coming spring
and summer.
It is estimated that 7,000-10,000 of
group (2) are at present in Austria and 2,000-3,000
in Italy: of those in Austria 4,300 are in UNRRA
camps Spittal and Judenburg.
3. a large further number of Slovenes have fled or
been expelled from Yugoslavia since the end of the
war. The expulsions occurred mainly in December 1945
and the majority of those expelled were Slovene
Volksdeutsch who were deservedly hated for their
conduct during the occupation.
A minority however
were of pure Slovene descent with clean war records,
who were ejected either because they happened to bear
German names or because they were known to be
unsympathetic to the government. These refugees are
not eligible for UNRRA care, but are none the less
refugees and in need of assistance.
Composition and character of DPs
About one in six of the refugees are townspeople, the
remainder being from the country: the majority of the
townspeople are from Ljubljana (Laibach). The people
from the country form a representative cross-section
166

. my inaccurate description of the Slovene Domobranci.

266

of a normal rural community and all come from a small

geographical area: farmers are in the majority but
there is the usual quota of mayors, teachers, priests
and craftsmen. On the other hand the townspeople are
mainly drawn from the intelligentsia and black-coated
workers, with teachers, clerks and students strongly
represented. There is a high proportion of children.
The majority of the refugees owned their own farms at home
or worked on the family farm, there being very few
hired
agricultural
workers.
Their
land
was
mountainous and not fertile, and they are therefore
steady, industrious and accustomed to hard work. At
the
same
time
being
small-holders
they
are
independent by nature and do not tolerate domineering
leaders but will obey reasonable leaders who have
their respect and confidence.
They are used to
managing their affairs on democratic lines, and once
they have elected representatives will follow their
decisions with discipline.
They have a high social
conscience and form a closely-knit and cohesive
community.
In particular they are enthusiastic for
education, their standard being one of the highest in
Eastern Europe.
Their crime rate is low, crimes of
violence being very rare.
The Slovenes are devoutly catholic and the church holds a
position in their country that is strange to American
or British people.
Many welfare, youth leadership,
journalistic, cultural and educational posts that
elsewhere would be occupied by laymen are among them
discharged by priests. This predominant position of
the church has its origins far back in their national
history. It is probable that the Germans would have
succeeded in their aim of Germanising the people, if
it had not been for the tenacious opposition to their
pressure that was led by the catholic bishops.
The
priests were thus in large part responsible for the
survival of the nation and have ever since been
accepted as the nation's leaders.
Two

further characteristics of the people can be

mentioned.
The first is their strong insularity.
The peasant is convinced that the world revolves
around Slovenia, and cannot conceive that less than
one Englishman in a thousand is aware of the
existence of his nation. Even the intelligentsia is
remarkably limited in outlook and narrow in its range
of ideas.
The second characteristic is their
passionate devotion to their land. No one that works
267

with them can fail to notice their sorrow at being

parted from their land or their yearning to return,
to retill their fields and to resume their work
together with their friends.
Repatriation
Some months ago a large number of the refugees intended to
remain in Austria if possible: they were unwilling to
return home but did not wish to emigrate as they were
reluctant to move to a place further distant from
their relatives in Slovenia.
Recently however
because of more unsettled Austro-Yugoslav relations
and the increasingly hostile attitude of the Austrian
press to all DPs, most of the refugees have changed
their minds.
At present it appears unlikely that
many Slovenes in camps will try to stay in Austria.
It is impossible to assess the number that will
emigrate
when
the
alternative
is
presented
emigration or repatriation.
If political conditions
became only slightly milder at home, the great
majority would go back. But if conditions remain as
uncompromising as at present, it is unlikely that
more than 1,000-2,000 will return.
There is little anti-repatriation propaganda in the camps,
and
what
there
is
has
small
influence
on
repatriation.
If the church and the intelligentsia
had the overwhelming influence over the people that
is sometimes attributed to them, and were using it to
oppose repatriation, the thousand Slovenes that have
already returned home would still be in the camps.
In reality the deciding factor on repatriation is
certainly the frequent letters that the people
receive from their relatives and friends at home. In
the summer and autumn of 1946 the tone of these
letters was optimistic, and following the advice
contained in them many refugees returned home. More
recently they have been less encouraging, usually
telling the people not to go back, but to wait until
May or June.
The actions and policy of the Yugoslav government have
also great influence on repatriation.
The Stepinac
trial, for instance, and the reported plans for the
introduction of the collective farm system in
Slovenia, have not encouraged repatriation.
A
further influence is the news that they receive of
the experiences of those that return home. Many are
able to go back to their own houses and resume work,
268

but inevitably the fate of others has also made a

strong impression.
The case of Maria Kocian, for
instance, was reported in the Yugoslav papers.
She
returned home, and for a year lived in an institution
similar to a convent. She was then brought to trial
and sentenced to three years imprisonment.
The
writer does not know further details of this case,
and has no intention of discussing its merits, but
wishes solely to point out the influence of this, and
similar cases, on repatriation.
Emigration
Commissions from the British government are visiting camps
to recruit workers for various industries.
The
opportunity will be an excellent one for certain
refugees and perhaps a number of Slovenes will go:
but the scheme as at present described cannot absorb
any considerable proportion, as England is prepared
only to take single workers or perhaps small family
groups.
The only other country [sic] offering immediate prospects
for large numbers is South America.
Firms in Chile
are reported ready to accept and pay the fares of
considerable numbers of immigrants, but as only
labour for plantations is required the project is
unlikely to evoke any response.
Ecuador has ample
fertile soil for thousands of immigrants, but a
complete lack of finance, so that although the
country
is
attractive
settlement
would
appear
impractical. The Brazilian and Argentine large-scale
schemes, which are for industrial and agricultural
labourers, do not attract the Slovenes, who wish to
receive individual small-holdings.
There remains the special Argentine scheme, details of
which are given in letters received by a Slovene in
Austria, copies of which are attached [see page 000].
The writer has been informed that the letter has been
shown only to a handful of DPs specially interested,
in view of the adverse influence it might possibly
have
on
repatriation.
The
letters
are
of
considerable
interest,
although
the
information
contained is incomplete.
No mention is made of any
advance of money to cover living costs for the first
months until the farms become productive, nor is
there any reference to the provision of temporary or
permanent housing.
Also the statement that the
International Welfare Organisation has funds for the
269

transport of 10,000 refugees to South America sounds

too good to be true.
The

letters however are written by two men with good

reputations for responsibility and reliability.
Mr.
Kosicek was a leading Slovene journalist before the
war and was sent to survey the situation in Argentine
by
Dr.
Krek,
the
virtual
representative
for
emigration matters of the Slovene refugees. The Rev.
Hladnik is a much respected Slovene priest who has
worked for fifteen years in the Argentine and has
excellent connections with the government and church
there.

Conclusion
The number of refugees that will return to Yugoslavia in
the
near
future
is
dependant
on
political
developments in that country: the number that will
require resettlement cannot therefore be assessed
immediately with any confidence.
Their conduct in
and out of DP camps during the last 21 months has
however shown clearly that if given the minimum of
outside help they are more than capable and ready to
help themselves, and that they would form excellent
immigrants to any country offering them reasonable
conditions of entry.
23.3.1947
The people I sent the memo to included:
* Major Blake, military attache to the Commander-in-Chief of
British Forces in Austria, the army being due to take over the
camps when UNRRA closed down at the end of June. He responded:
.. It was very interesting and you have certainly taken a
lot of trouble.
I will see it gets to the right
quarter. As there are likely to be DP 'developments'
in the near future it may be of great value. ..
*

Major Gerald R Sharp, British Information Service,

Klagenfurt, the British military intelligence officer
specialising in the Slovenes mentioned at the
beginning
of
my
memo.
He
responded:
I want to thank you for taking the trouble to send me
a copy of your memorandum on repatriation of
Yugoslavs, which I found most interesting.
Please
send me copies of any other such memoranda on this
and similar subjects that you may have occasion to
write.

Colonel

Hall,

Deputy

Director,
270

Displaced

Persons

Branch,

British Forces in Austria, who responded verbally.

* Peter Gibson, Intergovernmental Committee on Refugees,
Vienna, an old colleague from FAU days (see page 00).
He
responded:
Thank
you very much for sending me a copy of your notes on
the Slovene refugees. We had already received a copy
from our Klagenfurt office, and I am proposing to
send one of them to our Public Relations Section at
Headquarters,
as
they
frequently
ask
us
for
information of this sort.
I hope you have no
objection. No doubt you have heard of the continual
rumours of movement of Slovenes to the Argentine. On
our side we have heard nothing definite yet, and it
seems that if anything is done it will be as a result
of Church pressure, since our own missions have not
been very successful.
* T R Hobson, the labour MP recently in Austria on a
parliamentary delegation studying refugee camps.
He
responded:
Thank you very much indeed for sending me your views
on the above people, I appreciate your action.
I
shall pass them on to other members of the
delegation.
* Major [now Sir] Tufton Beamish, MC, the conservative MP on
the delegation. He responded:
Thank you very much for your letter enclosing your most
interesting article on Slovene DPs. I am very
grateful to you for sending this to me.
* Winston Churchill, MP, then leader of the Conservative Party
and of the parliamentary opposition, who acknowledged receipt.
* M.F. [now Sir Michael] Cullis, United Kingdom Delegation,
Moscow, c/o The Foreign Office, London. He responded:
I am writing to thank you for being so kind as to send me
a copy of your very interesting report on Slovene
Refugees in Austria and Italy. Not only have I read
this with considerable interest for its own sake, but
it has also been valuable in connexion with some of
the discussions on Displaced Persons which we have
been having here in Moscow in connexion with the
Austrian Treaty. (my bold) If I am in Austria before
you conclude your operations, I shall hope to have
the pleasure of seeing you again.

271

C H A P T E R

1 1

25 March - 30 June 1947

The regional head of UNRRA spends a day at the camp,

meets all the Slovene group leaders and urges them to
return home, and then after hearing their objections
tells them not to be afraid because UNRRA will help
arrange their emigration.
Two weeks later the new
UNRRA camp director "advises" eighteen camp leaders
to resign their posts and dismisses eight high school
teachers after the Yugoslav government accuses them
of obstructing repatriation.
Pernisek has to find alternative employment and is
taken on as a farm labourer, but the job does not
last long.
The TB Centre receives a series of
favourable
inspections
from
senior
UNRRA
administrators. The main camp is again raided by the
British military police.
Pernisek's young son has
his first communion. I send home a copy of my final
report on the TB Centre and an account of the
distribution of the clothing and cotton thread mailed
by my mother.
Pernisek finds a job on another farm and is called on
to troubleshoot an internal dispute within the
Slovene community. I hand over the TB Centre to an
eccentric veteran relief worker with experience of
fieldwork in Belgium in World War I.
She sends me
news of the Centre's fate after I return home and
fifty years later I solve the mystery of her
hostility to a respected refugee doctor.

272

The Pernisek diary:

25th March. Today is the feast of "Mary of the Arrival of
Spring".
**The swallows should be arriving but
there's still too much snow and it's a bleak and damp
day. We're celebrating Mothers' Day, and at nine the
High Mass for children and mothers, the Missa de
Angelis 167 sung by the boys, was beautiful. Our young
son was very happy when he pinned a paper heart on
his mother's breast and our daughter a posy; she also
In the afternoon
gave her a "spiritual bouquet". 168
the children performed a special concert in the
hall.**
Mr.

Chapman 169 , the chief of the UNRRA Mission in

Carinthia, spent the day in the camp.
He called
together all the group leaders at nine in the evening
and told them his impressions of his fortnight's stay
in Yugoslavia. He wanted to visit 14 people from our
camp who'd returned home to Slovenia but didn't find
even one at home. Interesting! I didn't attend the
meeting but spoke with some who were there and they
said he talked with objectivity about what he was
able to see.
He tried to persuade them to return
home.
When our people explained their views on the
regime and the amnesty and told him about the poor
experience our people had had, he apologised and
withdrew his statements. As he, at the beginning of
his talk, was painting a grim picture of the
prospects for our immediate future so, after the
explanations we gave, he told us we shouldn't be
afraid, we'd be looked after and they'd help us
arrange our emigration. In the afternoon he spoke to
the whole camp over the public address system, but
was very brief.

30th

March. ** Palm Sunday.

The youngsters are very
happy, proud of and boasting about the gaily-coloured
Palm Sunday bouquets they've made.
They show them
off in each of the barracks and they're critically
examined to judge whose is the finest and largest!
Some are even decorated with oranges.
A happy and

167

. Mass of the Angels

. A Slovene custom for children to put in an envelope and
give to their parents a handsome piece of paper on which they
have written how many Masses or specific prayers they are
offering up for them
169
. Mr C.D.Chapman, an Australian.
168

273

animated crowd gathers in front of the chapel waiting

for the blessing of the bouquets. It's only a pity
that it's raining heavily and that disturbs the joy
and festive spirits.
My small son is happy because
he has a big, beautiful Slovene bouquet.**
4th April. ** Good Friday and the first Friday of the
month, a gloomy, cold rainy day.
We've come to
expect some new disappointment each first Friday, but
feel confident God is visiting and trying us with
troubles and tribulations because he loves us and is
preparing us for our future.
Our cross grows daily
heavier,
our
suffering
greater.
You,
Lord,
experienced the same.
Your way led through Calvary
to the triumph of Easter morning.
After a lengthy
Good Friday full of suffering, may Easter morning,
resurrection and a new life shine on us also!**
8th April. We've a new camp director from Columbia called
Novarino, dark-skinned, dark hair, otherwise nothing
special.
I was summoned to see him this afternoon,
there were some eighteen of us.
Without any
introductory
greeting,
more
like
a
sergeant
addressing his men, he told us they'd received
complaints from the Yugoslav government against us
all, many against some, fewer against others.
He
therefore advised us to resign from the camp posts we
held to avoid the suspicion we were obstructing the
repatriation
of
our
fellow
countrymen.
Our
withdrawal would benefit us and also the rest of the
refugees. We shouldn't regard this as an expression
of mistrust (when was a kick an expression of trust!)
or dismissal. The posts were being held for us and
the withdrawals were only temporary.
So director Novarino forbade eight high school teachers
from teaching: the director prof. Marko Bajuk senior,
prof. Bozidar Bajuk, eng. Marko Bajuk junior, the
botany teacher prof. Dr. France Mihelcic, Dr. Franc
Blatnik, the teacher of Slavonic Studies prof. Janez
Sever, Dr. eng. Ludvik Zagar and the teacher of
physics and physical education Pavle Kveder.
The
climax of the director's speech came when he said
there would be nothing against us resuming our
positions when this pressure finished - UNRRA had
embarked
on
a
fresh
three
month
repatriation
campaign.
This

was a unique introductory speech for a new camp

director at Spittal - a greeting combined with a
274

diktat; we don't expect much good from this man.

Though as a person he's probably not bad, he'll be an
obedient servant and faithful executant of the orders
of his superiors.
We'll find some way out of this
predicament.
It'll be an enormous blow to the high
school but director Bajuk loves his pupils too much
to abandon them, and he's resourceful and persistent!
13th April. I've become a forester. I spend all day in
the woods, gathering firewood and pine cones and
sometimes dandelion leaves.
Mostly I'm on my own,
reading a lot and learning languages. Sometimes old
Mr.
Kremzar
keeps
me
company.
We're
old
acquaintances but always kept a respectful distance,
now I find what he has to say most interesting and
really enjoy his company. I feel well physically but
under great stress, and I notice the same with Mr.
Kremzar.
It's most fortunate the weather is lovely
and there's spring in the land.
15th April. Today the Archbishop of York Dr. Garbett came
to the camp. He only had time for a fleeting visit,
entered the kitchen and one barrack and then left.
He was visiting the British garrison at Spittal and
took the opportunity to drop in at least at our
refugee camp. Accompanied by senior church and army
officials, he had a talk with the camp director to
find out about conditions and then made a very quick
perfunctory tour. He didn't go through the camp.
22nd April.
I'm fed up with wandering in the woods and
the atmosphere in the camp is getting me down.
It
upsets me seeing how sad and disheartened people are.
The food is getting worse every day and the rations
smaller and smaller.
Why should I kill time
wandering the woods like a hungry wild animal when I
could get work on a farm?
Although I've no farm
experience I got a job today as a day labourer at
Tangerner farm, downstream by the river Drau.
My
wife goes and sews there fairly often and gets paid
in kind, in food.
The owner has just returned from a prisoner-of-war camp.
The fields are naturally rather neglected so he was
pleased to hire me. We'll see how it goes. I spent
the whole of my first day planting potatoes but I'm
not alone, there's also a man called Tone from
Dobrava, a farm worker and so good at the job, and
also a very kind and good person.
An Ukrainian
called Ivan was ploughing the field and treated the
275

horses with kindness and ploughed well.

and he told me he'd be leaving soon.

We chatted

26th April.
I think I've passed the trial period as a
hired hand well.
The work is hard and exhausting,
but much more interesting and pleasant than in a
factory or building roads.
The food is good, well
prepared and nourishing, and I may eat as much as I
want, and that's why I'm able to work.
I'm slowly
getting used to dealing with cattle and horses. The
owner is a wise man and isn't driving us hard; he
doesn't need to, as we love to work, and work well
and hard.
I go home tired and am able to sleep
soundly.
I like farm work and can honestly say I feel better among
cows and horses than among some of our people in the
camp.
During the day I forget completely all the
troubles and difficulties of camp life and feel
really free, but when I return home in the evening,
leave the Tangerner's fields and catch sight of the
camp I experience a pressure on my heart, and once
again a nightmare lies heavy on my spirit.
Sleep
relieves me of my worries. But the job finishes soon
and I'll have to return to the camp, as the owner
will be able to manage all right with only one hired
hand.
Erste Mai, wieder frei! 170 Last year I almost
1st May.
swore, seeing this poster, and this year I nearly did
so again.
Today we've elections for the camp
committee.
They are free, but naturally the camp
director
has
decreed
that
all
those
recently
discharged from their posts in the service of the
camp can't stand.
This was repeated over the camp
public address system again and again.
There were
leaflets,
posters,
word
of
mouth
propaganda,
falsehoods, slanders against individual candidates,
witty jokes but also brazen lies about people of
integrity.
People at last showed their true faces.
The conflict is unambiguously partisan: Spittal
against Lienz. There's still a small group among the
Spittal people who even now maintain with all their
might an agitation against those who came from Lienz
and make a stand against the majority who want to
elect experienced, hard-working and reliable people
to positions of authority.
The result of the
election showed that the people retained their good
170

First of May, again free!

276

sense.
5th

May.
*The second anniversary of our becoming
refugees.
In
spite
of
all
the
suffering,
deprivation, poverty and a hundred other difficulties
the two years have passed quickly.
God has guided
and protected us marvellously, often without our even
being aware of the dangers from which we were
preserved and the intrigues taking place behind our
backs. We must thank God every day for listening to
our prayers, because we don't even know the evils he
has averted from us.*

There's not the slightest prospect of an early return

home, although during the two years the situation has
changed profoundly.
Who, apart from us, in those
days thought of the possibility of a third world war?
The Americans were infatuated with the Russians, the
English drunk with victory, in their eyes we were
fanatical clerico-fascists and collaborators.
They
didn't or couldn't or didn't want to understand our
opposition to communism.
They were sure western
democracy was advancing triumphantly and in five
years there would be world order.
And today? The Americans are furious at the Russians who
push ever deeper into Europe, the hero Tito is now
seen as a bandit, a criminal who shoots at American
pilots.
The whole world is gripped in a war of
nerves which could any day change into a third world
war.
Time flies by, political developments follow
one another at a dizzy speed. So we live for ever in
fear that events will swallow us up. What'll happen
then?
Repatriation propaganda grows stronger every
10th May.
day.
The new director Novarino is a campaigner for
repatriation
pure
and
simple,
and
not
very
intelligent at that. **Today he banned the printing
of Taboriscnik171 , quoting in support a decree of
UNRRA and the Military Government.
Dr. Blatnik had
published a "Refugee Letter" and sent it to refugees
outside the camp and abroad, and also to Major
Sharp 172 , but it fell into the wrong hands and a great
issue was made out of it at UNRRA and Military
Government because it apparently contained some
171

. The Camp Dweller

. the British Intelligence expert on Slovenia, see pages
00 and 00
172

277

untrue
allegations
about
UNRRA.
An
UNRRA
investigation came to the conclusion it could only
have been written by someone actually living in the
camp, as it used the same paper as the Taboriscnik
and the print was the same.
So once again dr.
Blatnik has dropped us in it, and this time rather
badly.**
My letter-diary:
17th May. You must have put a great amount of work into
getting those parcels of clothes ready, thank you
very, very much. I'm quite certain every small piece
of material will be of some use: we have 500 small
children in the camp among other things. It's now a
year since the supply of substantial clothes, such as
it was, brought in by UNRRA has run out, and you can
imagine how well one set and a half of clothes will
last a year of heavy work, when the clothes have to
be washed without soap usually!
The

same day as I arrived back from Italy Colonel

Cottrell, the chief medical officer from HQ in
Vienna, together with his chief from Paris, visited
the camp and did a pretty thorough inspection of the
TB Centre. They were impressed by the progress made
and the standard of work of the DPs.
A couple of
days later Brigadier Parminter, the head of UNRRA in
Austria, also inspected us and was very pleased with
the place. The Brigadier is very pleasant and human,
resplendent in red tabs and monocle, but is reputed
to be well-intentioned but weak.
Things have gone
pretty well during the three weeks I was away, and
I'm glad to say my staff gave good support to the
UNRRA nurse who was temporarily in charge. There is
still a lot to be done to make the place really
efficient, but it does now run reasonably smoothly.

The Pernisek diary:

29th May.
At 11.45 pm we had a visit from the British
military police.
They surrounded the barrack and
checked my documents and asked me what I'd been doing
during the war and whether I was with the Ustashe or
was an officer with the Domobranci.
The sergeant
asked if I knew Josef Novak and had earlier been a
clerical, so the source of the denunciation couldn't
have been clearer. Then they left me and went to the
Kremzars, but he happened not to be sleeping at home
that night. At five this afternoon they wanted to be
278

given lists of the inhabitants of barracks 1, 3 and

15 at once, so we saw what they were after.
That
night they looked for Pavle Masic and France Grum as
well.
1st June.
*Once again "Today is the day the Lord has
made".*
It's the first communion for our children.
Our Francek is also among the fortunate ones, and
very joyful and happy.
Last night he went for his
first confession and came home crying. We asked why:
at confession he didn't repent, he prayed to repent,
but didn't feel sorry.
It took a long time to
quieten and console him.
Today he's his old self,
happy and in a good humour. He lives his experiences
deeply.
My letter-diary:
2nd June.
Things are happening here quickly and always
changing.
The latest news is that the British army
will take over all the camps from UNRRA in the
British Zone of Austria (and Germany) and not IRO as
was earlier thought. So far as Austria is concerned
this is a very sensible decision as the number of
refugees involved is not enough to justify two
separate organisations. In the US and French Zones of
Germany and Austria IRO, the International Refugee
Organisation and successor to UNRRA, will take over
not only the UNRRA camps but also those administered
up till now by the US and French armies.
So far as Kaernten and Steiermark are concerned, this new
decision will be in the interest of the DPs as it is
unlikely IRO will have more supplies than the army,
and the army can look after the DPs' interests vis-avis the Austrians better than IRO. My main worry is
whether the army will carry on with the TB Centre.
It should be obvious it is of value but one cannot
count on that. I have a good friend in Colonel Hall
in Klagenfurt and hope everything will be arranged
OK.
*Thank you again for the great trouble you must have taken
with the clothes parcels: I do look forward to their
arrival.
It's months since the camps received any
clothes, and what with growing children and hard work
the people are always in need. As with the clothes I
brought back with me when I came back from leave,
this time I'll give most to the professional families
who are in the greatest need.
They have no
279

opportunity to earn high wages like the craftsmen,

and because of their position and self-respect cannot
be continually applying for help at the welfare
office as some of the peasants do.
Many are well
enough off and don't need help, but some are working
very hard for their people and almost destitute.*
9th

June.
*Ten parcels have now arrived!
All in
excellent condition, most strongly tied up.
I
started, together with my old clothing distribution
clerk from Lienz, unpacking, sorting and dividing
them at eight in the evening and was finished at one
a.m.! The result was thirteen really useful bundles
for
twelve
professional,
or
semi-professional
families, who mostly worked hard for the community
for two years for little or no pay, don't patronise
the black market and have several children to
support.
The thirteenth bundle was for students
without families.

We made a list of the families most in need and considered

each piece of clothing separately from the point of
view of size, material, use etc. before allotting it
to one or other of the bundles. On the basis of this
careful distribution according to suitability we
reckoned that certainly over 90% of the pieces would
be used actually as clothing.
After two years of
experience in "making do" with clothing there won't
be much that's usable that will go to waste!
Particularly welcome were the many garments and
pieces of material that were suitable for women's
underwear and the gowns and evening dress, the latter
two items in particular being of first class strong
material -the sheet also was very valuable as linen.*
I thought you might like to see the enclosed note from Dr
Mersol, one of the families to whom I passed on the
clothing.
He has a wife recovering from a cancer
operation and four children 14-8 years of age. He is
chief camp doctor and virtual representative and
leader of the Slovene group, but his children are
some of the poorest clothed in the camp. His largest
son came to me to deliver the letter wearing his
"best clothes" - that brown jacket you bought for me
at Richmond, and which I took back with me to Lienz
with elbows, sleeves and edges completely worn
through!

280

The enclosed draft final report may interest you:

Report on TB Centre, Spittal
June 1947
Personnel
The chief nurse has been changed and the new
chief nurse has shown more initiative, energy and
authority than her predecessor.
When she has had
more experience she should fill the post most
satisfactorily.
The former chief nurse has taken
over the supervision of the Centre linen and
blankets, and is very fully engaged in repairing and
altering such material as the Centre has.
A fourth
char-woman has been engaged to clean the barracks
recently opened.
General
The following statistics show
(a) number of in-patients at beginning of month
(b) number of beds free
(c) total number of beds available and
(d) average number of in-patients over the month.
(a)
(b)
(c)
(d)
1st March
48
19
67
49
1st April
55
12
67
59
1st May
62
17
79
64
1st June
69
42
111
All patients now lie on spring beds and we have a total of
over 90 spring beds available.
A dentist's room has been equipped and the camp dentist
visits the Centre two afternoons weekly. Cooperation
between him and the Centre staff is excellent. A new
system has been introduced of dividing all patients
into four categories, according to the times at which
they are allowed out of bed: small cards marked A, B,
C or D are hung at the head of each bed. It is hoped
that this will make easier the enforcement of rest
periods by the nursing and other staff.
On 19 May
Dr. Gomez arrived from Trieste with the mobile mass
X-Ray unit.
The Centre medical and other staff
helped in the testing of the unit, and the van
finally departed for Judenburg on 4 June.
On the 13th May a large consignment of hospital
*Supply
equipment and furniture was collected from St. Marein
camp and a few days later a quantity of cupboards
were received from Grodig and benches from Vienna.
Release notes for two cubic metres of wood and ten
kilo nails have been received through the supply
officer Klagenfurt and urgently needed bedside
lockers are being made from the material.
We have
281

now enough furniture and material to cover our

minimum needs for the opening of all the barracks.
Sheets still are our most urgent need.*
Construction
Work on the open-air shelter has already
started and it is hoped that as a result of generous
help from the Camp the building will be soon
finished.
In the meantime a tent on loan from the
Camp offers open-air shelter for the ten patients
most in need of it.
The regular damping of the
canvas is being tried to reduce the temperature.
Welfare
Further valuable equipment has been received
from YMCA/YWCA, Klagenfurt.
The programme of
activities for the patients has been continued and
extended but a temporary setback and drop in interest
has been experienced as a result of some very hot
weather.
A walk taken by the majority of patients
accompanied by doctors and nurses into the local pine
woods to avoid the great heat in the afternoon was a
success and will be repeated under close medical
supervision.
Mass is now held regularly in the dining room and is well
attended.
A loudspeaker has been installed and
connected up with the Camp public address system: the
patients receive through this medium cheerful music,
news and repatriation propaganda. The Camp orchestra
has agreed to give the patients in the Centre a
weekly open-air concert: the first concert will be
held on Saturday evening.
As this will be the last UNRRA monthly report
Conclusion
on the Centre, an assessment of its development and
usefulness may be of use.
The Centre has been
organised specifically to achieve the best treatment
practicable for DPs of a variety of nationalities
suffering from tuberculosis.
It is adequately
equipped for the treatment of 110-120 patients, the
eleven barracks of which the Centre is composed being
in a reasonable state of repair.
The medical and
nursing staff have such specialist experience in the
care of tuberculosis as to make the treatment offered
of
a
substantially
higher
standard
than
that
available in individual camps: they are also provided
with X-Ray, clinical and laboratory equipment not
available to other camps.
For three months regular weekly staff meetings have been
held, at which the departmental chiefs have met to
282

discuss the most efficient solution to the various

problems that have arisen: the work of the Centre is
thus well coordinated and an excellent team spirit
has developed.
The chief doctor is well-qualified
for the post and is supported by a keen medical
staff, a capable radiographer and a reliable doctordispenser, who keeps his card index of drugs with
great
accuracy.
A
hard-working
chief
nurse
supervises the work of the other nurses with
initiative and authority.
The two welfare officers are discharging this particularly
difficult job with imagination and energy, although
development in this department has been slow.
The
improvement in the morale and behaviour of the
patients in the last three months has been marked.
The two officers are highly intelligent and give
valuable help in every side of the Centre's
activities, although sometimes they lack forcefulness
and initiative.
The admin. chief is a man with considerable experience in
administration and personnel management: he is well
qualified
to
discharge
the
functions
of
lay
superintendent and in general to coordinate and
supervise the activities of the Centre under the
technical control of the chief doctor. Storekeeping
of food and other commodities is carried out with
great accuracy by him and a most reliable clerkstorekeeper (both were qualified accountants and bank
clerks in Yugoslavia). The office is efficiently run
by these two men and a clerk-typist, particular care
being taken with admission, discharge and other
records. There is good cooperation with the medical
and admin. staffs of the camps served by the Centre.
The

hard-working
and
variously
qualified
cleaning,
maintenance and laundry staff is led by a resourceful
and most energetic foreman, who works under the
admin. chief.
The kitchen has a capable chief who
keeps
detailed
food
and
calory
accounts
and
supervises the work of a reliable staff.
The great
majority of the patients are well satisfied with the
food preparation and the doctors take a close
interest in its quality.

Many services are received from D.P. Camp Spittal, without

which it would be impossible to run the Centre: much
material of great value has been received from the
Camp. The closest cooperation is maintained between
283

T.B. Centre and Camp hospital, and relations are

excellent with the various Camp officials with whom
the Centre has to deal.
Relations with the local
Austrian health authorities are also cordial.
The chief doctor speaks good English, the radiographer,
doctor-dispenser and the two welfare officers speak
it to a limited degree, and the office staff have a
sufficient
knowledge
to
handle
English
correspondence.
All senior staff except the chief
nurse speak fluent German. The two welfare officers
between them cover such a range of languages that
they have to date had no language difficulties with
the 133 patients that have been admitted to the
Centre.
In general the Centre is sufficiently developed for it to
run smoothly and maintain its standard of work with a
minimum of supervision. The work of the senior staff
in particular has been closely observed over a period
of three months and it can be said with confidence
that they are responsible, hard-working and worthy of
trust.
If
for
any
reason
(repatriation,
resettlement, illness) personnel leave the Centre,
the chief doctor and admin. chief can be relied on to
recommend the most suitable substitutes available.
Notes

(1) To the above survey of the staff at present

employed it must be added that the personnel is by no
means perfect. Much of the staff has had little or
no experience in this kind of work.
Differences in
temperament have caused considerable difficulties so
far as cooperation between different departments are
concerned. One or two members of the staff are lazy
or unwilling to undertake work that does not lie
distinctly in their department - this latter failing
is however rare.

(2)

There is a general reluctance to being firm and

enforcing discipline among the patients, although
this is not peculiar to this Centre but is a
characteristic of DP camps in general.

(3)

The senior staff have also little experience or

understanding of the establishment of simple routines
whereby regular functions can be simply introduced
and enforced: there is a tendency to adopt with
enthusiasm an idea and after two weeks let it drop
for lack of a systematic routine.
This is
particularly so in the case of health education and
284

propaganda.
(4)

It is however hoped that these difficulties are

largely to be ascribed to the Centre's "growing
pains" and should continue to diminish.

The Pernisek diary:

13th June. I'm in Tyrol again, land of pleasant memories
for me, as a hired hand with farmer Vincent
Gugenberger of Ober Pirkach by Oberdrauburg.
*The
people of Carinthia call this district Tyroler Toerl
or the Gateway to Tyrol, where the Pustrica valley
begins, and Lienz is only a few kilometres away.* I
know the Gugenberger home from earlier, because when
we were at the camp in Lienz my wife spent a lot of
time there sewing and they paid her in kind. **She
had plenty of work, but the family suffered.
Every
day she travelled by truck with Hungarian prisonersof-war who were repairing the banks of the river
Drau, and returned with them in the evening.
Gugenberger really needs workers as it's the time for
mowing, cultivating and hoeing.
I'll have a go and
see how it goes and how much I can do. The work I'm
doing now is heavy, but I won't and mustn't fall
behind the other workers.
Mowing is hard and
exhausting, and when I lie down to rest in the
evening my hands are numb and when I get up in the
morning I can't bend my fingers and the first hour of
work is torture.
I comfort myself that I'll get
hardened to it, and in fact I have. It was easier at
Tangerner's as we worked slower, more calmly, with
good-natured Tone. He used to say, "don't be in too
much of a hurry! Whoever overworks as a day labourer
is a blockhead and if he dies from overwork they toll
a basket for him, not a bell".
And now I'm an honest-to-goodness day labourer.
When I
started the farmer told me he'd no money for wages:
he inherited the land from his father together with a
large debt he's trying to pay off.
So he won't
register me with the labour office, but pays me in
kind with food. Because we were starving in camp I
was very happy, and in fact he gave me enough for the
whole family.
As workmate I've a retired railway
worker Lojze, a strong, stocky man who likes to rest
now and again for a chat when at work. Then I also
get some rest!
The lightest job for me is leading
the horse, a heavy, slow beast, and the farmer is
285

pleased with the horse and with me, while he uses the
plough to earth the potatoes and maize.
Where the
fields are small and narrow I do it with a hoe.
So all's well.
Food more than enough, appetizing and
nourishing.
Before we start work there's "mush"
waiting for us on the table, a porridge made from
wheat, rye or maize flour boiled in milk in a large
copper cauldron.
While it's still warm the lady of
the house puts large chunks of butter on top, and
then the butter melts all over and forms a lovely
coating as it cools off. The master prays and we all
dig into the dish. The porridge is quite thick, and
we cut it with our spoons and put pieces into our
mouths.
It's delicious and sustaining, and I'm
always thinking of the morning slush in the camp and
the morsel of sour bread made of anything except real
flour.
During the morning the lady of the house brings us some
lovely smoked ham and bread, and cider to quench our
thirst.
At midday there's vegetable or potato soup
on the table, and ham dumplings made of bread.
They're hard enough for snooker balls but very tasty
because they're full of crackling and as large as the
cockroaches which creep around the fireplace. We've
salad as well, made sour not with vinegar but with
the liquid from sauerkraut mixed with sour cream.
Lojze and I have some difficulty getting it down! In
the afternoon we've the same food as for the morning
break, and in the evening a kind of maize cake
immersed in warm milk. The bread itself is flat and
hard. The people in Tyrol don't grow much wheat so
they use it very sparingly, as do the people of
Carinthia.
The lady of the house only bakes bread
once a fortnight and when it's cooled off locks it up
in a chest so it doesn't get eaten too quickly.
We get meat or chicken quite often, and dried meat or
mutton.
There's a story about chicken meat.
The
village nestles in the foothills of the Zilja Alps
and the Lienz Dolomites, and birds of prey, eagles,
vultures, hawks and others, circle round high up
above the villages all day on the lookout for prey.
And the children are the watchmen! When they see a
bird stop in the air and get ready to swoop down to
the earth, they grab their sticks: and if the thief
falls upon the chicken they scream and hit him again
and again. Of course some hens get hit too, and the
hen which doesn't get up after the battle goes into
286

the pot.
I

can't forget the black flat cake: baked from the

unleavened dough of wheat and rye flour, it was very
tasty.
She put it on the table when it was still
warm, and after we finished the soup she brought in a
large earthen jug filled with heated half-melted
butter.
We cut triangular pieces of black cake and
dipped them into the butter - a simply delicious and
sustaining morsel. The grease ran off our chins! We
ended the meal with stewed fruit or small fruit
cakes.
At haymaking or the harvest season a lamb
sometimes fell victim to our need for food.

What bothered me most about the kitchen however was the

swarms of flies and cockroaches.
In the camps we
were free of bed bugs, fleas, flies and mosquitoes
but in the farmsteads around here there's too much
vermin.
I don't know what the meals were like on
Sundays as I went home to my family then.
Each Saturday early in the morning the lady of the house
would fill my rucksack with food for the journey:
flour, lard, salt and other things I'm supposed to
take to the Alpine dairy maid. I started off before
six, going towards Mount Hochstadel.
The road was
steep, the knapsack heavy: I was bent going up the
hill, my knees almost touching my chin, and had to
stop and rest quite a few times, but I enjoyed the
magnificent view of the valley below. The river Drau
wound her way through like a snake, and lovely
looking villages and churches followed one after the
other: Lavant with its pilgrimage church, Lienz,
Nikolsdorf, Oberdrauburg, Graifenburg, all the way to
Steinfeld.
At about ten, breathless, I reached the Alpine farm on the
side of the mountain and greeted the dairy maid,
shouting very loud because she was deaf.
Anyone
could have heard our conversation: even the cows
paused and looked curiously in our direction.
She
gave me a large piece of the fresh loaf I'd brought
her, with some sour milk.
She then made the hard
boiled corn mush and covered it with warm milk.
After the meal I sat down to savour the beautiful
view of the Carinthian Alps and Dolomites, looking
like serrated cathedral steeples reaching up into the
sky.
I was aware of an eagle circling majestically
high above me.
Just before midday I used to start off towards the valley
287

carrying my rucksack of cheese and butter, lighter

than the morning load.
Going up the mountain I
didn't look too closely at the mountain path, but
going down I had to be careful as it became very
slippery. I reached the farmstead in record time and
handed over to the lady of the house the goods and
messages and greetings for the children from the
dairy maid. Then I took a bath in the rivulet nearby
and changed my clothes, and Lojze and I went to
Oberdrauburg station, very happy with rucksacks full
of food, he to Villach and me to Spittal.
So one day followed the next and I was getting used to the
hard labour on the farm.
I learnt a lot of new
skills, even how to look after cows and horses; and I
must say I was quite happy among the farm animals.
The work was heavy and I was very tired in the
evenings. For my rather weak constitution this work
was really too much - beyond my bodily strength. I
was particularly exhausted after the Saturday morning
climb up the mountain but I was healthy, my nerves
were steady and I calmed down considerably.
I was
living in unspoilt countryside without gossip, radio
or newspaper.
The only contact with the outside
world was the postman, but even he appeared very
rarely. I was living outside the world like a bull
on a pasture!**
Dr. Mersol asked me to convene a meeting of
16th June.
leading men in the camp to discuss the questions of
organisations and of Dr. Vracko.
People seem to
agree that, in these critical times when a new war is
inevitable, emigration across the ocean is the only
solution. There are rumours the communists intend to
carry out a coup and seize power in Austria this
autumn.
A Balkan Soviet Federation and a Danubian
Federation - of which Austria will be a member - will
come into existence in the autumn.
The Slovene Carinthian communists have started a powerful
drive against us which will probably be stepped up;
even the communists in the camp have become active
and hold meetings at which they discuss how this or
that one will be "singed".
Yesterday they'd a
meeting in the room of Tratnik the black marketeer.
Trobec announced to his comrades that Yugoslavia will
carry on with a non-violent repatriation, but if this
doesn't succeed heads will roll and, if necessary,
heads such as Blatnik's.
So more difficult and
unpleasant days await us.
288

Dr.

Vracko
has
seriously
lost
favour
with
his
collaborators because he visited Trobec. They don't
trust him any more and don't want to go on working
with him.
We don't blame him personally because we
know he's under particularly heavy stress.
He
worries about his family which stayed at home, it is
calling him home very powerfully and he'd like to get
support from us that what he's doing is right. Yet
he'll be more miserable and perhaps more unfortunate
if he continues as he's doing. We'll have to settle
this friendlily and with great sensitivity.

My letter-diary:
25th June. Up to a fortnight ago we all expected the IRO,
the International Refugee Organisation and successor
body to UNRRA, to take over the UNRRA camps.
My
successor had already been sent here and then it was
suddenly announced that the British army authorities
would take over. There was chaos and confusion as a
result. One thing was clear to me, and that was that
if the TB Centre was first handed over to the IRO man
and then after two weeks handed over by him to the
army, all continuity would be lost and the efficiency
of the Centre might suffer considerably to put it at
its least. The IRO man speaks no German and is not
particularly interested in the place anyway.
So when it became clear the army would take over I wrote
to Colonel Hall offering to stay on a couple of weeks
after finishing with UNRRA, so that I could overlap
with the army authorities.
He passed my offer to
Colonel Logan Grey, his chief in Vienna, who said "he
would be glad to accept Mr Corsellis's generous
offer."
So as things stand I should be home about
July 11th. I'll let you know more as soon as I know.
This is the last letter I sent my mother. I returned home for
good on the 5th July in order to complete my legal training in
Oxford.
The TB sanatorium was a remarkable example of what
refugees can accomplish on their own, with relief workers or
private agency personnel attached to them as "enablers".
But
some private agency personnel had serious limitations, and I
interrupt the normal sequence of the Pernisek diary for a
couple of pages to give an example of this.
I handed over the sanatorium to Violetta Thurstan, a 68-year
old former hospital matron with a spectacular record of service
with the British Red Cross in the First World War - twice in
289

Belgium, two months as prisoner of the Germans, Russia twice,

Poland, Macedonia and France, invalided home with shell shock
and the Military Medal. She wrote to me in England at the end
of July:
I expect you will be wondering how we are all getting on.
Luckily we are doing very well, all is quiet and
harmonious - and everybody very good (except some
naughty patients who went off to sleep in the camp
for a change - coming back very early in the a.m. to
their beds here).
We are getting on quietly with
some of the improvements. We have a recreation room
now for the staff, and a flourishing occupational
therapy room with a part-time teacher.
It is still
being proposed that we move to a better site - but
nothing settled.
It has been a bad month for the patients, very hot and
constant thunderstorms. We now have 84 patients - we
get about two or three admissions every day.
The
dispenser asks if you could possibly get Vol I of
Martindale's Pharmacopoeia - I understand you got
them Vol II, but they urgently need Vol I.
I
promised to ask you about it.
I am sure everybody
would want to send you a message if they knew I was
writing and then this letter would take many more
pages than I have time for - so I had better stop.
She wrote again in November:
I got your letter yesterday and as I happen to have a free
moment (I don't get very many) I will answer it at
Away from the
once.
First of all we have moved.
dust of the high road, the fog of the valley, the
baking huts, the frightful difficulties with fuel, to
a heavenly spot five minutes from a pine forest
beside a trout stream, glorious views of snow
mountains, facing south and flooded with sunshine.
It is an old Messerschmidt factory near Seeboden,
Millstaedtersee, very well adapted for a hospital,
with central heating everywhere, a lovely kitchen all
electric that can cook for four hundred people,
constant hot water, a very good recreation room for
the patients with piano, radio - a carpenter's bench
and other amenities, a separate chapel - a nice
garden but not very big.
I found this place and nagged at the authorities all the
summer till at last I got permission to move.
The
next day the agreement between Allied Commission
290

Austria and International Refugee Organisation was

signed and IRO at once sent a message to say we were
not to move.
I can't serve two masters and as ACA
had told me I could move, I went on quietly and got
all the patients up here. Then there was a fine to
do. People rushed down from Vienna, and Dr. Clement
said he did not approve of the move as the place was
too small - it was only a short-term policy - it did
not solve the T.B. problem etc etc (Nobody ever
thought it did). Dr. Clement said he wanted a place
for a thousand patients, we can only take a hundred
and fifty here.
I left them all to squabble among
themselves and went on with the move and the comfort
of having these patients so warm and happy and well
done by - I can't describe.
IRO are very angry with me, but I can bear it - the
patients are the important part.
I could not leave
them there to freeze. We were getting one metre of
wood every third day - only enough to heat the ward
for an hour and a half in the evening - there was
practically no wood in the camp. I had 106 patients
and 37 out-patients waiting to come in, kitchen not
big enough serving meals in relays till 8.30 pm, no
laundry, and with that large number of patients very
very ill some of them, (one died the week before we
came up) the washing had got quite beyond us.
Lekan and the staff are very happy to be here, and Dr.
Kovacic is beside himself with joy as he can really
have his patients well looked after now. We are not
being obstinate about it. If Dr. Clement can find a
place for a thousand patients, I shall be ready to
move these people there.
But there is no such
building in all Austria as far as I know.
We are having the ambulance up here, and I hope a 15 cwt
truck, so that we shall be fairly independent:
rations come up in bulk. We have nothing to do now
really with Spittal Camp. I wish you could pay us a
little visit and see what a lovely place we have got.
We are putting up three huts for the infectious cases
- otherwise everyone is housed indoors.
You ask how I get on with Dr. K. Very well. I find him
intelligent and cooperative.
Old Puc is a fool and
started by being very uncooperative. So I had him in
and told him if he went on in that way he would find
himself standing on the road with his little bag
waiting for a new job, and he has been much better
291

since.
But I don't find him very intelligent, and
not at all up-to-date.
Katrinka is moved to
Salzburg.
I have asked for a good welfare worker
instead of a nurse, as I have a very good
Oberschwester.
I am sure there is more news but I
haven't more time so this will have to do to go on
with.
For forty five years I heard no more about the TB Sanatorium
and Violetta Thurstan, and then the Pernisek diary threw light
on something that had puzzled me: her dismissive mention of Dr
Puc whom I had greatly respected, as had his fellow Slovenes.
Then in 1993 a monograph on "Violetta Thurstan and her
adventurous, exciting life" was published.
Born in 1879, she
died in 1978 at the age of 99, an authority on crafts and
weaving among the bedouins of the Libyan desert.
She had
qualified as a nurse already in 1905, was present at the siege
of Almeria in the Spanish Civil War and did recruitment,
intelligence work and lecturing for the Royal Navy in the
Second World War. In November 1944 she arrived in Cairo as a
relief worker with the Catholic Committee for Relief Abroad and
for the next two years operated between there, Rome and
Austria. In 1946, when 67 but only admitting to 55, she joined
the Displaced Persons Division of the Allied Commission
Austria.
Her biographer writes she was remembered with
affection, respect and sometimes awe, but adds:
Violetta could be overbearing, and it is easy to
understand how.
Her range of experiences by 1947
made her formidable. Most colleagues considered her
to be generous, firm but unsympathetic to those she
felt "did not meet the mark".
She made no excuses
for her terse comments or irritated rejections of
individuals found lacking.
She never apologised
whatever the circumstances.
Franc Pernisek completed the story in his diary entry of the
12th October 1948:
Dr.

Franc Puc, the doctor at the IRO DP tuberculosis

sanatorium at Seeboden, came to see me today for a
long talk.
A very unhealthy situation and tense
atmosphere has arisen there.
At first Mr. John
Corsellis directed the hospital when everything ran
very well as he was strict, conscientious, fair and
completely impartial.
In June 1947 he was replaced
by an elderly sour-faced lady of bizarre temperament
and behaviour, English, a Catholic, Miss Thurstan.
She brought with her another lady called Ela: she was
Austrian, a convert and a dress-maker by profession,
292

but Miss
sister.

Thurstan

installed

her

as

senior

ward

Under Miss Thurstan's protection Ela became more and more

autocratic, insolent and impertinent to the nursing
personnel, ward sisters, office staff and even the
doctors and interfered directly in their professional
work.
Today she has created an unbearably hostile
atmosphere between herself, the patients and the
nursing staff.
The doctors gave the patients their
medical advice, she hers: she has given the patients
different drugs to those prescribed by the doctors
and driven patients out of the chapel although the
doctors had given them permission to attend services
there.
So patients complained to Miss Thurstan, but she ignored
their complaints and Ela continued to harass people
to such an extent that one day there was even a
brawl.
Dr. Puc complained in his professional
capacity to Miss Thurstan about her behaviour but she
only shouted at him rudely. The doctors and sisters
then sent a complaint signed by Dr. Puc and 26 key
employees of the hospital to IRO headquarters in
Klagenfurt, which naturally sent Miss Thurstan a
severe reprimand. She reacted by reproaching Dr. Puc
for disloyalty because he had signed the complaint,
and threatened to prevent him emigrating to the USA.
He told me the whole story, full of anxiety and seriously
afraid of the harm this petty-minded woman could do.
I did my best to calm him down, suggesting he forget
about her altogether and place his trust only in God,
knowing that He will help him, as he is a deeply
religious committed Christian. I also told him that
no officer or manager in the IRO stays long, because
of
constant
transfers
due
to
unsatisfactory
interpersonal relationships.
He seemed to be
consoled but I don't know if he was really reassured.

When I read this I worried about what happened to Dr Puc. Was

he able to emigrate? I was not reassured until September 1993,
when his daughter Marija told me what happened (see page 00).
He got to the USA in 1949 with his wife, seventeen year old
daughter and sixteen year old son and they settled in New York
City. He found a job as a night-watchman and hospital orderly,
learnt English, repassed his medical exams, requalified and
worked as a hospital anaesthetist until retirement. The couple
had seventeen grandchildren and died at the ages of eighty and
293

ninety-one, "very thankful for what they had and happy".

We now return to 1947 and the next entry in the Pernisek diary:
29th June.
In the afternoon the executive committee of
the Slovenian Social Committee had a meeting, after
changing its name to the Slovenian Refugee Advisory
Board.
Dr. Miha Krek has chosen new members:
Monsignor Skrbec, Pernisek, prof. Sever, Dr. Blatnik,
Mavric, Lekan, Markez, Ambrozic, Dr. Puc, director
Marko Bajuk.
Dr. Vracko has been dropped.
In the
evening we had a performance in the theatre of
Everyman, which was most successful.
Brunsek is an
excellent actor and also an admirable stage-manager.

294

C H A P T E R

1 2

1 July - 31 December 1947

Emigration
starts,
and
at
the
same
time
a
deterioration in food supplies and an increase in
pressure for repatriation.
A new Anglo-Yugoslav
intergovernmental agreement on displaced persons adds
to the Slovenes' fears, and the camp director for his
part
behaves
with
greater
autocracy
and
insensitivity.
Adult
male
Slovenes
are
too
frightened to remain in the camp overnight, and sleep
instead in the woods or in the barns of friendly
farmers.
Morale rises with the arrival of a first consignment
of Swiss gift parcels, accompanied by letters of
support and good wishes.
Pernisek takes part in a
round-the-clock vigil of intercession in the chapel,
praying for deliverance from the pressure.
The
unusual behaviour of the Slovene leader Dr Mersol
suggests post-traumatic stress disorder.
Relations
between the Slovenes who have lived at Spittal since
July 1945 and those transferred later from Lienz
begin to improve, and mutually hostile factions
unite. Yugoslav government secret agents continue to
stir up trouble in the camp.
Military Government Klagenfurt banishes from the camp
54 Slovenes with their families, including the
Perniseks, in response to accusations from Belgrade
that they are impeding repatriation.
Pernisek
prepares to leave the camp but falls ill.
He is
admitted to the local Austrian hospital and his
family finds refuge with a friendly farmer.
The
intergovernmental agreement is abrogated and pressure
on the Slovenes lessens.
Pernisek spends Christmas
in the camp hospital.

295

The Pernisek diary:

1st

July.
Emigration across the ocean has started
gradually with the first contingent for Venezuela,
including some Slovenes, leaving Spittal camp early
this morning.
OZNA 173 checked on the loading, as
little Mr. Rak took a walk through the camp and
conferred with Trobec.
The camp director Novarino
takes his leave today - each one is worse than the
last.

17th July. Planned and premeditated starvation gets ever

worse - starve them, freeze them to despair and push
them back home and then they can say, "they went of
their own free will". We got a thin red bean soup at
lunch today, and the quality and quantity of the
bread is very poor. And today they took away all the
stoves from the rooms, leaving them only where there
were families with small babies. Only barbed wire's
lacking to turn us into a genuine concentration camp.
The well-known Major [sic] Maclean 174 was walking round the
camp today.
He was the principal British liaison
officer with Tito's partisans during the second world
war.
He speaks Serbo-Croat, and he's asking where
and who are the domobranci and the chetniks.
He
comes across as an absolute cynic from the way he
acts and speaks, going round the camp hunting and
catching young lads and men and asking if they've
been with the domobranci. If they say no, he asks if
they
are
anti-communists;
when
they
say
they
certainly are, he asks why, if they were anticommunists, they didn't join the domobranci.
The
man's a cad.
Maclean is back going round the camp and
5th August.
asking where the domobranci are, and these visits
bode no good. Why does this interest him so much at
this moment?
If anyone knows where they are, he
does. Can't he leave the dead in peace? Or rather,
is his conscience pricking him?
The food's appalling, just water.
quality, and much too little.
173

The bread's of poor

. Organizacija za Narodna Zascita, the Yugoslav secret

police
174

.
Brigadier
Fitzroy
(later
Conservative M.P. and later junior
author.
296

Sir
Fitzroy)
Maclean,
minister and successful

7th August.
A second
May God give them
country has masses
and enough tropical
16th

contingent leaves for Venezuela.

every happiness!
It's said the
of oil, not much drinking water
malaria.

August.
The Maclean Commission started its
interrogations, chaired by Major Stood.
They tried
again to catch Mr. Kremzar, calling him to the
kitchen to collect his ration-card in person, after
the camp sergeant had arranged things with the FSS 175
who were waiting in a car outside on the road, but
the two of us were watching them from a nearby hill.
The police drove off after talking briefly with the
sergeant in charge of the kitchen.

1st September. Today it was my turn to be interrogated by

the Maclean Commission, by a civilian who seemed a
decent sort of fellow and spoke poor Serbo-Croat. It
went something like this.
"Your surname and
Christian names".
I give them.
"Do you have any
document?" I show them. He can't believe I have so
many, because most people have none with them. "Did
you live all the time at your birthplace?" I say no,
because I studied at various places and lived longest
in Ljubljana.
I show him my Ljubljana municipal
identity card.
"Did you have a job in Ljubljana?
Where?" I show him my certificate of appointment at
OUZD 176 and the one of my passing the professional
examination.
"Was OUZD a German agency?"
I answer
briefly no.
"Are you married?", I show him my marriage certificate.
"Any children?" and I show him both children's birth
certificates. "Where do you plan to emigrate?" "To
England".
He winces slightly, but says nothing.
"Did you serve in the Yugoslav army?" "Yes". "Were
you called up? Where? Became POW?" "I was called
up at Slavonski Brod, but I wasn't made a POW". "Do
you have relatives at home?"
"I've a mother and
sister in Ljubljana".
"Did anyone threaten you?"
"Personally, no. But in general, yes, like they did
everyone else".
"Are you in contact with your mother and sister in any
way?" "We write to each other, but that's the only
175

Field

Security

Service,

the

British

police
176

. social security organisation for workers

297

army

security

contact". "Are they happy at home?" "My mother was

put in prison, they ransacked the flat.
They shot
her son, they took everything from my sister and she
had to do forced labour for very many months, and
they did the same to my mother. I think they're not
happy in view of all they had to undergo, because
they simply can't feel happy". He promised I'd get a
certificate and the result of the interrogation in a
few days. We rose and bowed to each other, and on 12
September this gentleman personally gave me a white
card numbered L 658 with Maclean's signature, so I'm
white!
9th September. *I had a bad headache and couldn't get up
in the morning. I got up later, washed and shaved,
but the headache got steadily worse. I felt chilled
and shaking and the fever grew in strength. I took
my temperature at around 11 am, and it showed 38.9 C.
I vomited green liquid.
Dr. Puc saw me and said I
had severe blood poisoning in my left foot. Earlier
I'd had a small wound in my fourth web space which
got infected in the communal bathroom. I had to stay
in bed till 15 September.*
19th September.
The socialist newspaper Die Neue Zeit
today carries a report from the socialist press
service that during the next few weeks 7,000 Slovene
refugees in Carinthia will be repatriated.
So
something is being prepared and once again the
English must be concluding a dirty deal. On the 8th
September an Agreement between the United Kingdom and
Yugoslavia concerning Yugoslav displaced persons was
concluded in Bled.
It was signed for Britain by
Charles Peake and J.S.Steele and for Yugoslavia by
Vladimir Velebit and Gen. Lajt. D.Lekic.
Its
substance, as set out in the Die Neue Zeit 177 , is as
follows:
The UK and Yugoslav Governments agree that their
respective
governments
should
jointly
make
a
concentrated effort finally to dispose of the whole
question
of
Yugoslav
individuals
and
collaborationists still living under British control.
To attain the best result, the Yugoslav Government
will send a special high-ranking mission to the
Special Commission for Refugees in Vienna.
The
mission will devote itself principally to achieving a
close cooperation, and in addition will carry out the
177

The New Times

298

duties and be entitled to certain rights as set out

below:
The Special Commission and the Yugoslav mission will
exchange the necessary information to carry out the
interrogation of every Yugoslav citizen who the
Yugoslav Government wishes to be interrogated.
The
Yugoslav Government shall procure full information
concerning organisations of Yugoslavs opposed to the
interests of the United Nations and the repatriation
of refugees in the British zones in Germany and
Austria and in parts also of Italy.
The Special Commission will in the first place as its
first priority carry out an examination of Yugoslav
nationals in the British zone of Austria.
Besides
investigation in the camps a great effort will be
made to investigate the past and present activities
of all Yugoslavs living outside the camps.
The British Government will further in the shortest
possible time move from the British zone of Austria
to Germany all Yugoslavs in the camps who are
suspected of having actively assisted the enemy
during the war, or are suspected of being members of
any organisations trying to overthrow by force of
arms the government of their native country; or who
are working and endeavouring to dissuade their
compatriots from returning to their native land.
The Government of the United Kingdom is in principle
prepared to facilitate the provision in the camps
under its control of materials for delivery to the
Yugoslav
Government
to
expedite
repatriation.
Technical facilities will also be provided to speed
repatriation, including in particular transport.
The Government of the United Kingdom will hand over
all Yugoslavs present in its territories, against
whom the Yugoslav government will prepare verified
and authenticated cases of active and deliberate
collaboration with Axis forces in a way in which the
facts are established prima facie.
But if the
British authorities find that under its criteria a
prima facie case of guilt has not been established,
the individual will be released, if the person is in
British custody.
Naturally the signing of the agreement gave rise to
feelings of powerful fear among our compatriots in
299

and living outside the camps, and in particular those

living near the Slovene border.
People were
terrified of the outcome of the dirty deal. We are
of absolutely no account any more, rubbish blown into
the foreigners' backyard, and they want to clean it
up by whatever means so long as they get rid of us.
This constant pressure to return home was bad enough
so far.
Now it'll be intensified still further,
we'll be starved even more: more discrimination,
disdain, persecution and oppression.
They want to
break our spirit, yet we trust in God. He will not
abandon us, He will not humiliate us, He will save
us. This is perhaps our last, although worst, trial.
24th September.
Today's Vienna Welt-Presse 178 denies the
news item about the repatriation of the Slovenes. If
such a well-informed Jewish paper prints a story like
that, it does so with a purpose.
The whole affair
smells worse every day.
6th October. The new camp director has been investigating
our theatre accounts and printing press for a few
days, looking for hidden funds he thinks we've been
using to maintain and supply an underground antiYugoslav movement. He's going about the job sternly
like a policeman, and in doing so he's insulting and
humiliating people.
Even the mild Dr. Mersol has
reacted and protested in strong terms.
Up till now
he has done all the interpreting.
Our people
consider each new camp director worse than his
predecessor, and they are right.
These people are
only concerned for themselves, and are probably more
afraid of the sack than we are of repatriation. This
type of former officer is in the same psychological
and social state when faced by possible dismissal as
a convict after many years in prison, who's afraid of
freedom and human society, as it's so long since he
found his way around: the gulf is too deep and he's
unable to bridge it.
An example of the director's intelligence was given today,
when he interrogated Mr. Hocevar and me - him about
the press, me the theatre. He was asking what we did
with our income and how we bought the necessary
supplies. When inspecting the press he came across a
printed copy of the army plays: The End of the Road
and Everyman.
"Who translated these?" the director
asks.
"Oton Zupancic", Mr Hocevar answers.
The
178

World Press
300

major's secretary tries to explain to him who

Zupancic is.
He asks again, "who's Zupancic?"
"A
poet and the best translator of English literary
works into Slovene".
"Yes, but what's Zupancic's
job?"
the major persists irritably.
"He writes
poetry and prose and translates mostly from English",
answers Hocevar, who is also beginning to show some
irritation.
"But what does he live from?
Is that
all he's doing?"
"Certainly", Hocevar answers
briefly.
"And is he really busy?" persists the
major.
Dr. Mersol gets redder and redder in the face and shifts
with embarrassment in his chair. "Yes, very busy",
Mr. Hocevar answers rather abruptly.
"Well, is he
registered at the labour office?" the major asks very
abruptly.
Now there's a look of anger in Hocevar's
expression, but he calmly and in a dignified manner
explains that Zupancic is the greatest living Slovene
poet and lives and works permanently in Ljubljana and
so the Spittal labour office has nothing to do with
him.
Dr. Mersol had the greatest difficulty not
bursting out laughing, and his chair was creaking
with the effort. That was the end of the inspection,
without anyone signing any official document about
it.
12th October. The beginning of a week of a terrible war
of nerves.
A British military police sergeant from
the FSS told Dr. Blatnik, "now a wild hunt for
Slovenes is beginning" and, when asked who they'd be
hunting, answered, "all the teachers and doctors and
priests and the rest of the intelligentsia".
So that's clear now!
The Yugoslav government wants to
separate the intelligentsia from the people by any
means, and that would completely undermine the
foundations of our community structure.
If the
people are isolated, they'll pursue them with
propaganda and threats of arrest, sow discord and
quarrels, make camp life unbearable and harass them
if they don't yield to government demands, and
finally send them home.
Even now they're very frightened, because day after day
the coarse and uneducated leader of the official
Yugoslav mission, who has access to the camp, uses
threats and doesn't simply try to persuade them but
quite shamelessly drives them to return home. A few
days ago he told a woman, "Madam, please return home:
301

in this camp you'll see terrible things in a few

days' time".
This kind of remark spreads quickly
round the camp and people start panicking.
Most of
the men don't sleep with their families in the camp
any more, but in barns on farms in the neighbourhood.
The farmers aren't afraid of allowing this because by
now they know we're honest and reliable people.
Quite a few sleep in the forest, but the nights are
cold and wet, and it's difficult to sleep in the
open.
The Bled Agreement has started a severe war of nerves.
The fears are justified because the British have
committed injustices in the past: they've done this
to us already, and they'll use hidden force in the
future.
What do a few thousand Yugoslav refugees
mean if they are wiped out in the interests of
Britain?
They didn't care about millions of
Armenians, Boers, Indians and Red Indians.
They're
used to it. Each page of British history is marked
with the blood and tears of subjugated and betrayed
peoples.
13th October. The first consignment of gift parcels from
Switzerland arrived today and with the gifts a lot of
private letters, particularly for families and young
people.
Some people showed me them and they make
interesting reading.
So there are still people in
the
world
who
have
compassion
for
us
and
understanding for the oppression of spirit we suffer.
The letters are full of expressions of sympathy and
comfort. It's getting colder; a very strong wind was
blowing the whole day.
I've fallen ill.
I'm suffering severely
17th October.
from nerves, which affect my digestive system, and
I've stomach pains again. This trouble recurs every
autumn and spring.
I slept at Tangerner's and as I
was returning home in the morning I saw a long snakelike line of men walking across the fields.
They
were led by a scout who observed what was happening
in the camp and signalled when to stop and when to go
on walking.
The men were dishevelled and frozen as
the night had been very cold.
Poor men, many have
contracted rheumatism which will give them trouble
for the rest of their lives.
23rd October. Last night London Radio announced that the
British government had published the white book on
the Steel-Tito agreement, a model of moral depravity:
302

they haggle over us as if we were goods. People are

becoming more alarmed every day, and we mustn't hide
the truth from them but must explain what's
happening.
Maclean is in Vienna again doing a deal
with us as the objects, saying they'll remove us or
arrange our emigration so that a minimum of refugees
will remain in Austria. We're expecting to be moved
this winter: that'll be an enjoyable journey in
cattle trucks across freezing terrain into Germany!
There's no longer an item in the Austrian budget for the
maintenance of DPs.
Very reliable proof that they
reckon that, if not this year, certainly next year,
they'll
arrange
our
emigration
or
removal
or
facilitate our removal. But I'm confident they won't
succeed in breaking our spirit, do what they will.
There are too many from Gorenjska and Krasje who
never yield but rather bend and then spring back
upright.
We've been to see people who are deciding
about our future and sent messengers with clear
instructions and information and with requests to let
us know to whom we should go to discuss this most
important matter.
29th October.
Visit of the National Delegate.
Nande
phoned me that Mrs. Berta Weiss was seriously ill.
That generous and noble lady has done so much and
collected so many things for us. May God grant her a
speedy recovery and preserve her for her family and
for us. I've told people and asked them to pray to
God and the Mother of God for her recovery.
Exile
has given us many good people, and Mrs Berta is one
of the most generous and compassionate.
People are
very worried about what will come out of the BritishYugoslav agreement on the return of displaced persons
from the British zone of Austria; there are a lot of
conflicting reports, and from the Tito side also a
lot of threats. Mr. Pockar told Katra, "up till now
we've been working for repatriation, now it'll be
tougher".
30th October. The Swiss parcels have arrived and we took
delivery of them. Everything is packed beautifully,
and we hope the contents are equally good! There are
38 cases and 6 sacks of food.
1st November.
All Saints!
We're sad in spite of the
glorious weather.
The English police, the FSS, are
rummaging in the card-index in the registration
office; we're afraid of another camp raid as they
303

usually follow, the same as good weather is followed

by gales and rain.
In the evening large groups of
men leave the camp to sleep in the forests, while
those who have friends among the local farmers sleep
in barns or haylofts.
2nd November.
Sunday.
Most of the men are sleeping
outside, as could be seen from the attendance at
today's Mass. The nights are very cold. People are
furious at the British who are at this very moment
making a pact with Tito and deciding how to get us
back home. When will this nightmare end?
4th November.
2-4 o'clock I kept vigil with the Blessed
Sacrament in the chapel.
We've been holding a
perpetual adoration of the Blessed Sacrament since
the 1st November. 5-10 in the evening the women and
children; from 10-5 next morning the men.
At the
same time many of the men are seeking refuge in the
woods.
We're praying and entreating that a
favourable solution be found to the refugee question
through the efforts of Mr. France Gabrovsek in the
USA.
He's going for important consultations at the
highest level.
A visit of the Yugoslav commission
has been announced for today. They didn't turn up in
the morning.
Last night there was heavy rain, and
the nearer mountain peaks are white with snow.
Chief medical officer Dr. Mersol was in a disturbed state
today. He works too hard and doesn't sleep for whole
nights, sitting up working.
At night he drafts or
translates into English all kinds of memoranda and
petitions, beside keeping his own record of events.
The agonizing fear and worry about our future in
recent days have undermined his nervous system in
addition to undernourishment, and it's no wonder he's
in a disturbed state. He's the whole time meeting up
with and talking with dead domobranci. His physical
constitution was seriously undermined by the injuries
he suffered in the car accident in which the
excellent camp director Ryder Young lost his life.
If he had survived, things would probably have been
much better for us because we'd have stayed in Tyrol;
he had many friends among the higher military command
and was well thought of and respected.
Every night about 150 men and lads flee the camp to freeze
outside in the woods or the fields. We had a meeting
of the reconstituted camp refugee committee today.
Slowly the people from Lienz are uniting with those
304

from Spittal and the moral level is rising again.

This can best be observed from the youngsters, who
are much calmer and more hard-working in the
classroom; the suffering of their fathers and older
brothers has matured them, and they're also doing
extremely well in school.
There's an improvement
among the older people too.
Movement is slow, but
it's again up-hill.
It was difficult, but we made
it.
6th November.
Mr. Trobec is in the camp again together
with his cronies. People crowd round him, some grasp
at
every
straw
in
desperation
and
at
every
opportunity to lighten their anxieties, particularly
those who don't seek peace and consolation in prayer.
So Mr. Trobec can question everyone and build up a
picture from which to prepare his report for those
who sent him to us.
He asked one girl, "well, how
are things?"
She answered, very bad, and then he
answered, "well, they'll soon improve as you are
praying night and day for a change. Very soon they
will be quite changed".
The weather is magnificent
today, so people are more optimistic.
It's amazing
the influence the weather has on people's morale.
7th

November.
The Yugoslav repatriation mission are
walking round the camp accompanying the anonymous
English members, and talking at random with the
people, asking how they are treated here, when they
plan to go home or why they don't plan to go and
who's advising them not to go, and similar questions.

10th November. At 5 this morning the British army raided

the camp: we heard by radio they were looking for
British military deserters, black marketeers and
"some other people", but clearly they were looking
for people wanted by the Yugoslav government. I was
questioned. As I am a member of the camp committee I
was very anxious until the end of the raid.
11th November. At last the bomb has gone off. At 12.30
the camp director announced over the public address
system that following a decision of the military
government in Klagenfurt fifty-four individuals must
leave the camp (the married ones with their families)
and be transferred to St. Martin 179 camp at Villach,
179

. "The barracks were built extremely cheaply, with no

double glazing and single thickness wooden walls. ..
In 1946
the barracks were used to accommodate DPs.
Russians,
Ukrainians and Poles from other camps around Villach were
305

because they are suspected by the Yugoslav government

of obstructing repatriation and spreading antirepatriation propaganda.
They listed everyone by
name, and I was among them with my family, so on the
anniversary we must move again to an even worse place
and with greater insecurity.
I'm not going to St.
Martin! The place is a den of thieves! From there
they'll banish us to Germany. And then where?
The Bled agreement is being put into effect.
I'll seek
refuge with farmers; it won't be easy as there's no
more work available on farms and winter is arriving
in the countryside. God will help, as this is surely
the last of our Stations of the Cross.
It's an
appalling shock for me and the family. I fear for my
health: every autumn and spring I suffer pains in the
stomach and duodenum, of nervous origin but sometimes
very severe, and I already started having them during
the last weeks of mental strain.
15th November.
I'm beaten; the pains became so severe I
had to go to bed. Dr. Mersol admitted me to the camp
hospital, but I can't stay because I can't stay in
the camp. I'll have to go to the local hospital.
17th

November.
On Dr. Mersol's recommendation I was
admitted to the general hospital in Seeboden, and I'm
in a large male ward. It's very unpleasant as it's a
surgical ward: on one side there are very ill
patients and on the other men talking and smoking up
to 11 at night. The tobacco smell is pungent, like a
Russian tobacco I often smelt before.
Here it's
exactly what the Italians call a "common shelter",
I
"Qui si dormiva, si mangiava e si defecava" 180 .
don't know how I'll be able to stand the stale air.
I asked the doctor at the morning round if I could be
moved to a smaller and less crowded ward and he said
he'd speak with the consultant who decides these
matters.

18th November. My wife and children came to say goodbye:

they're going to Villach.
The weather's bleak and
freezing and the children were cold. In the morning
they transferred me to a smaller, airy and light ward
for just three patients.
*Mr. Franc Hradacky is
transferred there.
The camp held up to 2,000 DPs.
.. St.
Martin was considered to be one of the worst camps in the
British Zone." Stieber, op. cit., p. 235.
180
. Here one slept, eat, defecated
306

manager of the steam-saw mill Moolbruecke, 62, a very

pleasant man.
He has a complicated fracture of his
right leg which won't unite and often severe pains
but doesn't complain - there's no moaning here, like
in the big ward.
The second patient is a pleasant
lad, Joseph Troier, a railway employee, who has been
operated on for a broken knee-cap after a kick in a
football match. He's a keen soccer player and so is
trying every day to get back on his feet, so far
without success.*
The company is congenial and we
get on well together.
19th November. Sinko 181 came yesterday to say goodbye but
has caught a cold and is in the camp hospital. The
doctors have advised my wife against moving to St.
Martin as the child is seriously ill, so my wife and
daughter are staying with the farmer Tangerner who
was glad to take them.
The English have played a
good trick on us with the Bled agreement.
This is
only the beginning and St. Martin isn't the last
place we'll be sent to. From there the route is to
Germany, but then where?
They've started with the
leaders and then they'll soften up and terrorize the
rest. But God will not abandon his people, nor our
Blessed Mother.
Therefore I implore with all my
strength, "remember, most gracious Virgin Mary, that
never has anyone who has implored your protection
been left unaided".
Slowly the bad weather will be lifted.
God is maturing
and purifying us for his special purposes through
suffering, and I'm secretly hoping this is the last
major trial we'll have to suffer.
The people are
terrified and the Yugoslav mission is working on them
powerfully, but they still don't put their names down
for repatriation; they're saying, if they treat us
like this here, what will it be like at home?
23rd November.
I'm celebrating my fortieth birthday, in
hospital. Goodbye for ever to the good times we had
formerly: probably not much good awaits me in the
future. A few more years in a cold foreign country,
probably a few hard years! I dreamt of a beautiful
home and a happy family life, now only a few years of
struggle for survival and then the end, probably
cancer. I'm very downhearted when I see how my wife
is suffering, how she looks for an escape from our
predicament and can't find one.
A camp is a poor
181

. Pernisek's 9-year old son

307

refuge, a poor shelter: but when even that's gone,

one feels totally helpless.
For a poor man abroad
barren earth is even more barren, wrote Preradovic.
A DP is a poor wretch, a being entirely without
rights, despite the brave talk of human rights of our
rulers.
24th November.
My wife visited me with our daughter.
She's very depressed, and told me a large group of
people expelled from the camp are preparing to move
secretly to the American occupied zone. She wants to
join them but I begged and prevailed upon her to be
patient and stay. We should trust God who will take
care of us. I have to stay, as the consultant hasn't
yet decided whether to operate.
He sees me every
day.
It's my nameday and that of my room mate
3rd December.
Mr. Franc Hradecky 182 .
We both have visitors: our
wives and daughters.
We're all sad and the weather
is bad, with rain, snow and an unpleasant south wind.
9th December.
Today I had my twelfth injection.
The
consultant spent a long time with me and told me,
"taking into account your situation and that of your
family right now, I won't operate. I can see you can
bear pain and discomfort: you're an undemanding and
patient patient.
You'll be going to somewhere in
America, where you'll quieten down, live well and in
peace and get cured without the knife, and all the
physical symptoms will disappear".
Obviously this
surgeon knew all about my present situation.
I
certainly didn't tell him anything, so Dr. Mersol
must have briefed him well.
As my pains were
reducing he advised me to stay in hospital another
week and then return to my family.
He thought I
should be able to return to the camp as the Yugoslav
mission had left.
11th December.
A ray of hope at last!
The Carinthian
daily, Die Neue Zeit, carried a report from the
Yugoslav Tanjug agency that the Yugoslav government
has abrogated the agreement signed at Bled on the 8th
September on the repatriation of Yugoslav DPs from
the British zone of Austria.
There is therefore a
great hope our situation will improve and the
dreadful pressure for repatriation will stop, and
with it the inhuman treatment of refugees.
Still,
why was the treaty cancelled?
Do the Yugoslav
182

. the saint's day of St. Francis

308

authorities have something else in mind, or did the

British lure them into a trap, and then were not
prepared to carry out the agreement the way the
Yugoslavs expected?
14th December.
My wife is thrilled and the children are
overjoyed that I'm going home. Perhaps we'll succeed
in sorting things out by Christmas.
16th December.
I left Seeboden hospital today, having
said goodbye to the chief surgeon Dr. Kukusch, and
the farmer Tangerner very kindly took me in his
house.
When I called at the camp, my friend Lojze
Ambrozic 183 told me the camp director thought all the
refugees who'd been expelled would be able to return
soon: he only had to wait for an order from above.
18th

December.
Dr. Mersol admitted me into the camp
hospital, as he says I should stay in bed for at
least two more weeks. I have to get my food ration
card, but my friend Lojze will get it for me. When
Lojze promises, it's done!

22nd December.
Anica Dolenc told me Joze Novak attacked
me yesterday on Ljubljana radio, so he's home
already! He's completed his job, so there's nothing
to stop him! He was the communists' chief agent and
informant in the camp while performing the same
function for the FSS. Now he'll be an informer among
our people at home; when the people have had enough
of him he'll be kicked out somehow. He also attacked
Monsignor Skrbec and Dr. Vracko, labelling us
agitators and criminals.
All the same, the storm
will pass, Slovenia see better times again and
Comrade Joze Novak get his just deserts.
24th December. This year I approach Christmas with dread.
We arranged to meet at 6 in the evening to celebrate
in son Franci's hospital room, where there's a small
Christmas tree and underneath a small paper crib, but
it's all a tiny reminder of Christmas. We had just
sat down when we were told to get out of the room as
the director and Miss Meredith were visiting the
hospital and they shouldn't see us.
Still they
didn't arrive at once. I find the behaviour of the
staff very strange.
Franci is admitted to the camp
hospital with the knowledge and permission of the
183

. Small farmer and grocer, emigrated to Canada where he

died aged 76. He had seven children, one of them the present
Archbishop of Toronto, Dr Aloysius Ambrozic. See pp. 00.
309

director and Miss Meredith, and we certainly have the

right to visit our child on Christmas Eve!
Meanwhile they were giving out presents to the children in
the theatre.
Franci was crying, but understood it
wouldn't be sensible to go out of the warm hospital
room into the unheated assembly hall. At 7 there was
a little Christmas party in the women's ward for
those able to walk.
The boys and girls under the
direction of Mr. Rudi Knez sang some Christmas carols
beautifully, and we all had tears in our eyes. Mr.
Knez accompanied the choir on the accordion.
I was
overwhelmed and tearful: I lived through some sad
Christmases but this was the worst, and my wife and
daughter were crying the whole evening in their cold
room.
I visited no one and wasn't able to wish
anyone a happy Christmas. After the party I crept to
bed.

310

C H A P T E R

13

1 January - 31 December 1948

The army raids the camp again but Pernisek feels the
worst of the persecution is over.
Large-scale
emigration
starts
and
Pernisek
visits
the
International
Refugee
Organisations's
HQ
in
Klagenfurt
to
discuss
documentation
procedures.
Representatives of Dutch and Swiss charities visit
the camp and return home to redouble their efforts to
collect aid. The Yugoslav authorities increase their
efforts to spread dissent and disunity among the
refugees and so discourage emigration.
Pernisek is now living with his family outside the
camp and drawing the normal entitlement of Austrian
civilian rations.
He wonders if someone is making
massive profits out of camp catering.
A group of
girls leave for Canada, most already engaged to
Slovene boys who have gone there earlier.
The
Perniseks are allowed to move back into the camp, and
the Argentinean consul starts immigration to his
country.
Pernisek goes by train to another camp and notes how
polite
the
Austrians
have
become
to
"bloody
foreigners".
He sorts out transport procedures,
admires the camp's small industries and returns to
Spittal.
The first hundred Slovenes from Austria
leaves for Argentina.
Pernisek and his small team
prepare the travel lists and other documentation.
The camp choir gives its last performance as it
starts to disperse. A valedictory mass is celebrated
for the next group leaving for Argentina.
Soon the
camp is almost empty.
The Perniseks see the consul
and are accepted.
The Yugoslav communists try to
hinder emigration and Pernisek is warned not to leave
camp on his own for fear of them. As the year ends
the Perniseks receive their entitlement of clothing,
linen and footwear, and an Austrian shopkeeper wishes
the departing Slovenes godspeed.

311

The Pernisek diary:

3rd

January 1948.
The New Year started with new
disappointments. As I woke this morning good Sister
Ivanka came into the ward and told me that English
soldiers had raided the camp again.
They were in
position already by three in the morning, started
their search at five and finished at nine. They took
away four Slovenes and sent them to the concentration
camp at Wolfsberg, and also came to the hospital but
only had a look at the children's ward and then left.

After this unpleasant incident I once again begged God to

preserve us from this kind of emergency and give me
back my independence. I am totally independent in a
way now but still can't do anything, and yet I
continue in the firm hope everything will turn out
happily.
The New Year will bring an end to the
uncertainties and unremitting fear, and our, and with
it my, fate will take a turn for the better.
Last
year was one of the most difficult for us and brought
with it immense suffering. Already in mid-April I'd
a premonition something sinister would happen,
because they wouldn't bar me from office in the camp
without
some
political
reason;
there
were
indications even then that they would eventually
drive us out of the camps to break our spirit.
At the crack of dawn the always brave and
5th January.
devoted hospital Sister Irena came and warned me I'm
also on the list and had better find somewhere else
to hide.
Strange sensations take possession of me.
If it hadn't been Irena I might have thought someone
was pulling my leg to frighten me, but this girl has
gone through too many frightening experiences in her
own life and taken too many risks: she's truthful and
has too good a heart to do such a trick. Nor can I
imagine that someone would pull her leg, telling her
I'm on the list just for fun; she's very intelligent
and alert and spots things others aren't aware of.
I'm ready for whatever happens to me. I'm in God's
hands and know He won't try me beyond my power to
endure.
My conscience is clear regardless of any
black list I may be on, and I've a feeling the worst
of our persecutions are over. I'm happy when I see
there are kind souls looking after me and I'm
grateful to courageous Irena for her kind warning.
7th January.

My daughter received a lovely letter from

312

her pen-friend Rita whom she's never met personally.

These short and very affectionate letters are a great
consolation to us, like a ray of sun penetrating long
overcast days of sadness.
12th January.
Miss Meredith is going round the hospital
prying after me and the doctor in charge told me as
kindly as he could the time has come for me to find
somewhere else to hide.
They changed my name to
Perme Franjo, born 22.10.1906, occupation care-taker.
So the trials go on.
There must be an informer
telling Miss Meredith of my whereabouts. I'd better
not put his name down on paper, but I think I know
it.
30th January. At midday I got up and went to see my wife
who's sewing for Dr. Puc's wife in barrack 1. When I
got to barrack 9 I slipped, fell and broke my wrist.
I felt a terrific pain and almost fainted.
Drs
Mersol and Rijahin put my arm in a splint. Strange
coincidence.
My daughter was looking for me twice
yesterday and once today to tell me my wife wasn't
with Mrs. Puc, so I never met up with her.
31st January.
Today I was taken by ambulance to the
hospital in Villach, given an anaesthetic and had my
fracture reduced.
When I woke I'd a plaster on my
forearm and hand.
We're well treated in this
hospital.
In the bed on my right is the crippled
member of the domobranci Jozef Janez, on my left
Bergant, and there are two Hungarians and an Austrian
also in the ward. An X-ray showed the bone has set
excellently. When I returned home a few days later I
didn't go back to the hospital but found refuge in
barrack 36.
Here it's very peaceful even if I'm
close to the "beasts' den" as the next barrack is
called. I'm also far away from prying Miss Meredith,
because she doesn't come in this area of the camp:
she can't stand the noise of the students in the
"beasts' den" with their various musical instruments
and general din. My good friend Lojze again arranged
a food card and is looking after me.
Nothing like
this life-long friendship since we were together in
the OREL 184 !
22nd February.
Dr. Mersol removed my plaster.
The bone
alignment is excellent but the wrist is stiff, so
every day I have a bath, ray treatment and massage in
184

. Eagle, Catholic youth movement in Slovenia between the

wars
313

the camp hospital, naturally with Miss Meredith's

knowledge. Meanwhile there's still no permission to
return to the camp although she is always saying
we'll be returning because the Bled agreement has
lapsed and the Yugoslav mission no longer has access
to the camp.
8th March. Today I moved with my family into the barrack
belonging to the firm AIKA which lets out these
former autobahn barracks.
The leaseholders want me
to get a City Council residence permit so that I've
permission from that side as well. The move went off
very well and Miss Meredith lent me her official car
for the whole day and gave me permission to take with
me everything I need from my room: wardrobe, table,
chairs and bed. I can't understand her. We didn't
hit it off well from the very beginning, but now
she's as kind and obliging as she can be.
The
barrack isn't empty yet, it used to be occupied by
Dr. Francek Zebot, who has moved secretly with his
family to the American Zone of occupation 185 .
10th March.
I had a hard fight with the Mayor of St.
Peter in Edling.
The rooms had been authorised but
he refused to issue the ration cards. He was really
difficult but after I'd told him my whole life story
he softened a bit and said, "na ja, you're a
political refugee so I should and will help you".
He's an old Social Democrat and uncle of Mr.
Tangerner's wife.
When he realised my wife and I
worked for Mr. Tangerner he changed completely.
12th March. I've today got ration cards from the Council
after four months of great deprivation and want, but
with God's help we have happily surmounted these
difficulties also.
The saying goes, "when the need
is the greatest, God's hand is nearest". A number of
very good people, some total strangers, helped us
tremendously in kind and by showering their love on
us.
Also Archbishop Rozman helped us a lot
personally and through his new circle of friends, and
Mr. Nande Babnik did us a lot of good by encouraging
good local people to help refugees.
24th March.

Today I visited my brother-in-law Mirko at

185

. lawyer born 1911, brother of Anka and Dora Zebot (see

page 00), later became a professor in the USA, author of
Neminljiva Slovenija (Klagenfurt 1988) with chapters on
Viktring and Dachau, and the Viktring tragedy.
314

Feld am See. As I got off the bus a gendarme stopped

me, demanded my documents and asked where I was going
and what for.
It's my experience that if there's
ever a flea or a gendarme nearby they're sure to
attach themselves to me!
I certainly didn't look
like a tramp, and there are many roaming the roads
nowadays.
I usually dress appropriately when
visiting
people,
but
still
the
gendarme
was
suspicious.
When I reached my brother-in-law and
told him what happened, he and his foreman were very
angry. The latter had been a gendarme in my birthplace during the war and knows our people well. He
holds us in high esteem because he knows the
suffering the Germans inflicted on us.
We had a
pleasant meeting and I invited my brother-in-law to
visit us. The foreman gave me two pairs of new shoes
for the children, realising that our clothes would
have worn out by now, especially the children's.
28th March.
Easter Sunday!
Christmas was miserable and
Good Friday much the same, but we're celebrating
today joyfully.
There was a good procession last
night and a beautiful Solemn Mass this morning. When
the priest intoned the Resurrection Alleluia, a
joyful Alleluia burst out in our hearts too!
Thank
God our suffering is over.
There are always fewer
people at Mass, as smaller and larger groups leave on
transports to all parts of the world.
29th March.
Today my wife went with a large group from
the camp on a pilgrimage to the shrine of St. Ema at
Krka while I took my son to visit Mr. Hradecky, my
room-mate in the hospital at Seeboden. He's been in
Graz hospital a long time. Now he's started to walk.
21st April. My wife was sewing in Tristach, in the house
of Johana Jagodic, the papal delegate's sister, up
till the 19th April and then she suddenly fell ill:
they brought her home and Dr. Mersol examined her and
diagnosed severe jaundice. As we've permission from
the camp authorities to be treated in the camp
hospital, they came to take her there.
Both the
children are very frightened as they're behind at
school. I hope my wife will recover soon; Dr. Mersol
keeps telling me she will. I owe him an immense debt
of gratitude for his kindness and goodness and have
no means of returning it except by my sincerest
prayers.
29th April. I went today with Father Cyril to the HQ of
the International Refugee Organisation in Klagenfurt
and we spoke with Miss Prentis. She didn't say much,
315

but her lady interpreter made the most of it and kind

of took over: we can't do without interpreters, but
they're often a great nuisance.
The first question
was if we were the people who kept on writing to the
IRO: we answered yes, and she asked us not to.
We
both listened and said nothing. Then we asked her to
speed up the procedures so that we could move as soon
as possible to Argentina, and she asked if we had
money for the journey. When we said no, she said IRO
didn't have any either. We then went on to strictly
practical matters, such as preparing lists of all
those wanting to go to Argentina: it was decided the
best would be a card-index with exact details.
We then went to a pub with Mr. Janko Hafner who works for
the IRO, and talked over the practical issues in
detail; he told us that OREL used to organise its
one-day outings for its members better than IRO does
the emigration of thousands of DPs.
In the camps
they've crowds of clerks who are bored stiff, as
there are at HQ, but they're unable to produce
reliable lists.
He advised us to do it on our own
and at our own expense, so that IRO would have more
money left for emigration.
16th May.
It's confirmation day at Spittal camp, with
about fifty confirmands.
17th

Our people from Spittal camp went on a

May.
pilgrimage today to Zihpolje and Viktring, the place
of sad memories.
It was a glorious day, such as
we've had few this year.
In Viktring church they
prayed for their sons, husbands, fathers and brothers
who were taken from there directly to their deaths,
but suffered indescribable tortures before dying.

27th

May.
Yesterday the students went on outings to
different places, and came home tired and hoarse. My
daughter's class, which was led by prof. Luskar,
didn't get home until 3.30 in the morning. Today is
the Feast of Corpus Christi.
It rained early and
then the sky cleared and there was only a short
shower during the procession.
Three Dutch people
visited the camp at the invitation of Mr. Nande
Babnik: Dr. Koenver the director of Dutch Caritas,
Dr. Govaert a medical doctor and Mr. Cleuren a
photographer. They all speak fluent German and I've
been allocated as their interpreter and guide.

After breakfast we attended Mass, where the guests greatly

316

admired the choir's polyphonic singing. Mr. Cleuren

filmed the service and after it we joined in the
procession.
They were much impressed by the good
order, cleanliness and neatness of the people, how
beautifully they were dressed and the national
costumes of some of the girls and women. I explained
they'd brought them with them when they fled from
home, but their ordinary dresses were old and turned.
In spite of that, it's true they're better dressed
than the local Austrian population. They admired the
singing. During the procession Mr. Govaert asked how
many rehearsals we'd had as everything seemed to go
so smoothly. I told him we had no rehearsals at all,
ever; our people are used to order and discipline
from home already. "Yes," he said, "but one can see
you've already been living three years in the camp".
In the afternoon I went around with the photographer who
was filming scenes of camp life. Although everything
was very poor, he was impressed again by the order
and cleanliness of the rooms and friendliness and
politeness of the people.
He was surprised at the
number of children and old, and even very old, people
as well.
We went to the cemetery and saw some
refugee graves which he filmed.
The guests also
attended our evening May devotions which they liked.
After that we improvised a concert of Slovenian folk
songs for them in front of the theatre.
Foreigners
like Slovenian singing very much, those arranged for
choirs and especially popular songs. They then heard
two domobranci describe how they escaped from the
mass graves at the Roski 186 pits and hid for a long
time in the woods before returning to Carinthia and
rejoining their fellow refugees.
The Slovenes' insecurity and fear that the British might still
forcibly repatriate them, were increased by Britain's refusal
to admit that the original large-scale repatriations had taken
place at all.
Hoping to clear up this central issue on my
return to
England, I asked the Foreign Office for an
interview.
On the 12th June Mr Wallinger, the civil servant
"dealing with refugee questions", saw me.
I did not keep a
copy of the letter I wrote Father Franc Blatnik at the time,
but he gave his version two years later 187
186

. Roski pits = the pits in Kocevski Rog.

See Nikolai
Tolstoy's 30 page account in chapter 7 of his The Minister and
the Massacres: The Pit of Kocevje.
187
. "The official British answer concerning the repatriated
domobranci",
in
The
Viktring
Tragedy published by the
317

The British press has all along kept silent about this
English tragedy of shame, and maintains its silence
even today. In 1948 Catholic delegates from a London
organization questioned the government about its
cover-up of indifference. The answer was that about
600 Yugoslav collaborators were repatriated at the
end of May 1945; they had fled from the Yugoslav army
into Carinthia and British troops had disarmed and
returned them to their native country in compliance
with international law.
Apparently the delegates
were satisfied with and did not challenge the answer.
John Corsellis, the well-known English welfare officer at
Lienz camp who tried to understand and help our
refugees, wrote about this to Dr France Blatnik in
1948, and explained the English position:
" In view of the answer quoted earlier John Corsellis
wrote to the Foreign Office, astonished that the
government could give an answer which was untrue. He
told them he had been at Viktring at the time and
seen with his own eyes how many had been sent back,
and these were no collaborators. The Foreign Office
wrote that they would be very interested to hear from
him in greater detail and invited him to visit them.
When he arrived, they started by asking what he had
personally witnessed and then said, 'thank you for
such a detailed account.
It may have been as you
describe but we have different reports. These speak
of only 600 Yugoslav collaborators being repatriated.
Perhaps the figures are not completely accurate. You
must understand that our troops in Austria had a
precise objective at the time: to organize a defence
in the event of any attack by Tito or the Soviet
Union.
So they were not prepared for these
collaborators to turn up, nor did they want to have
much to do with them. That is why their report was
perhaps here and there inaccurate or insufficient,
but it's the only one we have.
The officers who
signed it have returned to civilian life, and the War
Office cannot trace them to get them to give a fuller
account of the whole affair, so that we are limited
to what we have. You maintain that over 10,000 were
repatriated.
We do not dispute this, but all the
same 600 remains the official figure for us because
that is the one that appeared in the reports made at
Association of Slovene Anticommunist Fighters (Cleveland, Ohio,
1960)
318

the time. Thank you very much for the interest you
have taken in the matter, and goodbye!"
Forty years later I discovered an answer to a Parliamentary
Question in 1946 which gave the total as 900, so that the
Foreign Office had been progressively re-writing history.
The Pernisek diary:
14th

June.
Today Mrs. Berta Weiss from Switzerland
visited the camp.
I'm acting as her escort and
interpreter.
Mrs. Weiss is interested in the
everyday life of our people, and one sees tears more
often than smiles in her eyes.
The poverty upsets
her greatly. In spite of it one doesn't see children
or grown-ups in dirty or torn clothes, and people are
clean and well combed, the men shaved, the rooms tidy
and no bad smells, even where there are small babies
in the family. She's the driving force in collecting
aid for Slovene refugees, and puts her Catholic faith
into practice.
After she saw all the poverty she
said she'd redouble her efforts to collect aid.

22nd June. *My wife had another severe attack of jaundice

and the doctors diagnosed inflammation of the gall
bladder.
She was admitted into hospital, where she
stayed until the 28th June.*
1st July. The Yugoslav authorities have been trying long
and hard to entice as many people home as possible or
prevent them emigrating.
They know well that every
refugee in his new homeland, when he ceases to be a
rightless DP and becomes a free man again, will be a
living and eloquent witness to communist atrocities
during and at the end of the war and will open the
eyes of all those who still believe in communism.
They have failed because the officials they sent to
the camps to persuade people have done it so crudely
and inhumanely they ended up disgusting even those
who yearned to go home with all their hearts, and so
they didn't go! The officials deserve to be punished
by the Yugoslav authorities, rather than press the
British authorities to persecute and vilify innocent
people on the grounds that they are agitating against
repatriation.
They've adopted a detestable tactic,
trying to sow dissent, internal quarrels and disunity
among the refugees so that they'll appear in a bad
light to the rest of the world - the refugees will do
less harm to the communists if they quarrel among
themselves and are discredited.
319

They've started sneaking into the camps a variety of

clearly criminal types, who try to link up with
similarly corrupt, morally worthless, individuals as
assistants and collaborators.
Also they attempt to
infiltrate them among emigrants going overseas so
that they can continue their disruptive activities
with them.
They try to get on their side a
collection of grumblers and discontents, of whom
there's never a shortage, and the morally deformed.
In Argentina some emigrants with communist leanings
organised railway strikes, but there were no Slovenes
among them!
The results were serious, as the
Argentine authorities have stopped the entry of
persons of Slav origin, don't approve any more group
passports for refugees and will only consider
individual applications.
Every communist activity is directed from a single centre,
from which all instructions emanate.
Their paid
operatives
must
carry
out
the
directives
unquestioningly if they don't want to lose their
heads.
The centre is the Cominform in Belgrade,
which links up all communist organisations throughout
the world.
While its activities are highly secret,
some of the latest directives for activists have
seeped through.
A recent one was issued on the
priorities of communist activists in refugee camps:
to foment, support and continue divisions between
differing political groups with the aim of exploiting
the refugees in order to attain communist policy
objectives.
It's essential to foment dissention
between refugee newspapers, and in the private lives
of refugees and in their workplaces.
They must
promote conflict between old and new emigres, within
the upper classes of the refugees and specially
between the politically active. They must also cause
rivalry between the more and the less able, so that
the less able feel discriminated against.
The
refugees' fight against the communists must be
transformed into a fight among themselves. All kinds
of malcontents must be made use of, and hatreds,
quarrels and antagonisms stirred up. Everything must
be
done
to
prevent
positive
and
constructive
activities growing among them.
Special attention must be paid to identifying
frictions between the allied authorities and the
refugees, and also between the camp administrations
320

and the refugees, so that the latter begin to hate

their protectors. Disorders must be fostered between
the occupiers, the local police and the refugees, so
that the refugees always appear the villains of the
piece, criminals, work-shy and ungrateful. The world
should end up with the most unfavourable view and
estimation of them, and in particular the countries
to which they have applied for emigration.
They
should destroy any kind of cultural activities among
the refugees, and discredit them in the eyes of
potential future employers.
To achieve this they
should make use of ideological fellow travellers and
individuals
of
low
mentality,
not
excluding
criminals.
We've already read in the local
newspapers of incidents where refugees have attacked
isolated mountain farms and taken away goods, horses
and cattle and even killed farmers who tried to stop
them.
That's why more and more frequently emigration commissions
from different countries are turning down people
suspected of being communists.
In our camps there
have been several cases recently, such as Mr. Rak who
applied for England and was accepted, but before the
group left was locked up in Kellerberg and released a
few days later.
A Mr. Breznik was turned down but
became very angry and violent, broke all the windows
and the door in his room, and then openly attacked
Mr. Vencelj Dolenc, hitting him and shouting, "it's
you who keep on saying I'm a member of OZNA [Yugoslav
secret police]". He also was put in prison.
We know of other incidents and also read about them in the
Austrian papers.
There are few villains, but they
manage to give all the refugees a bad name. This is
exactly
what
the
Comintern
wants,
and
these
manoeuvres are more damaging than the Bled agreement,
arranged through diplomats.
What's going on now is
organised by dishonest journalists or dishonest
police, and the world believes them. The diplomats,
who will decide on our future fate, also know what's
happening!
Three days later I reappear, this time as a lobbyist.
My
letter was addressed to an old Friends Ambulance Unit
colleague, Peter Gibson, joint author with John Rose of the
report to FAU headquarters of July 1945 which recorded that
"the
intervention
by
BRC/FAU"
preventing
the
forcible
repatriation of the civilians. Peter later became a senior IRO
official in Geneva:
321

4 July 1948. Dear Peter, .. The question that is worrying

me this time is the future of the students' home at
Graz, and I thought perhaps you might be able to help
me. ... IRO has said it cannot take the home over and
the army will shortly be withdrawing support and it
will be given up to the Austrian authorities and the
"eligibles" will be advised to take the next
opportunity to emigrate.
... Have the students got the wrong end of the stick and
is there no cause for alarm, or is there a danger the
students will no longer be able to study at Graz? ...
I'm enclosing the relevant sheet of the letter that
Mate Roessmann, chairman of the Slovene students'
committee, wrote me and a letter I wrote to Captain
Smith, secretary of the Refugee Defence Committee [in
London] in which I give the facts as I see them.
I would greatly appreciate any comments and suggestions if
you think there is anything one can do from this end;
if the question is mainly one of money, it might be
possible to get some help from students' or catholic
funds here, at least so that those who have almost
finished could take their degree or intermediate.
You will understand how out of touch one is here in
England,
and
the
difficulties
one
has
in
disentangling truth from rumours and the impractical
from the practical.
I hear pretty regularly from many of the refugees, but the
news they give is very scrappy. I suppose the USA's
announcement that she will take 200,000 DPs in the
next 12 months (or was it 24 months?) will be a great
help to you, always supposing they have not
overlooked the little matter of transporting them.
My last letter from Austria says about 100 DPs are
leaving Spittal every week; if that is so generally,
you must be doing pretty well.
The Pernisek diary:
15th August. **This is the third anniversary of the fine
afternoon Stanko Skrbe, Ciril Lavric and I went to
visit the church of Our Lady of Lavant in the next
village. We were so hungry and starved you could see
through us. For lunch we got plain broth and nothing
else.
The Russians had killed their last cow and
eaten the meat themselves, and all that was left for
the others was a watery zinc-coloured liquid!
The
three of us were walking like drunks, staggering from
322

one side of the road to the other, dizzy not from

alcohol but from lack of food.**
We've

settled into our new way of life here and the

children are making normal progress at school. This
is because we're getting our ration entitlement of
food which is enough to live on and, most important,
can prepare it as we want. We get the same quantity
on our ration cards as they do in the camp, and the
food we earn by working for farmers is a bonus. I've
discussed this with Dr. Mersol, who discussed it with
Miss Meredith and the camp director, and they
couldn't believe it.
I'm convinced some people are
making a massive profit out of the catering in the
camp, and one has to look for them outside the camp.

22nd August. There was a solemn celebration of the feast

of the Immaculate Heart of Mary today and the chapel
was full to overflowing.
We started with a sermon
and the litanies of Our Lady, after which we said
together the new "Prayer of the Slovene Refugees"
written by our bishop in exile Dr. Rozman.
3rd September.
Miss Lieven from IRO HQ in Klagenfurt
arrived and told us that some two hundred people will
be transported to Argentina this month, and that all
who can't go anywhere else are on the priority list,
as
are
families
with
many
children
and
intelligentsia.
6th September.
Today Dr. Kacin from Gorizia visited us
and made a favourable impression.
A small group
including Monsignor Skrbec discussed how to maintain
contact between Slovenes overseas and those in Italy
and Austria.
The bond must remain strong and the
ways of achieving it solid and efficient.
Now, as
the majority of Slovene refugees will be emigrating
overseas, it's up to those in Carinthia and Gorizia
to continue the political activities of Slovenes
outside Slovenia itself, and keep good contact with
Slovenes overseas. Let us remain as united in future
as we are now, and help each other.
8th September.
I went to Tristach near Lienz to visit
Monsignor Dr. Jagodic and Dr. Basaj.
We discussed
how to get Catholic Action going again and reorganise
it as soon as we arrive in Argentina; and also
student affairs, particularly the university students
at Graz, where conditions are improving excellently
and peace and mutual respect have been reestablished
323

and the unrest between the Mladci 188 and the Strazari
resolved.
9th September. Some of our girls left for Canada after a
long wait. They should have left in July but it was
obvious they wanted to stay longer with us and
parting had come too early, so that there was a lot
of tears. It was difficult looking at them, healthy
and beautiful in body and soul, like blossoms being
strewn by the wind. Fortunately most were engaged to
Slovene lads who'd gone to Canada earlier.
Like
slaves in the market, they were examined meticulously
from
teeth
to
nails
and
measured,
weighed,
scrutinised and sifted in all respects to guard
against defect or deficiency. They were looking for
the healthiest and fittest to work in hospitals,
mines and beetroot fields!
On the evening before departure we gave them a lovely
farewell party. If some of the good wishes expressed
are in fact fulfilled, the girls will be happy and
content.
The main message was, "you've completed
your search to settle somewhere and we'll do so
eventually, and we hope we'll all meet again". Today
there was a special Mass for them. The parish priest
Lamovsek gave a warm farewell homily, with good
advice and instructions on life in the new world.
Anica Dolenc left. Parting was very, very difficult
and she wept copiously, but so did everyone else. I
registered the family in the camp: I'd applied to IRO
earlier and was told we're accepted, so I hope we'll
move in today.
Yesterday a sports festival started in
12th September.
the camp.
The programme included soccer, volleyball, light athletics, table tennis, chess and a
gymnastics display.
It continues today.
There's a
foodstall selling sausages, pastry, fancy bread,
bonbons, etc.. Now that people are going, not home,
but across the ocean, there's plenty of everything.
16th September.
Today the Argentinean Consul Mr. Jose
Ramon Virasoro came from Vienna. He had a talk with
the Delegate Monsignor Jagodic and promised he'd give
emigration permits to all Slovenes, and specially to
families
with
small
children.
He
authorised
188

. Two rival student and youth organisations from between

the
wars,
their
names
meaning
"The
lads"
and
"The
guards/sentries/sentinels"
324

Monsignor
Jagodic
to
give
certificates
of
relationship to people who didn't have them but
wanted to travel together with their relatives. Our
workload increases daily!
24th September. We're enjoying a babje leto 189 . The whole
summer we didn't have such hot sun as during the last
few days, and I've been attacked by the latest camp
disease, travel fever.
I went for a travel permit
although friends laughed at me and said nobody
bothers with such trifles any more. But if there are
fleas around I know I'll catch them, so I won't go on
a longer journey without a permit.
The people at the district council were very friendly and
gave me a permit for the whole of the British zone.
This morning I went to the station and asked for a
ticket for Trofaiach. The clerk was polite although
I didn't have any change.
The ticket collector
greeted me effusively, "good morning, Sir, ticket
please" and returned my greeting smartly, in a manner
I never experienced before the war. I climb into the
carriage.
It has an light bulb and a clean floor
without cigarette ends, although there are plenty of
good cigarettes in Austria today.
*At Villach I have to change to the Leoben-Graz express.
I get off and look around for the express. "Sir,
here's the Graz express!" says the guard very
politely.
Goodness, how polite the Austrians have
become to the "bloody foreigners"! I can't help but
offer him an American cigarette.
With a cordial
smile he takes it.
He opens the carriage door and
gently shoves me in. The seats are reserved. "I've
no reservation: they'll throw me out". Nothing I can
do. He pushes me in again firmly, so I travel in a
reserved seat all the way.
I hardly sat down when
the train fills up.
I travel seven hours like a
duke.
By 10 "my stomach was in my heels".
I had very little
food with me so I thought I'd better not eat yet. A
tall, slender waiter entered the compartment with a
large tray of hot, spicy salted pork sausages and
rolls and announced, "gentlemen, fresh sausages". My
mouth watered and I glanced towards the tray.
The
waiter took the hint and spiked a sausage on a fork.
I was embarrassed as it looked as if I was the only
one succumbing to the smell of meat although in
189

. Indian summer - literally old wives' summer

325

reality I didn't plan to buy one.

Most of the
passengers were eating apples, so that I thought I
was in a rabbit warren. So far as the sausages were
concerned, I could only savour the tempting smell.
At midday there was again a bell. The waiter came to tell
me dinner was ready and would I kindly come into the
dining compartment.
Trying to be diplomatic I told
him I didn't have any travel ration cards with me, to
hide my negative financial balance, but he said,
"that's not important. What matters is that you have
the money" and hurried on to the next carriage
ringing his bell. That beat me! But I hadn't fooled
him, because in those days money was as scarce in
Austria as white flour at home during the war.
We reached Leoben seven hours later.
No time for sightseeing, I had to catch a local train for Trofaiach,
packed with cheerful men returning home from work.
In a corner was sitting a poor man, his trousers full
of holes and patches, his striped underpants showing
through. To hide the holes he tried to pull the rest
of his trousers over them.
The workers exchanged
glances and started to pull their trouser legs the
same way. My stomach started to rumble loudly so I
finally eat.*
I reached Trofaiach at 3 and after walking twenty minutes
found myself in the camp. It's beautifully situated,
surrounded by woodland and with high mountains all
around, and is well-kept and clean, even if it houses
twenty different nationalities.
The 300 Slovenes
have their own area.
Outstanding features of their
quarter are the flower beds in front of the barracks,
with a variety including "man's flower", tobacco with
its wide palm-like leaves, and also lots of small
children wearing short shirts. Thank God we have and
will continue to have lots of children.
This year
there's hope of a good harvest. Our people are still
full of vitality and healthy in body and soul.
I didn't come to Trofaiach to sight-see, but on official
business, to sort out transport procedures because
our group from here will leave for Argentina on the
30th September. The parish priest Rev. Klemencic was
very happy to hear that emigration is now really
taking place.
We talked late into the night, and
there were quite a few of us, Vilko Rec, Dr. Erman,
Joze Rot and some others. We went to bed very late.
Vilko Rec, a friend and distant relative, gave me his
326

bed, but was it hard! The palliasse was filled with

wood
shavings
that
had
become
compacted
and
unyielding as a plank. Poor Vilko, on top of all his
troubles, to have such a penitential couch!
In no other camp where there are Slovenes have so many of
our people been rejected for emigration by IRO. The
lovely chapel is in my opinion the most beautiful of
those in the camps: like a Japanese reception room,
with red wood, red and gold paper and red silk
curtains,
it
offers
a
beautiful
and
original
interaction of lights and colour. Chaplain Malavasic
arranged and looks after it.
The camp also has a
series of small home factories making aluminium
bowls,
soup
ladles,
other
utensils,
church
decorations and similar useful and much needed
objects.
Between Judenburg and Leoben, close by the railway tracks
and not far from Judenburg there's a locality called
Knittenfeld composed of large flat fields and
meadows, where the Germans dumped the English and
American planes they shot down and their own
seriously damaged, unserviceable military aircraft.
When our people were still living at Judenburg camp
they found this planes' cemetery, and when they moved
to Trofaiach remembered it and asked the British for
permission to make use of the scrap metal.
They
started dismantling the plane wings, and piece by
piece transported them to the camp and made bowls to
take the place of the mess tins they'd used
previously, ladles, kitchen pots and even altar
monstrances.
The articles were very elegant and
useful, and the refugees earned good money from what
they produced. I remember the names of two of these
"industrialists", Krzisnik and Babnik, but there were
probably more.
They proved themselves masters in
this art and successful dealers, supplying other
camps.
The English didn't disapprove: on the
contrary, they were pleased the fields around
Knittenfeld were cleared and made available for
cultivation.
This very positive report on Trofaiach camp of September 1948
is the more remarkable when compared with one in the British
Foreign Office archives dated 31 May 1948, only three months
earlier:
The present inhabitants have now been resident in this
camp for six weeks, having been transferred en bloc
327

from "S" Assembly Centre Judenburg.

It is no
exaggeration to say that they could scarcely have
been in a worse frame of mind when they arrived here.
In Judenburg they had acquired a reputation for being
extensive and accomplished black marketeers and
thieves. They had as a community several murders to
their credit.
In a large number of cases they had
forgotten how to work.
Communal feeling among them
was non-existent, intrigues between and within the
various racial groups were legion, and any form of
communal activity or committee was used to further
these intrigues. They were further deeply resentful
of the move and tried to prevent it by every means at
their disposal.
Their moral state, in the strict
sense of the word, was extremely bad.
Dr Gabriela Stieber, in her excellent study of refugee camps in
Carinthia and Styria, records that the camp had undergone a
thorough refit in 1946 so that it could be used by IRO as a
assembly and transit centre within its emigration programme.
There must have been a spectacular transformation between May
and September, and Dr Stieber records some of the reasons:
The successes of social work in the camp showed themselves
in the establishment of their own kindergartens and
schools
for
the
Slovene,
Croat
and
Ukrainian
children. ... Two camp churches were adapted, one for
Roman and Greek Catholics and another for the Greek
Orthodox community.
The Pernisek diary continues:
The return journey was slower but more interesting, with
lovely countryside and villages.
I've the happiest
memories of the people of Trofaiach camp: they're
good,
peaceful,
kind
people,
very
united
and
harmonious among themselves. The people who've been
rejected by the IRO have to leave the camp at once.
They're being sent to Treffling, near us, and we'll
probably still be able to rescue some of them.
30th September. Today the first group of 101 people left
for Argentina quite suddenly.
It was announced at
midday they'd be departing at 3 am tomorrow. At 2 pm
they were told they'd have to move at 5 today.
Although they were more or less packed to go they
were put out by such brainless plan changing.
1st October.
The emigrants passed by the camp in their
express at 7.30 am, dead tired after a sleepless
328

night in the station waiting room.

It's hard to
understand this strange way of handling people; do
those arranging the travel really not think?
So at last the movement from Austria to Argentina started. It
took a year to finish.
An article in the Almanac of Free
Slovenia for 1949 190 recorded how it was set in motion:
The agonising days that followed the Viktring tragedy left
our people ready to go anywhere, to any peaceful spot
under God's sun.
Our eyes turned towards Rome and
Dr. Krek, who was already planning, conferring,
searching for contacts, lobbying and sending out
letters in every direction, convinced we had to find
a new homeland for our people where they could earn
an existence through the work of their own hands and
live in peace, if possible together so as to preserve
their way of life towards the day they returned home.
He scanned the atlas and collected intelligence endlessly,
exploring the situation in: Australia - Australian
bishops in Rome had promised to do everything to
enable us to emigrate there, but the problem of
transport arose, and the situation was now urgent
after three whole years of getting nowhere: South
Africa - a rich and cultured country, but only
willing to accept skilled personnel: France - not
willing to consider a single refugee in spite of
empty and unpopulated areas in its south: Ecuador an obviously rich country, but culturally and
economically underdeveloped and unable to offer our
people anything except uncultivated land. How would
they live for the first months, before the fields
were tilled for the first time?
Peru - no one
showing any interest in emigration, and the same
applied to Brazil.
Venezuela - prepared to accept
refugees
but
would
send
them
to
climatically
difficult regions and pay them poorly.
There
remained Argentina, the country most ready to receive
refugees, understanding their situation and offering
the best conditions.
We had already had a number of our people, specially from
Primorska and Prekmurje191 , for some decades in
190

. article entitled "The Slovene Social Committee paved

the way for our emigration", signed DRF in Koledar Svobodne
Slovenije 1949 (Buenos Aires, 1949) pp.162-165
191
. Two regions of Slovenia, the first on the south coast,
adjacent to Italy, the second in the extreme north-east,
329

Argentina, and this included a tireless idealist, Mr.

Janez Hladnik. Minister Krek appealed to him, and he
took up our case with such wholehearted enthusiasm
that by November 1946 he had been received by General
Peron, who agreed to take 10,000 Slovene refugees
with families and children. This was our salvation!
Mr.

Joze Kosicek, secretary of the Slovene Social

Committee (SSC) in Rome, at once visited all the
camps in Italy where we had people, explained the
situation to them and suggested they should apply for
Argentina. The response was unexpected with over 95%
in fact applying.
A special emigration committee
within the SSC was set up in Rome without delay, to
look after the detailed organisation - collecting
emigration applications, compiling a card index of
all refugees (we were the only nation in exile to
have a complete card index of all its people!),
providing
everyone
with
movement
permits
and
passports, negotiating visa issue procedures with the
Argentinean consulates, cutting down the consulates'
document requirements to a minimum (they always
demanded the least documentation from us!) and
finally supplying everyone with the wherewithal to
travel overseas.

All this wasn't easy for refugees who did not have rights,
legal representation, friends in the world or enough
money, although we did have Minister Dr Krek, former
ambassador with the Allied Commission for Italy, to
intervene for us whenever necessary.
Mr. Hladnik persuaded the Direccion de Migraciones 192 to
recognise the Slovene Emigration Committee in Rome as
the sole authority through which our refugees could
obtain travel permits, and a special subcommittee
with him as chairman was set up in Buenos Aires to
settle all procedures there and make the necessary
representations.
Finally the first list of 500
Slovene refugees was certified on 6 February 1947,
soon to be followed by others.
The consuls could not get used to the idea of almost all
our refugees having no personal documents, and we for
our part could never have produced the documentation
they demanded, so it was essential to reduce their
demands.
We were the first to be granted group
squeezed between Austria and Hungary.
192
. Directorate of Migration
330

movement permits and thus everywhere we had to break

fresh ground.
Eventually Mr. Krek's diplomacy
succeeded in persuading the consular department to
reduce the documents required from eight to three and
recognise the International Red Cross passport.
Other
national
groups
didn't
have
the
same
difficulties because Mr Krek had opened up the route
for them in the course of fighting to save our
refugees.
When the issue of visas was sorted out - the consular
department didn't want to issue more than five a day
-the ice had to be broken with the IGCR 193 , as it had
a representative of Tito among its members and did
not want to listen when asked to finance transport of
the refugees across the ocean.
Forcing people home
was clearly its first priority, as it was later with
UNRRA
and
the
PCIRO 194 ,
their
slogan
being
repatriation at all costs. Our refugees in the camps
had suffered heavily under that slogan and the
inhumanity of their staff.
*IGCR, UNRRA and later PCIRO sent standing commissions to
the camps, to interrogate people one by one, try to
persuade them to return home and search for
"criminals".
Their procedures made our people feel
they were appearing before criminal courts and being
condemned only because they had betimes recognised
the evil of the communist beasts, opposed them
patriotically and chosen the route of exile so as to
escape to a better future.
But these visits had
precisely the opposite effect.
The number of those
returning home dropped markedly; indeed the flow of
fresh refugees increased, and this flow has still not
ceased.
It was extremely difficult to argue the refugees' side of
the case, when there sat hirelings of the communists
of all nationalities in so many offices who made
difficulties over every small detail.
The Tito
government delegation in Rome diligently lodged
protests with the IGCR, UNRRA and specially with the
PCIRO and the Italian government.
How difficult it
was to work in such an atmosphere,how hopeless were
nearly all our cries and protests, all our appeals
193

. Inter-Governmental Committee on Refugees (1938-47)

which was succeeded by UNRRA (1943-47)
194
. Preparatory Commission for the International Refugee
Organization, (1947) succeeded by the IRO itself (1947-51)
331

and entreaties, whether it was a matter of the rescue

of whole groups or single individuals.
How many
journeys, visits and interviews, humiliations and
insults Dr Krek had to put up with, and that many
times, who at that time was working for the Slovene
community.*
The first larger group [from the refugee camps in Italy]
left for Argentina on the 6th June 1947.
The Pernisek diary continues:
4th October.
I was called to the IRO office in Villach
about a second transport to Argentina.
With
foresight and by good fortune I had with me a list of
the people registered for it. They told me to start
preparing the list at once, and I worked there all
day till 7.45 pm and so missed the train. Luckily I
caught the last bus and we went on with the list
until 6 am, when good team work got it finished.
5th October. Busy all day writing health certificates and
other data. Quite a few people who had registered to
go to Argentina changed their minds, so we had to
make totally new lists.
6th October. Snow has fallen on the mountains, it's very
cold in the valley and it's rained all day.
Dr.
Blatnik leaves us and is off to Italy.
Dr. Kalan
visited us from Munich. We had long and interesting
talks on political issues.
Munich is becoming the
centre for Yugoslav refugees, particularly Serbs, and
is very convenient for this, much more so than
Austria, as it's in the American zone and the German
authorities don't have as much influence there as the
Austrians have here, and the Germans don't have
political obligations to other countries.
The Serbs have only started to group themselves together
recently.
It isn't yet clear which movement will
prevail, the old and corrupt Carska party, which is
Great Serbian and dynastic, or a younger party
wanting moral and social regeneration of the state.
It's widely believed the King has few supporters
among the younger Serbs - and they are in the
majority - and his supporters grow daily fewer. He's
finished so far as the other Yugoslav nations are
concerned but might still have a slender majority
among the Serbs, and is also finished for the English
and Americans. The question doesn't interest us any
332

more as we already have one foot on the other side of

the Atlantic.
12th October.
Visit of the Argentinean consul Mr. J.R.
Virasora and other officials. His wife was presented
with two Ribnica wickerwork bouquets of flowers, for
herself and for Mrs. Peron. The consul promised she
would receive it in person.
Today he signed 257
visas which IRO has already paid for. A few families
were turned down because of illness (TB).
17th October.
The camp choir gave a lovely concert this
evening and everyone was moved.
They sang about
twenty well known songs we'd often heard before, but
today left us with really deep feelings, and the
atmosphere was most pleasant. Everyone knew this was
the last performance at Spittal camp for many of the
singers: the camp is beginning to empty and members
of the choir will be going in different directions.
This gave an added dimension and quality to the
occasion.
23rd October. Today 148 are off to Argentina, left-overs
from the last transport.
Last night we had a nice
goodbye meeting for them in the reading room. There
was Holy Mass at 6 this morning.
Father Lamovsek
gave a farewell address, recommending them to have
boundless confidence in God. Now they're starting on
a new phase in their life's journey, on a new era of
hope for which they're spiritually well prepared and
matured. He wished them all a safe journey into the
New World and a new life.
When the farewell song
195
was finished there wasn't a
Marija skoz Zivlenje
dry eye in the congregation. At 2 pm the emigrants
started gathering in front of the garages.
It's
getting harder and harder to say goodbye! At 3 they
went to Villach and at 7 boarded the train for Turin,
on which mothers got couchettes offering some chance
of a rest and the others sat six to a compartment an IRO train with well-heated carriages.
24th October.
Today is the feastday of the Archangel
Raphael, patron saint of emigres. Because we're all
about to leave the camp we had an all-night vigil in
the chapel before the Blessed Sacrament, with a large
number of people taking part.
27th October. Everyone had a thorough medical examination
and had to give a blood sample too. When they took
195

. "Mary the whole of one's life"

333

blood from Mr.Nace Jeriha the doctor looked at the

bottle, turned it upside down, shook it, added a bit
of a white fluid, shook his head and told Nace,
"please get your son and let him give his blood again
for you.
What we've here is mainly spirit".
Nace
grumbled, but proudly brought his son Lado who solved
his father's problem.
Now we're only waiting for
another visit from the consul, and then the journey.
31st October.
Feast of Christ the King.
There was no
special celebration as the choir is getting smaller
and smaller. In the evening there was a recital in
the theatre, when Dr. Basaj spoke well but too long,
*We also finished the October rosary devotions in a
lovely and solemn manner.*
This afternoon I had a long and disagreeable talk with Mr.
Z.
He registered himself and his children for
emigration, but not his wife, so she hasn't got an
entry permit for Argentina.
She wants at all costs
to go with her family and is begging us to find a
way. The problem is really great - a man with small
children on his own abroad, but she has given her
husband
untold
difficulties
and
is
simply
a
prostitute.
It's her own fault the marriage is
practically finished, and her character is such that
it's most unlikely she'll ever change her way of
life. Even if she promised one simply can't trust
her.
Her husband suffered a long time and now
doesn't want anything more to do with her.
Perhaps
the time has come for her to start doing some penance
for her former life style. There's no time to find a
sensible solution and we're all very sorry for the
children.
What'll happen to them?
I secretly hope
Monsignor Janko Mernik, who knows the situation, will
take care of them when they reach Argentina.
1st November.
All Saints' Day.
A particularly dreary
day, but that's how All Saints' Days should be. My
prayers are with my late father and brother. Father
has been resting in St. Peter's cemetery at Radec for
the last 33 years, my brother in some mine at Rog.
My mother has been faithfully visiting my father's
grave these 33 years and I'm very confident he's
already in the presence of God: he suffered long
years before dying and received the last sacraments.
During the service to commemorate the dead, Father
France Novak gave a very fine homily and the chapel
was crammed full.
After the service we formed a
procession to go to the cemetery where we remembered
334

with hymns and prayers all the Slovene dead buried at

Spittal cemetery. In the evening we had an excellent
performance of the play "The Dance of the Dead".
3rd November.
We're getting ready the new list for the
fourth transport, of 800 people.
The camp will be
practically empty.
4th

November.
Medical examinations for
transport, which means a lot of work.
British military band gave a concert in
Today it's music, a few months back
echoed with resolute and noisy calls, "go

5th

November.
We have our hands full distributing
certificates for the Argentinean transport.
Some
people don't want to go on and have withdrawn, hoping
they'll get to the USA, and we have to cross off the
list families with babies of less than six months.
Children aged 2-3 have to go to St. Martin camp for a
special medical examination.

the fourth
Tonight the
the theatre.
these halls
home"!

6th November.
**Today the camp director announced
that 29 people who aren't eligible for IRO care must
leave the camp and transfer to Kellerberg on the 10th
November, among them one of our office workers
Maricka Tomazic.
We can't understand how this is
possible: if there's a mistake she'll soon be back.**
20th November.
The consul is busy all day.
He's not
choosy where Slovenes are concerned, accepting even
the handicapped. The only people he won't accept are
single men over 45, but if they live with a family
they
can
go
to
Argentina
with
them.
He's
particularly keen on children and families with lots
of children. My family had to wait to be sorted out
and for recognition of our kin relationship.
This
wasn't recognised. A special commission attached to
the consulate decides such issues. We paid $49 tax.
21st November. My family saw the consul, everything went
fine and we were accepted immediately. He put us in
the $7 group, so we won't be entitled to stay in an
immigrants' hotel. By the evening most of the ablebodied refugees had been accepted.
23rd November.
The families left for Canada today. I'm
celebrating my own birthday in excellent spirits.
How hard it was this time last year! Today I've an
assured departure to a better future: there'll still
335

be great difficulties to overcome one by one with

patience, but the green light is shining. With God's
help we'll start a new life in our new homeland. The
consul says it is a large and rich country with
enough work and food for everyone; he's delighted
with us and our lovely healthy families and many
lovely healthy children who are not only our hope and
joy but also the hope and joy of Argentina, a country
ruled by a man with a great heart.
24th

Someone has stolen Father Ciril's

November.
emigration permit and Argentine visa; the same
happened the other day to Mr. Peterc. There are some
dirty tricks going on, the work of a small group, or
even of one man of deficient mind. No one could get
to the bottom of the Peterc case, but now it's
happened to Father Petelin it'll be sorted out as he
won't stop at anything; he's already pounded the
table in the camp director's office.

29th November. Today the remainder of the last Argentine

transport left. There was a Holy Mass for them at 6
and they left the camp at 3 pm. The farewells were a
lot easier than previously.
Mr. Janez Lavrih is warning us the Yugoslav communists are
doing all they can to hinder our emigration and are
thinking of kidnapping prominent leaders among the
emigrants.
OZNA has a widespread network.
I was
repeatedly warned not to leave the camp on my own,
especially in the direction of Lienz or Villach.
A Yugoslav "attempt to hinder emigration" was described in a
desperate letter Marija Jancar sent me from Graz:
I have to send you the very sad news of my husband Joze's
arrest by the FSS at 4 am early this morning, when he
was handcuffed and taken away together with a Croat.
You'll understand this is the worst that could happen
to me as I'm left without support or protection. You
knew my husband well, that he was always an honest
and good man who could never harm anyone. You could
also have an accurate picture of his attitude to
politics, that he could never have been a fascist,
still less deserved to be taken away in handcuffs
like a criminal.
You were our benefactor during the whole of the journey of
sufferings our people had to live through.
You can
well understand that the Yugoslav communists will do
336

everything to put every kind of pressure on the

intelligentsia to make any kind of employment and
existence completely impossible for them.
You'll
believe me when I assure you my husband's only
concern was for the completion of his studies and the
welfare of his small family. We've only studied here
and done nothing else, and have behaved exactly as
you advised us.
Joze said so often "Mr. Corsellis
urged us only to study, and this is what we really
must do".
Of course I don't know the charges that
led to his arrest. I'm only a woman and have no one
here to say a word in favour of him and myself.
I ask you to help me.
I've limitless confidence in you
and believe that you, and you alone, can help my
husband and me, if anyone at all can. Before all I
ask you is to see he is given a hearing as quickly as
possible. He's seriously ill with tuberculosis, and
a prolonged imprisonment could lead to a worsening of
his health.
In deepest faith in God and justice I
greet you with the deepest request that you help me.
Marija wrote again:
I received your kind letter yesterday and thank you from
the bottom of my heart for your warm words of comfort
and readiness to help. I enquired at the FSS offices
several times and they told me they were only
involved in carrying out the arrest and had nothing
more to do with the matter. My husband was arrested
under the Steele-Tito Agreement, and the so-called
Maclean Commission is responsible for the case.
I
asked Miss Jaboor to find out on what grounds and
evidence he was arrested, and she promised she would
and I'm convinced she's done everything she possibly
could, but sadly so far without success.
Also Dr.
Mersol cannot help me because we cannot contact the
Commission or influence it, the more so because it's
believed to be very friendlily disposed towards Tito.
My only hope here is Miss Graham 196 , who has already spoken
once with Joze in Wolfsberg and who works in
Klagenfurt, where the Maclean Commission is based.
We
DPs
are
powerless,
and
specially
the
intelligentsia,
whom
the
Yugoslavs
attack
and
persecute most.
Joze was taken immediately to
Wolfsberg camp, where he's in the "special section".
196

. British YWCA representative for Carinthia, with whom I

had earlier cooperated closely.
337

Arrests
were
made
simultaneously
in
Spittal,
Judenberg and here, and as far as we can find out
they were looking for 30 people including Monsignor
Skrbec, Professor Sever and Dr. Blatnik.
54 more
inmates of Spittal camp were then ordered to leave
the camp within 48 hours, mostly intellectuals
including Director Bajuk, Dr. Vracko and Dr. Zebot,
being accused by the Yugoslav Government of agitating
and acting against repatriation.
They must live
privately or transfer to St. Martin camp near Villach
until they are transferred to Germany.
I can't imagine on what grounds Joze was arrested.
It's
almost out of the question that the charge is based
on his activities at home, and it's more likely it's
because he's been hindering repatriation by his
efforts to arrange study possibilities here in Graz
and as the first chairman of the Slovene students'
group. He may well have been arrested on fabricated
and imaginary charges from the Yugoslav authorities,
not based on fact at all, as has happened in several
cases with most sad results.
As the Steele-Tito Agreement is interpreted here, and Joze
writes on the same lines, his case will be considered
first by an English commission and then by a mixed
Anglo-Yugoslav commission and finally decided in
London, presumably by the Foreign Office.
Hardly
anyone can help me here so that you're my only hope.
Joze hasn't yet been interrogated.
The food is no
worse than here, he's been given five blankets and
the barrack is heated.
He's allowed to write to me
twice a week and I can send him a parcel with food
once a week and write to him without limitation.
Our local Member of Parliament, a Conservative who had served
in the Grenadier Guards like Nigel Nicolson and had a
distinguished record in World War II, by good fortune had known
my father.
I appealed to him for help and he sent a handwritten reply:
I was delighted to get your letter, and am sending it on
to Chris Mayhew 197 at the FO.
It is better NOT to
publicise
individual
names
by
a
Parliamentary
197

. Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign

Affairs. Later Lord Mayhew. He told me in 1996 that it was on
his suggestion that the Maclean Commission was set up, and that
it had returned to Yugoslavia very few individuals, and then
only when there was strong evidence to justify this.
338

Question - I have too many such cases already on my

hands. .. Yours ever Douglas Dodds-Parker
P.S.

What magnificent, and unadvertised, work "the

Friends" do - they were always first on the scene
with help in the various crises before the war.

Later he sent me Christopher Mayhew's response:

.. Jancar is one of those men whose surrender has been
demanded by the Yugoslav Government on charges of
collaboration with the Axis powers.
You will
appreciate that our international commitments oblige
us to look into such allegations, but in order to
ensure that no man is handed back unless a prima
facie case of wilful and active collaboration has ben
established against him to the satisfaction of
English Legal opinion, we have set up a threefold
screening procedure.
A man is first of all
interrogated by a member of the Special Refugee
Commission to see whether he is in fact identical
with the man whose surrender has been demanded, and
to allow him to give an account of his wartime
actions. He is also informed of the Yugoslav charges
against him. [The case] is then reviewed by a legal
panel who decide whether a prima facie case has been
established.
The case is then referred here and is
again carefully scrutinised to see whether any
relevant considerations have been overlooked, and the
final decision is taken whether to hand him back or
not. ..
You may be certain that Mr. Corsellis's testimony on his
behalf will be considered in his favour.
A month later a telegram arrived from Joze announcing his
release, followed by a letter in German which began: "Dear
Brother! Excuse the form of address, but in my most difficult
days and hours you showed yourself more than a brother." Four
weeks later he wrote that he and Marija were on their way to
Britain as European Voluntary Workers.
If he had remained in
Graz he could have qualified as a doctor after a few months,
but did not dare to, fearing kidnap by the Yugoslavs after they
had failed in their attempts to have him extradited legally.
His
later
struggles
to
qualify
and
establish
himself
professionally are recounted on pages 000-000.
While I was lobbying for Joze, Geoffrey Stuttard 198 , a former
198

. While with the British army in Austria he worked with,

339

officer with the Allied Control Commission for Austria, was

appealing to the Foreign Office through Major Tufton Beamish 199 ,
MC, on behalf of the 54 inmates who had been ordered to leave
Spittal camp, whom Marija mentioned. He received a reply from
the Foreign Office which ended with a paragraph which is a
masterpiece of brazen effrontery:
I am very much afraid that these unhappy people have been
the victims of provocateurs who are constantly trying
to drive a wedge between the refugees and their
British protectors, since it has been explained to
refugees in our zones on many occasions that nobody
with a clear conscience need fear lest he be forcibly
repatriated.
This impression is heightened by the
reference to our alleged surrender of 10,000 Slovenes
- a canard which has been refuted on more than one
occasion, but which reappears with conspicuous
frequency in allegations purporting to come from
displaced persons. 200 (my emphasis)
The Pernisek diary:
1st December. Further transports have been halted for the
time being but will, they say, be resumed in the
spring around March.
Probably we'll celebrate
Christmas once again in Spittal camp.
8th

December.
Beautifully celebrated Feast of the
Immaculate
Conception,
this
time
without
the
students.
They are pushed to finish their studies
before leaving for Argentina.
A large number have
already left.

11th

Today Miss Meredith left for England;

December.
there was no special farewell arranged for her.
People felt sad when many of her predecessors left,
but it wasn't noticeable this time. She had a good
heart but couldn't show it, and appeared cold and
seldom laughed or smiled.
She looked after the
children well and devotedly, because what she did for
them came from the heart and sincerely with

and later married, Anka Zebot (see p. 00)

199
. Later Colonel Sir Tufton Beamish, Chairman of the
Conservative Foreign Affairs Committee 1960-64.
He had
recently been on a parliamentary delegation which had visited
refugee camps in Austria.
200
. The letter, dated 15 December 1947, was signed by Chris
Mayhew but no doubt drafted for him by the civil servants in
the Southern Department.
340

compassion, her face lit up with a gentle smile

conveying deep love.
She had another virtue: she
abhorred boasting and obsequiousness.
I think she
was a dour Anglican, but infinitely better than her
Catholic colleague at Seeboden.
18th December. In the afternoon I went into town with my
young son, and came across the OZNA spy Mr. Rak
lurking just outside the town gate. I go into a shop
and he follows me. It must be true they're after me.
24th

December.
We celebrate our fifteenth marriage
anniversary on Christmas Eve. The blissful peace and
deep happiness the day brings us are wonderful.
We've a lovely crib and a beautiful Christmas tree
which the children put up for us, and they had a
Christmas
party
with
some
nice
presents
this
afternoon. I can't bear to remember what it was like
last year.

25th December. A holy day. Everyone joyfully wished each

other a happy Christmas in the morning.
Next year
we'll be celebrating it in our new homeland,
Argentina. We hope God will continue to bless us and
we'll find a land of peace, the most important things
being health and work. God was with us up till now,
and will be in the future.
Today the weather is
clear but very cold. They regaled us with potica 201 ,
white bread and sausages. My wife's brother paid us
a visit with his fiancee. He's still living in Feld
am See but told us he's trying to emigrate with his
brother to Canada. We were delighted by the visit as
the children were able to see their uncle for the
first time and we had a most enjoyable family gettogether.
29th December. My wife and I were called to the store to
receive the items of clothing, linen and footwear we
were entitled to.
We were given a lot of good new
things; for me a new grey summer suit, two pairs of
shorts, shirt, two towels, new pair of shoes, working
clothes, pair of socks and vest; for my wife an
overcoat, summer dress, winter dress, towel and pair
of stockings; for my daughter a cardigan, lined
jacket, summer dress, pair of socks and towel, for my
son a vest, pair of shorts, towel and pair of shoes.
In

the
201

evening

was

at

prof.

Janez

Grum's

wedding

. A special Slovene cake for festive occasions

341

reception at the Weiss Inn in Spittal; the atmosphere

was really pleasant and happy.
I was wondering how
this perpetual traveller found the time to get
himself a bride, and such a lovely bride at that! I
think this young man knows every hidden mountain pass
in the Zilj Alps and the Andrach mountains; he must
know all the farmsteads down to Sillian and the
Toblas valley.
He criss-crossed these mountains
again and again, not for tourist enjoyment but as the
most trustworthy courier between the Slovene refugees
in Austria and Italy, preferring to walk on his own
unless he had to take someone into Italy.
He was
blessed
with
God's
special
protection
to
an
outstanding extent, but he's a very courageous
character himself.
Now this is the end of these
dangerous journeys, and he'll have to travel without
rucksack and mountaineering boots, in lovelier
company on a longer journey! May God give them all
blessings and protection in a happy marriage and the
family life they're starting on.
30th December.
In the morning it started to snow, and
continued on and off the whole day, and we began
putting our poor belongings into wooden boxes. I was
again warned not to go into town on my own, but did
go to Spittal to buy some tools. At the ironmongers
they told me they had none left because our people
had bought them out. The owner said:
We'll miss you.
You were hard-working, honest
people. All the years you were around we had peace,
no thefts or assaults, you never pestered us and we
felt relieved.
You were ready to do any housework,
and we could leave you alone in the house because you
people are honest and not demanding in any way. On
the other hand you were good customers and brought
profitable business our way.
We're already feeling
the pinch from your departure, and in future we'll
feel it even more.
It seems that most of the
Slovenes are leaving for Argentina.
We wish you a
safe journey: we're quite sure you'll all do well in
the new world because you're industrious, capable,
gifted, honest and very religious.
The whole town
and surrounding countryside are talking of nothing
else but your departure, especially the farmers you
helped so much.
We said a heartfelt goodbye and shook hands.
can also say, "goodbye, good people!"
342

We Slovenes

P A R T

E M I G R A T I O N
not an end,
but a beginning.
C H A P T E R

1 4

1 January - 5 February 1949

The Perniseks board the train for Italy and arrive two
days later at a transit camp near Turin, where they
wait for two weeks.
One afternoon they visit the
Basilica of Dom Bosco, founder of the Salesian Order,
and
a
settlement
of
Catholic
philanthropy,
Cottolengo's House of Divine Providence.
They travel to Genoa and board the American Liberty ship
S.S. Holbrook.
Mrs Pernisek falls dangerously ill
with jaundice and is carried to the sick-bay, where a
Russian woman in the bed opposite her dies of
pneumonia.
Fearful, Pernisek and the two children
attend the Russian Orthodox funeral rites.
Mrs
Pernisek recovers and they arrive on Saturday 5th
February at Buenos Aires, disembark and go to the
accommodation reserved at the "Immigrants' Hotel".

343

The Pernisek diary:

1st January 1949. A New Year, on the threshold of a new
life in the new world. We're leaving our wooden town
where we've lived four long hard years as second or
third class citizens without even the most basic
human rights. We were just numbers in the long, long
list of displaced persons brought about by the second
world war. We're leaving behind us terrible and hard
years, but still we're sorry to leave and I'm
experiencing strange feelings which I can't describe
as I put our modest possessions into boxes.
Something is gripping my soul, my throat and my
heart, and no words are coming from my mouth.
We're leaving the old world still in ruins. Our homeland
is close, almost within sight, just beyond the
Karawanken mountains which are visible from here. I
keep looking at them and remembering my mother,
sister, nephews and other relatives and good friends
there, whose hands I couldn't shake and say goodbye.
I haven't written to them we're leaving for
Argentina, I'll do so on the journey.
I'm restless
from hearing in the camp so many conflicting reports,
and I have nightmares of being persecuted and hunted
like a wild animal. We're taking leave of our fellow
campdwellers, friends and acquaintances, of our
unforgettable, good dr. Mersol, the parish priests
and curates and the other good people still
remaining.
2nd January. Those leaving for Argentina had a 6 am Mass
said by the Rev. Klopcic, who told us to go into the
new world in Jesus' name, carry it always in our
hearts, cherish and revere it.
Let us have
unconditional trust in Him and walk with Him always.
We will survive the new life abroad with His help, be
it ever so hard, and conquer all difficulties.
We hand in our heavy baggage.
All day my heart feels
heavy and I see others feel the same. They don't say
much but look as if oppressed by something: the
nearer the moment of departure, the heavier the
heart. Even my wife and children are silent. At 2
we climb into the lorries, and at 3 leave the camp.
"God be with you: safe journey" is heard over and
over again from those remaining, who waive their
handkerchiefs while we use ours to dry our tears.
Goodbye, good people.
344

At

the station we were put straight into comfortable

second class carriages and left at 6.
The train
moved slowly and nearly silently.
Strange.
We're
leaving
behind
four
years
of
anxiety,
bitter
disappointments and sad memories, yet the transition
from refugee to free person isn't easy.
It's quite
incomprehensible, the feeling at this moment.
We
didn't cry when we made a hurried departure on the
5th May 1945, leaving behind everything - home,
possessions, loved parents, brothers and sisters,
friends and acquaintances and most treasured of all,
our homeland. We didn't know if we'd be alive next
day, and if alive where we'd spend the night, what
we'd eat. We departed into the totally unknown - and
left as if on a Mayday spring excursion.
Perhaps
fear took the place of the sadness of parting or we
were given a special grace in those hours so we
didn't hesitate what to do. Personally, I'm sure it
was a special grace.

3rd

January.
The journey was unpleasant because the
heating didn't reach the end carriages of the very
long steam train. We travelled cold, and all the way
through Italy didn't get any hot food or drink
because we weren't allowed to leave the train, but
were guarded strictly by Italian carabiniere who
weren't kind at all.
The sky was overcast and the
countryside covered with snow: we stood at stations
for long periods, thirsty, longing for a hot drink,
with Italian police guarding us so that no one was
allowed to leave, nor could anyone approach us.
We
moved mainly at night and were freezing, as cold as
kittens.

4th

At around 11, frozen stiff, we reached

January.
Collegno, the station for Grugliasco transit camp,
where it was snowing hard and bitterly cold.
The
train was unloaded speedily and we found ourselves in
a former mental hospital, which from the outside
looked a large and beautiful modern building, inside
decrepit. During the war it had been used by German
soldiers, then by Jews and now it's a transit camp
for DPs heading across the Atlantic.

The

food isn't marvellous - every day macaroni and

potatoes, stinking of petrol, probably cooked on
petrol-fed stoves, but we do have plenty of good
white bread.
We don't see or smell meat anywhere,
but we're not hungry and don't suffer from cold any
more.
The fixtures in the wash places and toilets
345

are all broken and there's dirt everywhere.

5th January.
The people who were here when we arrived,
left today and we quickly took over their better
rooms. We found a large hall and people just flopped
down on the floor and slept the whole night, as we
didn't sleep at all on the train. In our hall there
are a lot of children, but it's a little warmer
because of the sun and some central heating.
6th January. Today is the feast of the three Kings. We're
still confused and very tired. There's a nice chapel
in the main building, still decorated for Christmas
and with a lovely crib. I attended Mass and a sermon
delivered by some young Slovene Salesian.
The Mass
communicated beauty and concentration, but the sermon
was excessively sentimental. Sermons covered in jam
aren't in tune with my spiritual disposition but
perhaps suit women, who somehow manage to make sweet
the most serious spiritual exercises and prayers:
they even address the Sacred Heart pierced with our
own most grievous sins: "O Sweetest Heart of Jesus".
The chapel was full of women.
8th

January.
I'm bored doing nothing.
It must be
beautiful here in the spring as there's a large,
wooded park, but now the trees are bare, the beds and
lawns covered with snow. There are high hills in the
distance, one with a large and prominent castle. In
the park I met some Slovene students from Graz, very
interesting, serious lads.
Ciko Skebe was the most
amusing, constantly cracking jokes and pulling
people's legs. Very pleasant!

**In the afternoon I took a tram to Turin with my daughter

and a small group.
We got there quickly and first
went to see the Basilica of St. John Bosco, the
founder of the Salesian Order.
It's really
beautiful.
The Sacristan gave us a guided tour and
told us a lot about the marvellous life of the Saint.
What didn't he tell us about the relics?
The
godfearing man I'm sure never lied, but his
enthusiasm certainly carried him away. He assured us
a great flask was truly water from the river Jordan
from the time when Jesus was baptised by John the
Baptist.
O sancta simplicitas!
Thank you, pious
Sacristan, for the pleasure you gave us!
After
touring the church we all knelt at the altar of Mary
Help of Christians. I thanked Her for all the graces
She obtained for me and begged Her again to grant us
346

a safe journey to Argentina, the land of which Don

Bosco so often dreamt and to which he sent his
missionaries.
After prayer I looked around for my daughter, but couldn't
see her. All the young ones were gathered around the
"live" crib and everything was moving - the stars in
the sky, the star above the crib, the lights shining
in a profusion of colours in the houses of Bethlehem,
the shepherds and sheep coming and going, and the
angels dancing in the meadows and floating in the
sky!
None of us had seen anything like it before.
Anica Semrow gathered the young people around her and
they started singing carols.
A crowd of Italians
surrounded us and listened, and they switched off the
current to the crib so that everything stood still,
except the stars above the crib and the stream which
were left on. The Sacristan reappeared, crying "Che
bello! Che maraviglia!" and we put some change into
his hand, thanked him for his tour and left. We then
went to see the huge Salesian Institute next the
church.
In awe and deeply moved emotionally and
spiritually I walked round the rooms where Don Bosco
worked and spent his remarkable life so full of love,
devoted to young orphans.
Next we visited Cottolengo's House of Divine Providence
which isn't a house but a whole neighbourhood, a part
of the town, a marvellous establishment without state
financial support, depending solely on the people's
voluntary contributions.
Its centre point is the
church where those living in the settlement pray
night and day, adoring God, revering him in the Host
and dedicating to Him their manual work.
We walked
past the huge laundry where the good Sisters were
washing everything from nice clothing to the most
revolting old rags from poor people. I marvelled at
the physical and spiritual strength they must possess
to do such menial work day after day.
We

passed through a number of hospital wards where

terminally ill patients are confined to bed, more or
less for the rest of their lives.
Anyone would be
shaken by the experience of seeing such misery; and
we were profoundly touched by the depth of faith,
confidence and love of God of these Sisters of
Charity who are leading such dedicated lives and
alleviating the suffering of the poorest of the poor.
They must be really holy women.
For all this work
they receive as reward a piece of bread, a simple
347

religious habit and a medal of Our Lady made from

humble aluminium.
But there awaits them the rich
reward and honour with Him who rewards all who give a
glass of fresh water to the needy in love.
I left with this thought: "You think you've gone through
much sorrow in your life? Just look at what you've
seen here in a short time, without even seeing the
worst.
And you're worrying about what'll happen to
you in the new world? Look how beautifully the Good
Lord takes care of all this misery because the people
here trust him totally, pray to him with thanksgiving
and serve him faithfully.**
9th January. It's a dreary, misty cold
warm and we're happy here. In the
in the garden and meet up with some
enjoy the company of the students
Blatnik, now living in Rome, paid us

day. The room is

afternoon I walk
acquaintances. I
from Graz.
Dr.
a visit.

10th January.
There are rumours we won't be here long,
but will soon depart for the promised land.
11th

January.
The list of people for Argentina was
posted, my family is on it. We leave the camp on the
14th for Genoa, and on the 15th board the American
military transport ship Holbrook.

The day of departure.

My wife's
Sunday, 16th January.
ill.
At Spittal they gave us tins of meat for the
journey, larger than usual and the label written in
Arabic, so we didn't know the contents.
They were
fish prepared for Indians and very strongly spiced.
My wife and the children ate them because they were
very hungry. I was put off by the strong smell and
only took a mouthful, preferring to remain hungry.
The strong spices probably caused my wife's illness,
because she has a weak liver.
The children, Father
Ciril and Sister Francka were not affected. We were
faced with the dilemma: stay or go? My wife decided
we should go but I was very worried.
**At 2 we had vespers and benediction in the chapel, sang
with deep emotion "Mother Mary went to a foreign
land" and " Mary, all men's guide through life, steer
us through our suffering path", and all had tears in
our eyes and left the chapel with reluctance.
We
prayed
confidently
to
Mary
for
God's
mighty
protection and for a successful journey.**
We left
the camp at 6 and were put on the train which was
348

well warmed.
We had a comfortable compartment for
eight people, and our group was composed of our
family, the parish priest Martin Rados and two
sisters - congenial company, apart from Father
Rados's severe cough. We slept very little.
Monday, 17th January. We reach Genoa harbour at 6 but are
not allowed out, and armed police immediately guard
the train.
At 8 the dockers start loading our
baggage onto the ship Holbrook which is moored in
front of us.
Then we're told to get off the train
and line up according to the numbers given us by IRO
officials. We step forward to receive our passports
and, with these in our hands, proceed in line into a
large hall.
There the harbour police checked our
passports again, and our hearts almost stopped
beating at this last police check on European soil.
Everything went fine, everyone was very polite, they
had no list of wanted people.
We boarded by a long gangway and members of the crew
examined our passports once again.
It was all done
very calmly, politely, quickly.
They separated the
men from the women, the men going to the male section
and the women to large communal dormitories prepared
with comfortable beds and clean, new, fresh linen.
We parked our hand luggage and went to rest for a
little on our beds. So here we are for a few weeks
in our new, comfortable, hard home on the waves.
*Slowly we crept on deck, where more and more people were
gathering.
People were also crowding onto the
harbour pier. We wait for the ship to move. I watch
the sailors inspecting the heavy ropes with which the
ship is attached to the tugs, which are ready to take
the strain.
Then "Let go anchor" and we hear a
monstrous roar. After the rattle of the heavy chains
subsides the ship begins to vibrate and we hear the
noise of the engines, which shake the ship as it
glides silently and slowly out of the harbour.* The
pier recedes and people wave us goodbye.
People's faces have turned serious and sad and most are
crying. Goodbye, homeland, goodbye our land and the
old world, goodbye our beloved parents. Slowly, very
slowly, the ship slides forward through the water and
the grey hill falls further and further behind and
grows more and more grey.
The tugs guide our
leviathan quietly and cautiously, now and then
changing direction to left or right, one tug
349

accelerating and the other slowing down. Finally the

tugs release the ropes and start receding from the
ship, while the sailors drag the ropes on deck.
*Now the siren wails, the ship shudders, the engines roar
and the ship vibrates as it slides majestically into
the Bay of Genoa and the Ligurian Sea.
Silent and
sad we slowly leave the deck, the day fades, it grows
cold, night takes us in her embrace. Our first night
at sea!* Around 7 we are summoned to the restaurant,
a huge room, spotlessly clean, elegantly furnished
with beautiful, spotlessly clean tables, chairs and
fine cutlery.
We are attentively waited on, and
plenty of nourishing, savoury food is served on metal
platters, just what we need after a whole day without
warm food and an exhausting journey.
After four
years of grim starvation we're given a really well
served good supper.
We take a short stroll on the
deck and then go to sleep.
Tuesday, 18 January.
The Ligurian Sea is notorious for
its stormy weather and we're overcome with seasickness.
Franci noticed I wasn't well and didn't
leave my side. During the morning I was sick, then
sat on deck and the fresh air brought some relief and
finally I felt much better.
It was late afternoon
before the sea calmed and people returned to the
deck.
Some are still leaning over the rails and
looking in to the sea.
*We passed the Balearic Islands around 4 pm. We are being
followed by a flock of white sea-gulls which overfly
the ship from time to time and then swoop down and
float on the surface of the water like small white
boats.
Each single body, silhouetted against the
azure sky or the dark blue of the sea or the multicoloured rays of the setting sun, is breath-takingly
beautiful.*
In the Mediterranean.
My wife
Wednesday, 19th January.
fell seriously ill during the night. One of the IRO
doctors on board, an Italian, saw her early in the
morning, just looked at her and told her to go on
deck. By 9 am she was suffering from stomach cramps
too painful to bear, which spread to her fingers,
hands, feet. I went to the ship's chief doctor and
asked him to see her. He came immediately, asked her
a lot of questions and examined her carefully.
He
asked her to grip a pencil between her fingers,
without success.
350

At that moment dr. Rijahin, a Russian refugee who was the

doctor at Peggetz and Spittal camps where he'd
treated my wife, came by. As he was just a passenger
with no official capacity of ship's doctor he didn't
want to interfere, but did manage to tell the ship
doctor's interpreter, dr. Kremzar, how he treated my
wife in the camp hospitals. The ship doctor listened
carefully and told my wife she'd be better soon. He
went away and got a morphine injection which he gave
her and then took her in his arms and himself carried
her into the ship's sick-bay. Soon she was given a
second injection of morphine and two litres of an
intravenous
transfusion.
He's
a
young,
very
sympathetic American doctor.
When my wife was
resting on deck after discharge to get fresh air he
came in person every day to ask how she felt.
What kind of a boat is our S.S.Holbrook? It's an American
Liberty ship which was transporting American soldiers
and equipment across the Atlantic to Europe during
the second world war, a very large, very comfortable
ship with mess decks for the sleeping and living
quarters of the soldiers, a very large kitchen with
gas-oil cookers, huge cold stores, a most modern
well-equipped hospital and separate dining rooms for
officers and crew.
On deck there are plenty of
comfortable easy chairs, so there's no need to fight
for one.
The food is simply ideal for half-starved refugees.
For
breakfast fried egg and bacon, cereal with milk or
porridge cooked with milk, tea or coffee with milk,
bread and jam and a small glass of fruit juice: for
lunch ham, salad, potatoes, gravy, bread, pudding and
fresh fruit; and for supper sausages, roast potatoes
and French beans or ham, salad, bread, pudding and
coffee. During our deep sleep we slid silently into
the Atlantic Ocean.
Thursday, 20th January.
Gibraltar is already far behind
us and we're sailing quietly on the Atlantic which is
calm and dark blue with a slight breeze caressing
long, low waves. We're following the African coast.
At 7 am Father Lamovsek said a Mass for the recovery
of our Mummy; every morning between 6.30 and 9 Masses
are celebrated in the officers' saloon and in this
manner we all nicely take our turn.
Attendance at
them is impressive.
351

*After breakfast we made our beds and then stayed on deck.

The sky was clear, just a few tattered clouds, and
the sun was scorching so we took off our warm
clothing. The heat will grow every day as we slowly
approach the equator. We're sitting or lying on the
deck chairs, chattering.
The children are enjoying
themselves in their own ways.*
Friday, 21st January.
Burial at sea.
In the morning I
went to see my wife in the sick bay; the children
aren't admitted even though they'd love to see their
mother. She's still deeply jaundiced, and yesterday
was
given
two
intravenous
infusions
and
two
injections of morphine for severe colic. The doctor
told me she was severely undernourished and very
weak, but assured me it wouldn't be very long before
she recovered.
In the bed opposite there was a
Russian woman seriously ill with pneumonia.
The
doctors are afraid of this disease because these
patients can't stand the night dampness and sea air:
that's why they're warning us not to stay on deck at
night.
The sailors check the deck so that no one
sleeps in the open, as the air in the cabins is
becoming more and more oppressive.
The poor Russian woman died during the night. At 5 pm all
the passengers gathered to pay their last respects.
A funeral at sea is deeply moving.
The sailors
brought the corpse tightly wrapped in linen and put
it into a loosely woven metal net, and then put it on
a make-shift platform. Russian Orthodox priests, not
in church vestments but in their own civilian
clothing, said prayers over the body.
Then each
group said the Lord's Prayer in their own language,
for the repose in the depths of the Atlantic Ocean of
the soul of the deceased sister.
Then the soldiers
slowly lifted the wooden plank on which the body was
laid and, while a hymn of mourning was sung by the
deep bass Russian voices who took the place of the
tolling bells, the body was slowly lowered into the
ocean, feet first with a heavy iron weight attached,
and quietly slid into the waves. Instead of flowers,
the eddies from the watery grave provided their own
wreath-like formation.
The children and I were
gripped with a chilly fear as we thought of our own
dear gravely ill mum in the sick-bay.
Saturday, 22nd January. It's a beautiful day and our ship
is swinging and swaying quietly on the silver-blue
waves of the ocean.
The sunshine grows warmer and
352

warmer. I visited my wife in the sick-bay and found

her looking better. She also was very shaken by the
death of the Russian woman. There are a lot of ill
people on the ship now and the doctor is very busy.
Many are suffering from flu, a consequence of the
train journeys and the really scandalous conditions
at the transit camp in Grugliasco.
There

are floods in the bedrooms because some of the

toilets and pipes serving them are blocked. A number
of passengers are completely careless and unconcerned
about hygiene; they must be thinking they're still
using open latrines into which one can throw
anything, paper, rags and all kinds of rubbish. The
principal offenders are the Russians, not the old
emigres but those who escaped during the second world
war or soon after, and those who escaped from the
labour camps: also the army deserters and criminals.
They all wear clear marks of past sufferings in
Russia first and then in German labour camps.
Even
the priests show these types of remnants of past
sufferings and abuses.
Most of them lived for many
years in forced detention as convicts or in forced
labour camps, and became stubborn, rebellious,
indifferent.
Yet they remained deeply religious in
spite of all the abuses and hardships showered on
them. They respect only God and put their only hope
and trust in Him.

What

can you expect then from the many working class

people who were exposed, in Slovenia or in Germany,
to the Gestapo's most inhuman abuses and harassment
and forced to eat from cattle troughs? Now they are
not amenable to reason or advice, but are stubborn
and rebellious.
The majority are heading for
Paraguay.
How will they be able to make a better
life for themselves there?
Especially since they
don't seem to be united, but rather disunited and
full of hatred for each other. It took two or three
days of hard work to clear the toilets and pipes,
bedrooms and sitting rooms. The sailors supervised,
we worked.

Sunday, 23rd January.

It's our first Sunday on board.
The American flag was flying on the mast during Holy
Mass. The officers as well as the crew members who
were off duty came to hear Mass. The day was lovely
but getting hot: we're already in the tropical belt.
*Wednesday,

26th

January.

It
353

was

sticky

night

and

nobody slept well, but came on deck early for some

fresher air.
Fewer and fewer people have flu and
most of the passengers are in good spirits.
The
children lie asleep in the deck chairs. I'm leaning
over the rail watching the waves when something
starts to flash. I see a shoal of silvery fish rise
from the sea, fly 200 yards and then disappear in the
water. These must be the flying fish we learnt about
at school, but could never imagine what they'd look
like.
I wake the children, they run to the rail
shouting with delight.
They ask me endless
questions,
eager
for
an
explanation
of
the
phenomenon.
No lecture in school, no photo however
good could replace the experience of seeing real
flying fish. My son and daughter run to wake their
friends to see the fish flying.
They come running,
followed by their parents and other grown-ups.
How
marvellous is creation in this otherwise terrifying
ocean.
Thursday, 27th January.
A very hot night. Shoals of
flying fish still accompany the ship, but today we've
new companions - dolphins, who are giving us an
entertainment, playing like children and racing us.
Tonight we're allowed to sleep on deck.*
**Friday, 28th January. The Equator. At 6 in the morning
we sail past the island of San Fernando, which
belongs to Brazil. It's far away, small and rocky, a
high
security
prison
for
the
most
dangerous
criminals. I spot a small white boat heading for the
island and Mr. Kremzar leans over the rail by my side
and explains it's a patrol boat and there's no way
out of this "hell in paradise" and escape is quite
impossible. He adds:
Think how lucky we are to have escaped a similar hell and
to be sailing free and in peace towards genuine and
democratic freedom.
I shudder to think of Ljubelj,
Vetrinje and the four years of fear and humiliation
that lie behind, when UNRRA and IRO staff looked down
on us as inferior beings, lorded it over us and
ordered us about like black slaves; and of the fear
and
lack
of
the
most
basic
necessities,
of
unrelenting persecution and bans that forced us to
hide in the hills and mountains and wander in every
kind of weather, half-starved, frightened, exhausted,
resting our only hope in God's protection.
With His mercy we survived.

I lost two lovely sons - I'm

354

not complaining and don't quarrel with God over this:

He gave me them, He took them from me.
One son is
left, almost miraculously and after many prayers on
his behalf, and I'm asking God to let me keep him.
He was betrayed and condemned to die, his brothers
prayed he be returned to me, and he was. I'm old, my
wife no longer young.
I cried in anguish but have
forgotten the harm that was done me.
When we left home we did so quietly, without sadness or
anxieties, like on an excursion. We didn't think of
the homes and possessions we were abandoning, our
jobs or how we'd travel, we thought only of escaping
some days of savagery and confusion. We didn't know
where to go, where we'd end up, who'd feed us, where
we'd spend the night.
We went into total darkness
and insecurity without a guide: yet we were
completely calm. Think of what I'm telling you now.
This was a very special grace we obtained through our
prayers to Mary the Help of Christians to whom we
appealed, to whom we dedicated ourselves and for
whose protection we begged. This peace was a special
miracle of God's love for us.
Now we know well where we are going, that we'll have a
hard life and hard work for months and years.
But
we'll be free - to earn our own daily bread which
won't be lacking as we're heading for a country rich
in resources, our Land of Canaan: free to work, pray
and speak. We're not entering a new land and a new
environment unprepared.
We've had four years of
strict novitiate and of uninterrupted spiritual
retreat and so we should be spiritually mature,
accustomed to scarce resources, diligent, industrious
and united.
You're still young, you've a good half
of your life still in front of you.
Grab life's
opportunities with vigour and fight life's battle for
survival with unshaken confidence and trust in Mary,
Virgin and Mother of God who'll not abandon you
unless you abandon her. Try to tune your life with
the will and providence of God who's leading you and
all of us into a new life in a new world. God must
have a plan for us; only let us respect it and submit
ourselves to His will and, believe me, we'll be happy
in the new world. My years are counted, I won't be
able to do anything remarkable, but I'll continue to
fulfil my duties with unshakable trust in God so long
as I'm able to.
So the two of us measured the distance between land and
355

the heavens, sat, meditated a little and then ate the

excellent and abundant lunch the Lord's providence
had provided us.**
*Saturday, 29th January.
Under the Southern Cross.
A
glorious morning and a calm sea, shining blue.
No
real waves, just little curly ones. We're expecting
a very hot day.
The whole ship is bedecked with
small flags, and at 2 there's a special ceremony, the
christening of the sailors crossing the equator for
the first time.*
Tuesday, 1st February.
I'm still quite ill though the
worst is over; but I don't dare eat or drink
anything.
It slowly appears that only those who
drank iced tea at dinner on Saturday fell ill.
Contaminated ice, and not meat, was to blame.
My
wife and children didn't drink at dinner and had no
ill effects. When the doctor saw my wife on deck he
ran to her asking if she was all right; when she
answered yes, he just folded his hands as if in
prayer and went off very happy.
*Wednesday, 2nd February.
We're slowly approaching our
destination.
The water grows less deep, its colour
turns to emerald and the weather is very good. May
God grant us a safe journey for the few remaining
days until we reach Buenos Aires.
They started
returning our documents, kept safe by the captain
himself, a sure sign that the end of our really
pleasant voyage, apart from the last three days, is
approaching.
This is our first carefree and
enjoyable vacation in the form of a sea trip for
eight long years.
I'd welcome a repeat of such a
lovely and peaceful sea vacation.
At 2.20 the ship
took a right turn and started sailing down the coast
of Brazil.
Friday, 4th February.
In the morning we had the usual
devotion for the first Friday of the month and had
many things to tell Jesus. We offered up to Him once
again in reparation and reconciliation all the
bitternesses of the war years, all the suffering and
sadness of the four refugee years, the starvation,
harassment and persecutions, and prayed for His help,
protection and blessing in the new homeland.
We're
well
prepared
for
the
new
life,
spiritually
toughened: may He show us His mercy and help in our
difficulties at its beginning. We didn't abandon Him
in our most bitter hours, we shouldn't leave Him when
356

we start living under better conditions than before.*

The ship stopped at 8 am. Our destination, Buenos Aires,
and our promised land Argentina were six miles in
front of us.
The cleaning of the ship is in full
swing. The outside was newly painted by the lads and
young men during the voyage and what remains to be
done is to clean the spots that had been fouled
during the food poisoning. We're waiting for medical
and immigration check-ups.
The officials came on
board at 8 last night when the ship stopped briefly,
checked our documents, stamped them and took with
them the duplicate copies.
I was very pleasantly
surprised
when
I
received
the
Immigration
Commission's living and ration cards for fourteen
days for the Immigrants' Hotel, and feel much
relieved: it'll help us over the biggest initial
difficulties. The officials told us that the police
at the Immigrants' Hotel will issue us with personal
identity cards which will entitle us to live without
hindrance and enjoy the same rights as any other
Argentinean citizen.
The medical check was nothing special; they only examined
our eyes, and that to see if anyone suffered from
trachoma.
Of all the refugees they found only one
Slovene with it, a bachelor called Pekolj, who was
refused permission to stay and will have to go back.
There was no difficulty at all with the handicapped
people, all were accepted; they were very generous
with them.
I noticed this particularly in the case
of one Slovene man; if I hadn't seen it myself I
wouldn't have believed it.
He had one totally
paralysed arm, and we all had to lift up both our
arms. But the doctor himself grasped this man's arms
and lifted them up and then let them drop.
So he
didn't notice the paralysis, or didn't want to notice
it, I don't know ... The Argentinean pilot who will
guide the ship into harbour came on board.
Saturday, 5th February. Arrival and disembarkation. The
tugboats bring the ship into harbour and we wait to
disembark.
There are Slovenes on the pier waiting
for us, waving handkerchiefs to greet us.
We start
disembarking at 9, and go to the customs with our
personal luggage. They open our poor bags and let us
go.
They work fast.
We go immediately to the
Immigrants' Hotel to get a bed each and a place to
stay, and then straight on for chest X-rays. They're
searching for people with tuberculosis of the lungs.
357

They found a few but the problem was solved somehow

and they were allowed to stay.
I found the first
meeting with those who came to Argentina before us
rather depressing. They seemed to have nothing nice
to say, only complaints that they can't find anywhere
to live, they're quite desperate, they want to go
back, etc., etc.
Some women in particular were
insufferable with their complaints and this had an
upsetting influence all round.
Well, here we are!
This is the end of the life of a
refugee wandering the world.
We're starting a
completely new chapter of our lives. Every beginning
is difficult, but let's confront any new difficulties
with courage and strength.
We're really and fully
free, in a rich country, they're offering us work,
prosperity can be seen all around us.
With God's
help, if we persevere and don't demand too much,
we'll succeed in organising a good life for
ourselves.

358

C H A P T E R

1 5

Tragic to say, this country, my second

better to me than my native land.

homeland,

was

Argentina
The refugees were nothing if not articulate.
While
it was still in progress, they published their
perceptions of the event of supreme importance to
them, their emigration, which of course amounted to
their successful survival as a community.
I begin
this chapter with extracts from the relevant chapter
of the Free Slovenia Almanac for 1950. It discusses
why most of those in Italy and Austria put Argentina
as their first preference, and lists the areas where
they settle.
The Pernisek and Kremzar families then give their
experiences as immigrants, followed by the Bohinc
family of eight and Stanko Jerebic who arrives on his
own.
They are followed by Jorge Vorsic, after a year of
engineering studies at Graz University: Mariano
Loboda, for whom Argentina is the only chance because
he has his mother with him: Stane Snoj, for whom the
contrast between Argentina and home is so traumatic
that he would if possible return to Europe by the
next boat; and architect Bozidar Bajuk, who tells his
family's story from Slovenia right through to
Argentina.

359

The Free Slovenia Almanac for 1950 202 records the preparations
for emigration up to the end of 1949:
The groups in Italy decided almost unanimously to emigrate
to Argentina for several reasons.
The allied
authorities were very anxious to relieve Italy of the
refugee
burden,
and
Argentina
was
the
first
government to open its doors in a hospitable manner
to the Slovenes and simplify its official entry
regulations.
Conditions
were
reported
to
be
favourable, especially for workers, with enough jobs
and reasonable rates of pay, and there were countless
opportunities for anyone fit and prepared to work,
with an economy developing at a steady pace and a
cultural life reviving.
Most settlers remained in
Buenos Aires, where it was easiest to find jobs, and
in spite of a desperate housing shortage the Slovenes
are step by step approaching an acceptable standard
of living.
Substantial groups have dispersed over the enormous
country to Tierra del Fuego, Comodoro Rivadavia,
Miramar, Mar del Sur, Chapadmalal, San Luis, Cordobo
and in particular Mendoza, where there is the largest
and best developed Slovene settlement outside Buenos
Aires.
Smaller groups have settled in Chile,
Ecuador, Venezuela and Peru, with a few in Brazil and
Paraguay.
While this was happening immigration arrangements to the
USA, Canada, Britain and Australia also matured.
Canada in particular has accepted a good number of
young Slovenes and they have organised themselves
there well, establishing a sound economic base for
their future and starting up cultural and religious
activities.
IRO has arranged transport, a boon for
our families who could never have paid on their own.
Our people started arriving in Argentina in very small
groups, a couple on the 25 January 1947, six more six
weeks later, another six after five weeks and so on.
The Immigrants' Hotel was not opened to refugees
until September, and till then the only spot, where
new arrivals could lay down their bundles and seize
any work they could find next day, was a modest guest
house on Austria Street.
Large-scale transports
202

. article entitled "Slovene refugees depart in different

directions" in Koledar Svobodne Slovenije 1950 (Buenos Aires),
p.128
360

started on 21 January 1948 on the following ships:

Santa Cruz
Santa Cruz
Empire Halverd
Stevard
Olimpia

300
517
168
552
116

Stevard
Sturgis
Bundy
Heinzelman
Olimpia

253
393
241
183
244

Ravello
Sturgis
Black
Holbrook
Langfitt

145
305
179
492
233

In addition to these groups of hundreds of immigrants,

other boats arrived monthly with smaller groups, the
last on September 1949.
The Slovene emigration to
Argentina of over 5,000 is now closed as is also
probably that to the rest of South America.
Franc Pernisek's diary ends with his arrival in Buenos Aires on
the S.S. Holbrook with wife, daughter aged 13 and son aged 9,
but a letter from him completes their story:
The first two years were very tough. For three months we
lived with twelve other families in an empty
warehouse but then found something on our own; a
single room, sharing a kitchen with two other women.
My first job was with a carpenter but I soon began
work for the Slovenian Association and stayed there
eight years, helping our people in all kinds of ways
with their search for accommodation, their children's
education, job applications, completing official
formalities etc.
We

arrived in Argentina just when there was maximum

expansion and a shortage of workers and office staff
of all kinds.
Our people were thrifty and hardworking and quickly got their own houses, and finance
houses offered loans at very favourable rates.
That's how I built my own house.

Eight years later I found a job in the office of a textile

factory and worked there for twenty-five years until
I retired at the age of 74 on full pension. My son
studied at the State University in Buenos Aires and
has worked as an architect since 1966, is married and
has four children. My daughter started work already
at the age of 14, first in a stocking factory and
later as a secretary with different firms.
She is
married to a lawyer and has three children; their
daughter has just qualified at university as a
biochemist while their two sons are still attending
university, studying engineering.
The Perniseks enjoyed more than forty years of married life in
361

Argentina, until Antonia died in 1991 at the age of 85. Franc

still lives there with his daughter, son-in-law, son and seven
grandchildren in the same house or nearby.
His friend France
Kremzar died some years ago, but his son Marko, a successful
business man and writer, tells what happened to his family:
It was in 1949 I changed from refugee to immigrant, as
happened to most DPs in the UNRRA camps in Austria.
It wasn't at all easy for people to decide where to
go.
After finishing my time at that very good
Slovene college, the "Secondary School - DP Camp
Spittal an der Drau", I enrolled at the University of
Graz but had only completed half a year of history,
philosophy and psychology when I was told our days in
Austria were ending and we had to choose the country
we wanted to go to.
I could have emigrated to the
USA but there were three other members of my family
who depended on my decision, my father and mother and
my mother's sister, all over sixty and thus anything
but desirable immigrants. As I didn't want to leave
them on their own I returned to Spittal and we
started the procedure for emigration to Argentina, a
country which accepted whole families and wasn't too
strict about age.
The Argentine Consul arrived and handed out application
forms.
Friends in the migration office advised me
not to put myself down as a student but invent a more
practical occupation, and having none I wrote
electrician.
The Consul looked at us and said he
couldn't accept three elderly people with only one
family member of working age, however good an
electrician he might be and in spite of the
favourable health certificates, and to cut discussion
short told us to report next day an hour before he
was due to leave.
We were the last people he saw.
He stared at us for a long time and then signed our
papers without a word. We were emigrants.
IRO

organised the travel: train to Turin, weeks in a

transit camp and train to Genoa.
The boat, the
"Willar A. Hollbrook", belonged to a US line and was
completing its short life transporting Slovene, Croat
and Russian emigrants to Buenos Aires. A US shipyard
was then to convert it into scrap, but it is said to
have sunk on its final journey to the States.

Our voyage went smoothly and the US navy fed us well.

Because of my basic knowledge of English I was given
the job of keeping my compatriots informed over the
362

loudspeakers of everything from the Captain's orders

to items judged of interest by the transport
commander, a Norwegian civilian IRO employee.
When
we disembarked IRO gave us a final gift: a toothbrush and two cartons of Lucky Strikes per passenger.
We sold our eight cartons when we landed and from
this, our first commercial transaction on the
American continent, accrued the capital with which we
embarked on life in Argentina. Previously we had had
no money because we escaped from home with only our
lives and the clothes we were wearing, and since then
had lived within the "closed economy" of the
beneficent UNRRA.
There was a large number of DPs on the transport and the
Argentinean authorities in the "Immigrants' Hotel"
were very strict: you could stay only two weeks
finding work and lodgings.
They woke us at seven,
served breakfast at eight and locked the dormitories
to prevent "abuses". They also gave us lunch and an
evening meal.
I started looking for work, father
looked for somewhere to live, while mother and aunt
sat on a bench in a neighbouring park.
I couldn't
find work until we'd a permanent address and my
father couldn't find somewhere to live without the
guarantee of a job. Most families split up, the men
going off on their own to work on public construction
jobs and the women to domestic work of a superior or
lesser nature depending on luck.
A few fortunate
ones found work and accommodation in factories, while
some families with several children travelled on into
the interior, into unknown territory.
When our two weeks were up we hadn't found anywhere to
live and they let us stay on another week, and in the
meantime we were visited by a fellow Slovene who had
been living in Argentina since the world crisis
before the War.
He knew my father and suggested a
solution. He lived in a suburb of Buenos Aires and
was married with two sons and a daughter who boarded
in a college during the school year so that they had
two rooms free, and he proposed that my mother and
aunt should look after the house and garden so that
his wife, also a Slovene, could return to work. I'm
still grateful today to that good man, who in course
of time became godfather to our son Andrej.
As I knew nothing about electricity in spite of an old
book I got hold of in Austria to teach myself, and
recognised after two attempts I had as little
363

aptitude for carpentry, I started work in the

"Goodyear" factory as a cleaner.
At last we had a
roof and I earned enough for us to eat, but we still
had nowhere to go when the children returned home
from school in the holidays, and so it was agreed
we'd contract our living space, and we stayed with
that family for about two years.
My father, a
journalist, found a job as a cleaner in a sanatorium
and I progressed to specialised workman, assembling
the cabins of heavy lorries. The work was exhausting
but better paid.
One

day the trade union decided to strike, so while

waiting for the dispute to end I worked as a building
labourer on a new estate being put up in the middle
of the pampas not far from us.
Eventually an
agreement was reached that the firm would improve the
daily pay, and in return was entitled to make workers
employed for less than a year redundant. I was among
those sacked, and so kept on my labouring job at the
building site and claimed the compensation for
dismissal I was legally entitled to.
I was paid
eventually.
Never before had I had so much money,
almost two months' pay, and I discussed with my
father what to do with it.
We decided to buy a
groundplot, a little parcel of land in an uninhabited
area which already had planning permission for
housing.
We then obtained a loan from a building
society and with the help of bricklayer friends built
ourselves and moved into a pretty little house, while
the growing inflation made loan repayments easier.

The job in the "garden city" was temporary and I kept on

looking for a permanent one. I heard a Swiss textile
firm had built a new factory and was waiting for new
machinery from Europe.
Next day I presented myself
at the still incomplete plant and asked to speak with
the man in charge.
A Swiss mechanic saw me and I
introduced myself as an apprentice weaver.
When I
admitted I'd never seen a textile machine in my life
he got angry, but I noticed that one of a bank of new
looms had already been installed and they were trying
it out with some cheap thread. I asked him to let me
learn on this machine while he was installing the
others.
He burst out laughing, but agreed on
condition that I performed with the same speed and
quality as the professional weavers when all the
machines were ready.
I was paid at unskilled rates
but he taught me the job and I passed weeks loosening
up and testing machines while they were being
364

installed.
By the time the factory opened I could
work as well as the others, making fine cloths for
suits and overcoats for the local market and export,
and I still possess a union card as a cashmere
weaver.
From the beginning I combined work with study. I attended
a business administration course to improve my
Spanish, and this taught me both the language and
book-keeping, of which I knew absolutely nothing.
When I asked if I could inscribe at the university on
the strength of my European certificates of secondary
education they told me I'd have to follow a lengthy
procedure to get them recognised, sending them
successively to the Ministry of the Interior, the
Foreign Ministry, the Austrian Foreign Ministry in
Vienna, the Austrian Ministry of the Interior and
finally the University of Graz.
The Rector had to
certify the authenticity of the documents and they
had to return the same way.
I thought they'd been
lost by the time I was told by the Ministry of the
Interior
to collect them.
It took a year and the
certificates returned with annexes attached, covered
with seals and signatures, each certifying the
authenticity of the signatures on the previous
document.
So now I could enrol with the National
College
of
Buenos
Aires
to
take
examinations
equivalent to the baccalaureate, pass them in a year
and
complete
my
secondary
education
following
Argentinean requirements.
I was still working as a weaver by day and studying at
night and week-ends, and was told when I applied to
the University Faculty of Economics and Commerce I'd
have to pass some more examinations in commerce, for
which I needed another year of secondary studies.
Eventually, after four years, I was able to enrol and
return to the university.
Now I had to find an office job near the university if I
was to be able to study. This brought with it a new
problem, because I'd earn less in an office than as a
textile operative; so I asked mother how much I'd
need to earn for the four of us to live as modestly
as possible. A North American firm offered me a job,
but the salary was fifty pesos less than the minimum
mother set. I told the personnel director the extra
money was essential and he said if I worked well I'd
be earning as much or more in a few months.
I
insisted I had to have the money at once but he
365

couldn't give it. Just as he was sending me away, a

man passed through the office in a great hurry - I
learnt later he was the managing director.
Perhaps
he'd seen my expression, because he asked the
personnel director what the problem was. On hearing
it was a matter of fifty pesos, he said, with a very
strong American accent, "why not give it him?" and
that was how I got my office job.
On top of work and studies I devoted time to our community
life, as did most of the Slovene emigrants. We met
each Sunday after Mass, celebrated by our Slovene
priests.
Soon this was happening in several
parishes, where we organised cultural and sporting
activities.
Our teachers had begun gathering the
children of school age together as soon as we
arrived, and although they'd the same difficulties
over employment and food as we had, they taught them
every Saturday, as they'd done previously in the
refugee camps. Some families who had a little money
sacrificed it for the Saturday morning school, and
the teachers taught without expecting any kind of
payment - a tradition that persists until today.
Small cooperatives were soon set up to buy land in the
suburbs and so the "Slovene Hearths" started, and
very often families without houses of their own
helped set them up in their neighbourhoods.
They
provided bases for the Saturday schools and included
classrooms, a chapel and a multi-purpose hall for
theatre, athletics and dances.
Then we built a
Slovene Cultural Centre which brought all the
"hearths" together, and the teachers joined together
and combined their study programmes and adapted them
to new needs.
Later we started secondary education
courses on the same lines and then a university.
So we divided our lives between work and study during the
week; and between study, family and community at
week-ends.
Many devoted even more time to work
within the community.
We were very conscious of
living abroad against our real wishes, and this
despite the welcome the Argentineans extended to us.
I qualified as a public auditor within the prescribed four
years and then married.
Later I returned to the
university and took a degree and then a doctorate in
economics.
After two years with the firm where I
started, I changed jobs fairly often so as to learn
more and gain wider experience before graduating. I
366

soon started working with international undertakings

in the area of finance and ended up as deputy
managing director of one of them. But that's another
story.
Marko Kremzar married a fellow Slovene, Paula Hribovsek.
She
has already told how Director Marko Bajuk first refused her a
place at the school in Peggetz (pages 00). Now she continues
her story:
I came to Argentina more or less on my own but joined a
family - Mr Pavcic, a grocer owning his own shop in
Slovenia, and his two daughters in the same class
with me at school, who more or less adopted me for
emigration, just as Stanko Jerebic attached himself
to the Kremzar family.
This happened quite often.
We stayed two weeks in the Hotel de los Inmigrantes
where Father Orehar, who he was in [spiritual] charge
of our community in Argentina, came to visit us.
There was a group of girls working for two partners, a
Serb and a Croat. Like many of the Serbs and Croats,
they had money when they arrived and set up a
machine-knitting factory.
Father Orehar asked if
they needed another girl and thus found me a job,
while the two Pavcic girls found different work. The
man who ran the factory rented a house two or three
blocks away for his girl workers - nine Slovenes and
three or four Croats. Only the Slovenes lived in the
house, *and later the boys called it Babigrad or
granny-castle!* They were good employers and treated
and paid us well, and we were quite content.
A
family (father, mother and daughter) ran the Convikt;
the
mother
cooked
for
us
and
we
paid
her.
Accommodation was free, and we were paid enough to
save some money.
The factory had a rooms for the machines, a cutting room
and one for sewing and ironing.
I'd no special
skills, so I started as an unskilled worker. I kept
to one job, sewing the pieces together by machine.
I'd used a machine at home, but not this kind.
In
the evenings I took typing and Spanish courses, but
not short-hand.
A year later I was called by a
friend who was working in a factory office where
there was a vacancy. I went, was interviewed, did a
short typing test and was appointed.
My Spanish
didn't need to be particularly good, because I was
working with numbers!
It was better paid, and I
continued there six years from 1951 until I married
367

in 1957.
They were good employers, and the room
where I worked was alright with about eight girls,
all Argentineans.
The other Slovene girl worked in
the next room. I also remained in the house until I
married, although no longer working for the knitting
factory: we shared the rent.
I first met Marko in Spittal. I didn't know him well, he
was just one of many students.
We continued in
Argentina the pattern well established in Slovenia
and continued in Austria, of girls limiting their
circles of friends to fellow girls and boys to boys,
until the boys were old enough to start work and
enjoy an income sufficient for them to contemplate
marriage.
But every Saturday and Sunday we went to
our church and were there all day. We had Mass and
meetings.
The girls felt secure, knowing it was
probable they'd marry; they wanted to marry and have
their own families, but didn't feel any urgency for
finding a man: in the natural course of events a man
would probably find them! In my circle of friends at
church gradually one and then another found a boy
friend and went off and got married, and this was a
natural progression. I was in about the middle. But
there was a group of girls who didn't marry because
the domobranci were killed.
Some of them continued
to live with a brother or sister who was married, and
some are living alone today. Of the nine living in
the Convikt only one became a nun, and only two
remained unmarried.
So 20% remained unmarried, and
many of those who didn't marry are now teachers.
Ten days before the SS Holbrook left Genoa with the Perniseks
and the Kremzars, The SS Black left with the eight members of
the Bohinc family. Juliana Bohinc tells their story:
Every

day father and one of my sisters left the

Immigrants' Hotel to look for accommodation but
returned with sore feet.
In the end they found a
small house we could rent with our scant resources,
65 km from the capital.

How marvellous to be on our own again and in a house! No

matter it had no furniture; we sat on the cases
holding our few belongings.
No matter the kitchen
lacked pots and pans; by candle-light, we heated
water for tea on a kerosene heater we'd bought in
Austria.
We had some bread from Buenos Aires with
us, and that was our first meal. We laid the coats
we were wearing out on the floor and settled down for
368

the night, not without first thanking God that we'd

left behind us the perils of war and those that
threatened after it.
How happy we felt in the
knowledge we were all safe and sound!
Next morning we got to know our closest neighbours who
were very friendly. But what confusion! They spoke
the only tongue they knew, Spanish, while we tried
Italian but found that hands and gestures were more
help. We soon heard some fellow countrymen lived in
the neighbourhood, who'd spent the first post-war
years in refugee camps in Italy and crossed the ocean
eight months earlier, and so seemed veritable
veterans to us. There were also a few families who'd
arrived twenty years ago and spoke Slovene, and they
were our counsellors and more than once interpreters.
We

first had to find work.

At 65 father became a
bricklayer's mate, something he'd never done before.
He took the train at five in the morning and got back
at nine in the evening, because there was neither
industry nor good jobs where we lived and 60% of the
locals had to travel two or three hours to get to
work. My oldest brother was found a job nearby; the
pay wasn't good but he could work extra hours. One
of my sisters worked for a family in the capital,
while another sister and I found some sewing near
home in a workshop making slippers, where the pay was
also very low. We were advised to place our younger
brothers aged 13 and 15 in a college like the present
technical school where they had to study for five
years, as this was the only way they could obtain
admission.

Once we'd taken stock of where we were living and how

things were, we resolved to build a house of our own
near Buenos Aires, where the job prospects were
better, as soon as possible.
My father was
interested in the areas with larger groups of
Slovenes and bought a plot of land in one of them by
instalments, as was the custom.
The monthly
instalments were almost the same as the rent we were
paying, and we were saved by the relative cheapness
of food. We fed very modestly as we were anyhow used
to a simple diet, we spent the absolute minimum on
clothes and there was no question of any kind of
entertainment. We suffered severe shortages of every
sort but didn't complain, but set our sights on
moving, to provide us with more friends and better
work.
369

I still dreamed in secret that once I lived near the

capital and knew the language better I could take up
my beloved books again and continue with my studies,
for I'd completed secondary school and matriculation,
with the exception of mathematics, at the refugee
camp in Spittal. In mid-1950 everything seemed to be
going well and father was very happy with a better
job as night-watchman. But one morning he got home,
lay down, exchanged a couple of words and went to
sleep -for ever.
His heart, which had suffered so
much from all we'd experienced for so many years and
now seemed about to enjoy happiness and the fruits of
his labours, could manage no more and called it a
day.
The day we buried my father I buried my own plans for the
future.
Forty-five years have passed since we took root in this
part of the world, and I think our parents can look
down from eternity with satisfaction on their six
children, thirteen grandchildren (all, according to
their ages, with secondary, tertiary or university
education) and up to now seven great-grandchildren.
We all share the tongue they handed on to us as our
common family language, and follow the example of
honest work they set us.
Most of the emigrants travelled in family groups, but not so
the 16-year-old Stanko Jerebic:
In February 1949 I landed on my own in the then bustling
port of Buenos Aires, but with many friends gained
during three long years of refugee life.
We were
taken to "The Hotel of Immigrants" where I, a minor
without parent or guardian to guarantee my good
behaviour, was shut up in a room on the top floor
with a small group with similar backgrounds.
An
armed marine was posted at the door with instructions
not to let us out till someone came to our defence.
This had little effect on us youngsters, as we'd
liberated ourselves from worse situations in recent
years and reflected that every country was entitled
to interpret the concept of freedom in its own way.
After four days a merciful soul did appear and signed for
me, and the door of the refuge opened. I'd been told
Argentina was developing rapidly, a lot of building
was going on and people with relevant skills were in
370

great demand.
I was reminded of this in the Plaza
Britanica, when I was accosted by a gentleman with a
very thick beard and loud voice who saw me
gesticulating and asked if I spoke Italian. With the
aid of the language of Dante we agreed that next day
he'd meet with me and four more lads, all experienced
carpenters, to go to a neighbourhood they were
building in the suburb of Lanus. I didn't have much
difficulty recruiting my team, one of whom had in
fact attended courses in carpentry at Spittal refugee
camp.
It isn't easy to improvise skills in carpentry and our job
at the site wasn't likely to prove very long-lived.
So I leafed through the classified advertisements of
a German newspaper and found what I was looking for,
a coffin factory requiring precisely five carpenters,
and thither we went.
While they finished building
the factory, the good man sent us out without comment
to five small workshops for us to study the
difference between European and local coffins.
He
sent me to a small undertaker who made coffins for
use in his own business.
He was smart enough to
realise I wouldn't be a conspicuous acquisition as a
carpenter but might be useful preparing corpses for
the death vigil. I didn't object as it provided me
with the means to eat, and was anyhow not unrelated
to my admission to the medical faculty of the
University of Graz some months earlier.
I continued to leaf through the German-language paper. I
went in tie and polished shoes to offer my services
to a firm advertising for a book-keeper, as by that
time I'd completed eight lessons in book-keeping at a
Pitman School.
I'll never forget the accountant's
guffaws when I told him of my professional skills,
but there's another thing I'll never forget: how the
good man stayed behind after work every day to teach
me, then let me take over the books after a few
months and praised the quality of my work. I stayed
five years and learnt enough Spanish and book-keeping
to justify my existence.
Curiously, in spite of the difficulties we had finding
work, it was those first years that led me to devote
myself to cultural, and especially theatrical,
activities within our community, as if the small seed
of creativity sown in the refugee camps burgeoned
into fullness after the many years of silence imposed
on us by the occupiers. The community activities of
371

our first years in Argentina never developed on the

same scale later on, although we then had less need
to be worried about meeting our daily needs and so
had more time for activities not involved with work.
Jorge Vorsic remembers his first weeks in Buenos Aires with
equal clarity:
*A

few pictures retain the vivid focus of first

impressions: our arrival from the raw winter of
Europe into the sweltering South American summer, and
being towed into port by tug and tied up in front of
a grey building which at the time seemed enormous,
the Immigrants' Hotel. There we were lodged in huge
halls in beds of I don't know how many tiers, all
metal, and shared the building with dark-skinned,
black-haired
scantily-dressed
people
who'd
lost
everything in a terrible earthquake in the province
of San Juan, more than 1,000 km away, thus meeting on
our very first day with authentic inhabitants of
these lands. Later in the week we were passed from
queue to queue and crowned the bureaucratic nightmare
with repulsive photographs clipped onto identity
cards,
authenticating
us
as
genuine,
legal
immigrants.
To start with I was given about 45
dollars.

The first few days brought some unforgettable experiences:

someone discovered a bar in the railway station where
you could buy whole milk for a few cents, and after
so many years of semi-starvation with milk out of the
question, this seemed proof we'd arrived in a rich
country with everything available in abundance.
Going for a short walk I was lost in admiration of a
34-floor skyscraper which towered over a pretty park,
unable to believe such a building could exist. Then
I visited Santa Fe Avenue and was dazzled by the
lavish window displays of things I'd never seen
before, and overawed by the number of well-dressed
men, all wearing waistcoats and hats and, more
impressive still, practically all wearing black
moustaches. In short, everything astonished me.*
The day came when we had to leave the hotel. I was with
my parents and my sister's family.
Most of our
fellow Slovenes had arranged where to go: some to
relatives, others to houses arranged for them by
people who'd arrived earlier. In our case, a cousin
who'd arrived a year before suggested we share his
flat, while my sister's family was put up in the
372

small house of a godchild.

*We loaded our few
belongings onto a small truck and set off for the
other end of the city, along wide asphalted roads
traversing luxuriant parks.*
When we arrived the worry was how to find a job.
In
Austria I'd helped a painter friend during the
holidays and so thought I should look for this kind
of work, but a 40-day strike had put a halt to all
day-work and my cousin found me a job in a branch of
a large firm where he'd already attained the position
of weaver.
I started as an unskilled labourer, and
as the firm was run by Germans and I could speak the
language they treated me very well. It was there I
first noticed how the Germans looked after their "own
people" - we could learn from them. It was left to
my workmates to exploit my ignorance of Spanish and
indulge in jokes at my expense.
When the strike finished I found a job as a commercial
painter and worked there for two years. I must have
had some aptitude as my last employer, Herr Narr,
didn't want me to leave and offered me a post as
foreman.
But now I'd some knowledge of Spanish as
well as a year of engineering studies in Austria and
I longed for more appropriate work. I found a job as
a technical apprentice in industrial engineering, and
at the same time studied Spanish in a German college
where the instruction was in German. More important
still, we were able to take the local equivalences to
our Abitur exams thanks to our intellectual leaders,
under the guidance of Dr Bajlec.
I'd passed the
Abitur in the secondary school at Spittal, and in due
course passed the necessary subjects and was awarded
the title of Bachelor of the National College of
Buenos Aires. With honours!
I

then inscribed in the University of Buenos Aires

Engineering Faculty but only reached the fourth year
due to constraints of work.
Later on, when I was
already married and had a family, I decided to study
economics and business administration and took a
degree after some years of sacrifices.
I've been
involved
in
teaching
since
1960
within
the
Engineering Faculty of the Industrial University of
Argentina.
I
became
Director
of
Industrial
Engineering of a firm, employing 6,000 people, and
for the past 20 years I've worked for the firm owned
by the Slovene Herman Zupan.
373

I'd the good fortune to meet Mirjanka, a Slovene and also

a university student at that time. God united us and
we've five children, all conscious of their Slovene
descent, and nine grandchildren who speak Slovene and
mostly already attend Slovene infant or primary
schools.
*Mariano Loboda is remarkable for his commitment to Slovene
community activities at all levels.
He starts his story in
Austria:
Hope

of returning home to freedom and justice became

weaker and weaker so that most people started to
think of emigration overseas.
At first we were
against this because it meant going still further
from our beloved native soil, but reality was
inexorable.
The first opportunity for emigration
arose in the middle of 1948 - to the USA, but only
for people who had friends or relatives there to
sponsor them. Commissions from Venezuela, Chile and
Canada soon followed with offers for healthy young
people able to work, but not for families with
children or old people.

One fine day the loudspeakers announced the visit of a

commission from Argentina and we secretly looked in
the atlas for this unknown and far away country,
because it was the last chance for many of us.
My
mother and I joined the long queue of families with
numerous children and older folk and saw a gentleman
in a white shirt, with black hair and white skin who
smiled in a friendly manner - Dr. Virasoro, the
Argentinean Consul in Austria. "Let them all come",
he said with a sweeping gesture, and his aides noted
our personal details.
I shall never forget this
generous invitation to people without homeland and
almost without friends in the world, which opened up
before us a small hope of a future with self-respect.
Departure day in December 1948 soon came and I boarded the
train not fully conscious I was going so far away,
perhaps for ever.
Some of my friends had gone
earlier and others would soon follow so that parting
wasn't too difficult.
I remember how we were
summoned to the dining room after some hours at sea
and saw an enormous table full of great pieces of
white bread and all kinds of cold foods and other
prepared dishes.
My eyes were dazzled, having seen
nothing like it for years, but my stomach suffered
from the motion of the waves and I ran to the deck to
374

part with the little food I'd eaten hours earlier,

and I was obliged to forgo the delicacies.
I
recovered after a couple of days and from then on the
voyage was highly enjoyable.
During it we painted
the ship's deck and for this were given several
packets of Lucky Strike cigarettes.
We disembarked on the 15th February 1949.
The heat was
infernal and I looked ridiculous wearing my clothes
from Austria, which we'd left in mid-winter: my best
trousers were for skiing and caused smiles on the
streets of Buenos Aires where the temperature was
around 32.
The differences between this new world
and Slovenia or Austria were enormous. What we most
regretted was our inability to speak Spanish, as the
intensive course in the camp proved insufficient.
Climate, customs and food were completely different,
but what surprised us particularly was the kindness
of the people: no one rejected us, everyone tried to
help and no one laughed at my poor Spanish. On the
contrary, they did their best to understand what I
was trying to say and more than once helped out with
a few words of English or German.
I

quickly sold for $15 the packets of cigarettes I'd

earned by painting on board and changed them into 60
pesos, which constituted the initial capital for this
new stage of my life.
Within a week people from a
building firm came in search of bricklayers and
bricklayers' mates and offered board and lodging on
the job. I enrolled with a number of friends and we
were then able to leave the Hotel of the Immigrants
and start building a factory in the suburbs, 15 km
from the capital.
The site was enclosed by a wire
fence.
After the first day's work I ran round the
perimeter and with a friend crossed the fence with a
feeling of exploration into the unknown. But being a
bricklayer's mate wasn't easy for a former student
unaccustomed to physical work, and more than once I
was on the brink of despair.

Two weeks later I received my first pay packet of 190

pesos or $45 and bought a few clothes to go out on
Sunday to a Salesian college in the city where a
Slovene priest used to celebrate Holy Mass. Here we
gathered, gossiped, told each other what had been
happening to us, swapped information on jobs and
lodgings and reminisced about life at home and in the
camp.
I soon joined the Slovene Society and a
society for young catholics dedicated to missions.
375

We joined different bodies instinctively, to feel

less isolated in this strange environment. This was
healthy because it integrated me firmly into society,
but it also led to my giving up my studies.
After three months I got a job in a metal factory, and
later in a repository and then became the first and
sole employee of a newly established Slovene credit
cooperative. This failed to grow as expected due to
unstable economic conditions, and so I took worked
for a textile firm and ran the cooperative in my
spare time. After ups and downs I ended as manager
of the cooperative, the post I still hold today.
In 1955 I married a Slovene girl I got to know in the
organisation for young Slovenes.
With her I've a
lovely family of three daughters and two sons, who
are all now married to Slovene boys and girls and
have made us ten times grandparents.
After several
moves I built the house where we now live, and where
our children and grandchildren return every Sunday to
enjoy a family reunion.
All my children have their
own houses and acceptable standards of living, and
all have completed secondary education - and one of
them university.
From the first I played a full part in the life of the
Slovene community, where I occupied a variety of
positions. Thus I was on the executive committee of
the central organisation, the Slovene Society of
Buenos Aires, and president for four years. I'm also
active in the Slovene House in Ramos Mejia, a
satellite town of Buenos Aires where some 300 Slovene
families live and which is one of the seven Slovene
centres in the capital. Since it was established in
1958 it has run courses in Slovene language and
history, at one time attended by 150 Slovene children
and today by 65.
Classes are held every Saturday
morning, the Slovene history ones being taken by me
for two hours every week since 1974.
I was also
president of this Slovene House for four years.
I've also taught Slovene history three hours a week since
1988 at the Ravnatelj [Director] Marko Bajuk Slovene
Secondary School of Buenos Aires, which was founded
by Dr Marko Kremzar in 1960 and had 132 pupils this
year, coming from all the Slovene centres of greater
Buenos Aires. I was a member of the Slovene National
Council, a kind of Slovene government in exile, for
four years until it dissolved itself on the
376

democratisation of Slovenia after the free elections

and democratic constitution of 1989.
Even if it may seem frivolous I'll also mention that I'm a
member, and have served as president, of the Plus
Ultra Club, composed of seven former pupils of the
secondary school in DP Camp Peggetz.
We founded it
in 1952 and have since met regularly once a month and
been active as a group in the most varied cultural
and social activities of the Slovene community.
We've maintained books of minutes of the annual
assemblies and monthly meetings from the very
beginning, and I doubt if there are many similar
cases. What unites us is the friendship we forged in
the DP camp.
All my activities within the community have been and are
unpaid but in spite of thousands of hours sacrificed
for the common good I've never lacked the means for
my own financial progress, and I've derived limitless
spiritual gratification.
God rewarded me in giving
me a marvellous family and a respected position among
my people and Argentinean society. Deo gratias.*
*Stane Snoj was 16 when he arrived in December 1948, and his
conclusions summarise Slovene attitudes to Argentina:
For

most of us it was our first encounter with the

Hispanic world.
When Slovenes want to emphasise
their ignorance they use the expression "spanska vas"
which means literally "Spanish village" and signifies
"I haven't a clue" - just as I haven't the slightest
idea what a Spanish village is like.
Spain is for
Slovenes more distant than other European countries:
but we went still further away, to a South American
country with characteristics still more strange.

Slovenia is an alpine country of small cities and

picturesque
villages
scattered
between
rolling
meadows and encircling hills with little rivers and
streams flowing from the mountains.
Accustomed to
such scenery, we found ourselves on a hot summer's
day in an endless plain and a giant city of four
million
inhabitants,
with
regular
and
endless
squares, not to speak of the other differences customs, climate etc. To celebrate Christmas in the
full heat of summer for the first time was so strange
we could never forget we'd left home on the other
side of the Atlantic. In a word - our initiation was
so bitter that most of us would have returned to
377

Europe on the first boat if we'd been able to. But

there is a saying that there is no evil from which
good can not come.
A spontaneous spirit of self-preservation arose and united
us in the face of all difficulties.
During those
first months the only help we could expect was from
ourselves, as we were without language, money or
acquaintances
apart
from
our
fellow
Slovene
immigrants. It was natural to hang closely together,
and soon larger groups of emigrant compatriots,
always with a priest, sprang up in areas within
greater Buenos Aires and the interior.
Those who
perforce had to live apart suffered greatly.
Hardly had the first contingents arrived before the
priests arranged to celebrate Mass in Slovene in a
Buenos Aires church, and this was the weekly point of
reunion for all of us, every Sunday - the mandatory
meeting no one wanted to miss. Before and after Mass
we'd a great gathering in the courtyard and on the
parish pavement, united by the life and lot we'd
shared in the refugee camps of Austria and Italy,
where we retold our experiences with Argentineans at
work and in search of a home, and updated on social
news.
Our political and religious leaders set up
United Slovenia, a society for mutual aid which acted
as our spokesman with Argentinean society, and at
once periodicals and reviews began to be published in
our language. Soon there appeared the first Slovene
course
books
for
primary
school
children
and
organisations for young people, religion and culture.
We simply started up again and adapted to our new
circumstances the customs and activities we'd brought
with us from Slovenia and from the camps.
Today, 46 years later, there exists within the republic of
Argentina a Slovenia in miniature which has become
famous even abroad.*
How was this possible - this
"Argentinean miracle"? It is good to recall:
1.

That as refugees we had no money; we started with the

50 pesos we were given, and our only capital was the
determination to earn a livelihood by hard and honest
work.
We'd a great capacity to put up with
difficulties, to adapt to living on a little and, at
the same time, a determination to improve our lot.

2.

The ways we helped each other.

As we were poor, we
could only do this through the personal credit we'd
378

3.

earned at work: a request on behalf, or word in

favour, of a Slovene, coming from a fellow Slovene,
soon became the best form of recommendation. I speak
from personal experience, because during my years in
Argentina I changed jobs four times, always for the
better and always supported by the recommendation of
some Slovene friend.
It was the same when we were
looking for somewhere to live during the first
months.
The way we also helped each other when it came to
building our houses. I can quote from the experience
of myself and my wife, who originally settled in
distant Mendoza, 1,100 km from the capital. Five of
the Slovene families where she lived bought plots and
helped each other build their own houses, starting
with the families with most children.

4.

The way we didn't, despite our own extreme poverty to

start with, forget the members of our families who
remained beneath the communist yoke in Slovenia. We
knew they were being treated like third-class
citizens and subjected to all kinds of tricks, raids,
confiscations and moral and material deprivation, so
the first pesos we earned were devoted to buying aid
parcels. For example, my father-in-law sent packets
of food and second-hand clothing to his wife who was
on her own with their five young daughters to look
after. Communist functionaries raided the houses and
stole many of the things sent from Argentina, but the
answer to protests was simple: write to your husband
to send some more.

5.

The way, while still building our own homes, we

contributed money for the construction of our
cultural and religious centres in Buenos Aires and
the suburbs, and also in Mendoza and Bariloche.

This is the story of the great majority of the Slovene

immigrants, although not all.
To behave the way I
described we had to remain faithful to our moral,
religious
and
national
values
for
which
our
forefathers had struggled at home and for which we
had to emigrate from Slovenia and continue the
struggle abroad. The Christian ideals and philosophy
of life which the Church succeeded in sowing among
the people during its thousand years in Slovenia this was the "miraculous" formula that saved our tiny
nation.
What happened to us Slovene emigrants in
Argentina since World War II was only a repetition of
an old story.
379

This evaluation of the Slovene experience in Argentina is

complemented by the comments of Henry Ziernfeld, a Slovene who
settled in Canada after engineering studies at Graz Technical
University, and visited Argentina a few years ago:
Most of those who were in Graz came either to Canada or
the States, and very few went down to Argentina -I
remember Milan Ecker, Brusnikin and Joze Markez.
There's a strong community life among the Slovenians
in Argentina, a lot more than in North America: here
we've become much more assimilated.
The standard of living of those in Argentina is at the
moment very bad because whatever savings they had
they lost through inflation.
Those who have their
own businesses are better off.
But others, even
though they graduated down there, still after so many
years cannot afford to retire, because inflation is
eating away whatever savings they had.
They were
doing reasonably well before. They told me after the
war all the banks in Argentina had corridors in their
basements full of gold brick, because they made so
much money during the war selling wheat and cattlemeat
to
the
allies.
All
the
money
simply
disappeared; politicians transferred the gains into
their private accounts in Swiss banks, and Argentina,
despite many natural resources, is still a poor
country.
It's

sad, because the Slovenian community worked very

hard: you can see quite a difference in their village
there. A big chunk of the Slovenian people were sent
to Lanus, one of the poorest areas they were allotted
in Buenos Aires. They built a really modern village,
very nice, and not very far from there you can see
all these clapperboard houses, streets just a sea of
mud. These people were there before. And when the
Slovenians came they had nothing, they were just put
there in the middle of this garbage dump almost, and
they built something.

380

C H A P T E R

1 6

Canada
The Free Slovenia Almanac for 1949 and 1950 describes
the Slovenes' first two years in Canada and records
their
emotions
and
perceptions
at
the
time.
Individuals follow with their own family histories.
First a sister, her brother and her future husband,
whose first jobs are domestic worker, farm labourer
and railway and forestry worker; and then a married
couple
who
eventually
establish
themselves
as
surveyor and librarian.
Another family group follows, composed of two
engineering students, formerly close colleagues and
friends at the University of Graz, and the two
sisters they are soon to marry in Canada. And then a
succession of individuals who illustrate Slovene
resilience and the variety of occupations they adopt,
including
draughtsman
and
technical
designer,
physician, Archbishop and teacher.

381

Canada was the first country to welcome Slovene immigrants on a

substantial scale.
Up to October 1948 it had accepted more
than the rest of the world combined, the totals then being:
Canada
624
Argentina 232

Britain
Brazil

96
85

Venezuela

60

with smaller numbers accepted by Chile, Ecuador, France, Spain

and Sweden, and only 3 by the USA.
At the end of 1948 the
first Free Slovenia Almanac, lavishly illustrated and running
to 190 pages, included a five-page survey of "Slovenes in the
World" and a whole page on Canada.
The article is of
particular interest, written as it was while immigration was
still taking place and mirroring the perceptions at the time,
without benefit of hindsight: 203
Canada, land of forests and lakes, was the first country
of North America to open its doors to our emigrants.
They came after special commissions selected them in
the camps, and had to sign on for a work contract for
ten months and only when that expired could they
freely choose their own jobs.
The first group of
forestry workers, which left in October 1947,
successfully completed their contracts for this
heavy, and up to then unaccustomed, work.
A good
number soon had, as a letter records, '$1,000 in
their savings accounts; and all the same don't
imagine they're not well dressed and every one of
them hasn't helped their people back home.'
The
letter continues:
A second group, this time of girls, arrived in
January 1948 and are employed as domestic helpers and
hospital nurses throughout Ontario.
A group of
seamstresses and tailors arrived in March, the first
to be allowed to bring other family members with
them.
Some stayed in Montreal while others went on
to Toronto. They were followed in April by 82 lads
for work on the railways, and then some workers on
farms, sugar cane plantations etc., and then in
September our largest group - of girls, who went
mostly to Toronto.
Did they cause excitement!
You
can imagine the numerous reunions of sweethearts in
the new homeland.
How agreeable is life in Toronto!
I first heard
about the city during evening chats on board ship
when we were told that the most nearly comparable
203

. Koledar Svobodne Slovenije 1949 (Buenos Aires, 1949),

pp. 175-7
382

climate for us would be there.

As we waited in
Montreal for the fateful decision on who'd be sent
where, we were after two hours of struggle divided up
"s sivcem". We found it difficult to part with our
compatriots and fellow seamstresses and tailors who
remained in Montreal.
Eight of us went on to Toronto - the first Slovene
refugees in that enormous city - and were distributed
between several factories so that we were at most in
pairs.
It was hard to wait till evening to meet
together and talk over the day's events, but we were
all in our own ways toughened by the experience of
refugee camp life and gradually adapted to our new
circumstances.
There are a lot of old Slovene
settlers in and around Toronto, and we get on really
well with many of them.
Our refugee community has grown a lot since the
arrival of the girls, the railway workers and those
who've completed their contract year, and will grow
still more when those who've been scattered across
the breadth of Canada complete their year. We've as
yet made no progress with cultural activities because
we're struggling with so many difficulties and have
no one to depend upon but ourselves, though there'll
be big developments once we're used to the language
and have got to know the rules, what we may and may
not do.
Of course we arrived in our new homeland
penniless, all our possessions having been lost or
destroyed for us.
What no one can rob us of is our faith, Slovene
culture and eternally beautiful Slovene songs. This
is our whole wealth, for the sake of which we'll
dispose of and honourably replace the bitternesses of
the Slovene nation. Our only cultural performance so
far has been a concert of Slovene national songs by
the choir of our lads working on the Ottawa-Toronto
railway.
"Old" and "new" Slovenes from all over
Canada and even from Cleveland USA came, and Slovene
song echoed back and linked our hearts with home and
our fellow-countrymen, reminding us of our mothers,
fathers,
brothers
and
sisters.
"The
Student
Blacksmith" transported us for three hours to our
birthplaces and we even forgot we were in Canada.
We've time and opportunity enough in Toronto to
fulfil the duties of our faith, and once we've been
sent a Slovene priest we'll also hear Slovene Holy
383

Mass. As at home in the parish, so here the House of

the Lord gathers us together each Sunday, to share
our burdens with God and pray for his help for
ourselves, our suffering family members and our
homeland, that he should bring as soon as possible an
end to godless communism and lead our scattered
brothers and sisters back into the arms of our
beautiful Slovene homeland. To all Slovene refugees,
scattered around the wide world, we send heart-felt
Toronto Slovene greetings. May God be with you!
There follows the more detailed report for 1949 on the early
days in Canada:
When we set out for Canada the threatening nightmare of
daily moral and physical pressure on us from all
sides in Austria, the unclear situation and the dark
future indicated, particularly to us younger ones,
that we should leave as soon as possible. That led
us to apply to the Canadian commissions visiting the
camps,
submit
to
all
the
examinations
and
interrogations and assemble for the departing train.
It's true a one-year work contract oppressed us
somewhat and tied our hands, but we knew that a year
soon passes and after that a new life awaited us.
On arrival the employment office took possession of us.
Some were sent to build new railways, others to
forest work, particularly in the north, and a few to
places with different industries, and most of the
girls to private households for domestic work or as
nurses or nursing aides in all kinds of health
resorts and hospitals.
Work was found for many in
farms, mostly in the west in Manitoba and Alberta.
So we emigrants were soon scattered all over Canada
from Vancouver to Halifax with countless miles
between us.
Often we found ourselves completely isolated among strange
people, but all the same smaller Slovene circles and
societies were formed.
40 men were sent to work in
the forests north of Kapuskasing, others on the La
Perade line in Quebec province and the Smithfalls and
North Bay railway lines.
They didn't stay long in
the same place but moved with the job, the team at
North Bay covering the whole line between Smithfalls
and Port Arthur. After completing railway jobs some
teams were transferred to the forests, and groups
were split up into smaller sections and dispersed
over the provinces of Quebec and Ontario.
384

The compulsory contract work was however soon over and we

thought
about
moving
elsewhere
and
finding
occupations of our own choice.
Most rushed to the
provinces of Quebec and Ontario, and they looked like
becoming the central territory for the Slovene
refugee-emigrants.
The true centre became Toronto,
where for the time being the majority of Slovenes
are, and also our Slovene priest.
In addition to
Toronto, the group employed in the Bata shoe factory
in Batawa near Trenton is also growing.
A smaller
community is gathering in Montreal, but it's expected
there won't be a new influx of people there because
it's difficult to find work. Some lads are also in
London Ontario. Many decided to look for mining jobs
when their year's contract finished: one such group
is at Noranda Quebec and another at Sudbury.
The girls have also been scattered, but the largest group
is in Toronto and there are a good many also in
Montreal, with smaller groups in Bellwile, Guelph,
Pariz, Preston, Hamilton, Cemptville, all in the
province of Ontario, and also in Winnipeg, Manitoba,
and in Quebec.
Earnings during the contract period vary considerably.
Workers on the railways and in the forests have been
quite well paid, while the girls who have been worst
paid have been those doing domestic work and on
farms, busy early morning to late at night and
receiving $40-45 a month.
In Canada as everywhere
Slovenes have proved themselves hard-working and
enterprising, and some have saved so much during the
period of compulsory work that they've been able to
consider building their own houses or at least buying
a building plot.
This is a matter of joint effort
and so the best expression of mutual aid put into
practice.
Two or three lads combine their savings
and buy a house. That's how we've already got four
Slovene houses in Toronto, two in London Ontario and
one in Smithfalls.
For a long time we didn't have our own priest, although Dr
Janko Pajk came as often as his parish duties
allowed.
In December 1948 Dr Jakob Kolaric of the
Congregation of Missionaries (Vincentian Fathers)
came to Toronto and we now have regular Sunday Masses
in the Church of Marija Chenstochova.
From time to
time the Croat priest Dr Rudolf Hrascanec has also
come to celebrate Mass. Attendance to start with was
385

modest, but now around 200 Slovene refugee-emigrants

regularly
gather
for
Mass
and
a
conversation
afterwards.
There follow the memories of individual settlers.
Marija
Suhadolc, nee Plevnik, spent her contract year in Halifax:
I didn't leave Spittal until September 1948: I was one of
the later ones and found it very hard to make up my
mind where to go. The idea of leaving Europe, that
there is no chance to go back, of starting off life
in a strange country, was not very pleasant. So my
brother left in June 1948 and I in September.
He
went with a group of young men needed for work out in
the woods or with the farmers; and then later on the
authorities were looking for young girls and I went
with a group for domestic work.
Before that they
were looking for seamstresses.
We had an interview
and were checked physically to make sure we're in
good condition, and anybody who had any sicknesses or
whatever would be refused. I wasn't shocked by this
really, because I guess I didn't have that fear. Had
I been sick I think I'd be really worried whether
they'd accept me or not: there were a few cases where
people that were not feeling so good would send
someone else for the X-Ray, just to qualify.
I

decided for Canada, though reluctantly, because my

brother had already gone there and we thought it was
still closer than Argentina.
At that time we were
still thinking of returning to Slovenia; we'd save
the money and go back when the opportunity came. We
didn't come with the intention of staying here. Then
all of a sudden you heard after a few years, "oh, soand-so bought a house in Toronto".
Bought a house?
.. he wants to stay here? Then it followed, people
started getting married and establishing themselves
and then taking life seriously, and reality set in
and of course Canada became our second country, our
second home. We love it now, we're happy here, and
fairly soon it became our first home.

It'd be interesting to analyze the cut-off point, when

emotionally and de facto it became our first home and
was no longer our second one. Hard to determine. I
suppose in most cases the birth of our first child;
when you're still single your feelings are different.
You've mixed feelings and your home is still where
your home was. Then as you get married you sort out
your feelings, and I think we became Canadians when
386

we got married and the first child was born and we

bought a house and so on.
Then you begin to feel
you're part of this country.
It's

interesting what a substantial proportion of my

generation married fellow Slovenes and how few
married Canadians or other nationalities. There were
very few "mixed" marriages.
A few married partners
from Germany or Spain - some studied in Spain, met
girls there and then emigrated to Canada - but most
married Slovenians.
We were very attached to each
other when we came to Canada and there was this
church that was rented in Toronto and the Slovenian
group would meet there for Sunday Mass and it was a
big, big congregation and meeting everyone in front
of the church, it was beautiful.
And the whole
Pristava side 204 tended to result that there was quite
a strong feeling of sharing our recreation together.

I was never seriously ill, I don't remember being ill so

as to have to go to the hospital or seek medical
help.
We had periodic examinations and of course
before going to Canada everyone was examined and Xrays taken and so on.
I suffered from quite an
appreciable degree of undernourishment in Austria but
this didn't seem to have had a noticeable effect on
my constitution or health, no anaemia I was aware of.
My first child was born in 1953.
As soon as I arrived in Canada there was no problem about
food. It took a while before you realised that it's
plentiful, that I could have as much bread as I want,
which I craved for while in Austria.
There was
plenty of time for a healthy, balanced diet to
eliminate fully any results of the longer-term
deprivation. I do recall my periods stopping while I
was in Austria.
I think that was due to the
malnutrition, and they didn't come back until I came
to Canada, quite a long time. This didn't worry me
too much because I'd heard from other girls who'd
experienced the same thing, so I wasn't the only one.
They were looking for a medical answer and were told
it was quite natural under those conditions. People
in the camps were quite surprisingly healthy and had
very few infectious diseases and kept themselves
clean. Most of us were young and active and tried to
help ourselves just as much as we could, and a lot of
204

. traditional Slovene community country club

facilities rather similar to that of a youth hostel.
387

with

people would go out in the farms from time to time,

to help and get some extra food.
I remember I did
that during the summer.
*When I arrived in Canada I spoke a little English because
I learnt some in school, and I was able to express
myself or ask for the direction and so on, but
pronunciation wasn't as good as it should've been!
The English we learnt in the camp wasn't the best
because it was taught by our professors and I guess
they learnt from books.*
When I came here as a domestic worker I worked for a
family in Halifax by the name of Daley.
He was a
well-established lawyer there and was very good to
me.
My contract was for one year as a living-in
domestic worker and I started in September 1948 and
finished the following year.
Then my brother who
stayed in Nova Scotia decided to come to Halifax, and
Mr. Daley helped him to go on with school and
encouraged me to take night courses.
So we decided
to stay another year and I took courses in English
and book-keeping, but found them a little difficult
because my knowledge of English wasn't sufficient to
grasp the different technical words.
Anyway I used
my time to get some education and learn the language
as much as I could.
There

were a few friends I'd met in Halifax, also

Slovenian girls, with whom I spent my time, and my
brother was there, so I was quite happy. But I was
sort of looking forward to going to Toronto, where
the majority of Slovenians were. In 1950 my brother,
who was enrolled in St. Mary's University in Halifax,
decided to join the Jesuits and had to go to Guelph,
a place close to Toronto where they had a novitiate.
I decided to go with him and stay in Toronto.
Mr.
Daley sent a letter of recommendation to the
President of Simpson Company in Toronto and I was
able to get a fairly good job, office work: I
remember having a big book and keeping records. That
was something very exceptional at that time.
Most
other people were still struggling and doing all
kinds of manual work to get ahead, so I was very
fortunate.

Then I took night-courses in typewriting and bookkeeping

and English and so on in 1950. I met my husband in
1951 and we got married in 1952 and moved to
Hamilton.
I continued working for a little while,
388

then stopped.
At that time it was like you get
married and you have a family.
That followed
naturally, so we had a family. I didn't need to go
out to work to supplement our income: my husband
bought a house and we rented out upstairs, so we got
some income and were able to get by.
Marija mentions that her brother emigrated three months before
her. Now the Rev. Professor Josef Plevnik, S.J., he describes
his first years in Canada:
We came over on the ship Saturnia which was the Italians'
big liner, confiscated by the Americans as part of
war reparations.
The upper decks were luxury and
they still had Italians and others there, and the
lower deck was for the refugees. Steerage. When we
came to Halifax the first impression of Canada wasn't
very good because we couldn't see for fog: Halifax
harbour can be that way. Then they processed us and
I was the interpreter; I did my best but missed a few
things of course.
That first night in Halifax harbour, there are quarters
where they take these newcomers, refugees.
They
locked the doors on us and there was a panic amongst
the Slovenians. They said, "they brought us way here
to Halifax, and now they have us". So the mistrust,
you know, was there.
They were never totally sure
whether you're really free or not free, even at that
point. Though it sounds crazy that's the way it was,
a moment of panic. All they wanted was to keep these
guys together, not to wander round: they didn't want
to hunt them next day all over the city!
They

had a list with our destinations, and mine was

Kantville, Nova Scotia, about thirty miles south of
Halifax.
I left with the second group for Canada,
June '48.
The first went into the bush and the
railways, and that was early February.
I was very
lucky, we went to farms for a year, better than the
first group in many ways.
Better still than the
Poles who came on the farms with a two-year contract,
because they gave us only a one-year one.

After the year we were released. We had a guaranteed pay

of $45 a month plus room and board on the farm, which
was to help the farmers - the Canadians were not
great at being farm hands.
That's no mean work ...
and we didn't mind it. After the DP camp days you're
willing to pick up anything! I had the first decent
389

meal after four years and was able to recover what

had been drained from my system.
Not overnight; I
worked on the farm no harder - I was raised on one
back home in Slovenia and take to that kind of work and I worked as I used to as a teenager, but my bones
ached and I couldn't sleep and I thought I was
getting rheumatism.
It wasn't that at all, it was
just the whole bone structure was soft - not enough
food for four years. I was a growing boy. Calcium
deficiency, but by Christmas it disappeared.
And

then I spent perhaps the only winter in my life

without a cold, because I had to work in the bush
making pulp-wood, out in bitter cold and snow every
day. The farmer made use of me to cut a lot of pulpwood. It was an old farmer, 70 years old, Eisenhower
was his name. So there I was, working, memorising my
English vocabulary!
I was the only Slovene on the
farm. I had to have one year there, and then began
my studies. My sister was already in Canada and the
family for whom she worked was a family, the Daleys a rich lawyer. He offered me a job: I could wash the
two cars every morning and shovel the snow and bring
in the fire-wood, for the room and board and
something like $25 a month, and I could attend a
Jesuit college, the Marist College in Halifax.
He
brought me there to introduce me to a Catholic
college, and that's where I met Jesuits for the first
time in my life. I eventually entered the year after
that.

I began with grade 11 which in Canada is a little better

than grade 5 in gymnasium and I knew most of the
mathematics, about 90%, although my English was poor,
my Canadian history was poor and all that.
But
anyway I said, "look, I know most of the maths. Why
don't you let me into first year college, which was
the equivalent of grade 12 there?" So they said yes,
but after two weeks forgot about it and I reminded
them. It was, "OK on a trial basis until Christmas,
and if you don't do well at the end of the first
semester exams, back you go to grade 11." I was 19
or 20 by that time.
Anyway, I worked hard and was
first in the class and they looked at me, "how could
this stranger get better marks than others?"
So
there was no question about my going back to high
school, I just continued and after a year entered the
Jesuits.
The man Marija married, Dr. Tone Suhadolc, now gives his story.
390

He was 26 when he started on three years of French, English and

German studies at the University of Graz but achieved little,
because he already had a doctorate in law from Ljubljana and
didn't take his academic work in Austria very seriously. Also
he had been held for some months during the war in the Italian
concentration camp at Gonars, where conditions were so harsh
that many died.
He himself contracted a serious lung
condition:
Before leaving Austria I worked for a while for the IRO,
the International Refugee Organisation, in Graz.
When they were taking people for Canada, they were
accepting only the hard-working guys, and so I
registered as just a farmer's boy with a few years of
schooling. Then I came to see the Canadian Consul in
Graz and the German girl there - we had worked
together in that IRO office - said, "hello, Herr
Doktor". Oh, I said, I'm finished! Because Germans
really like to use those titles.
Here nobody cares
about them. But somehow the Consul didn't hear.
In Canada I had to sign a contract to work half a year on
the railway and half a year in the bush, cutting
pulpwood. The months on the railways were tough, but
we were young and out in the country, and we had fun
really and good food.
In the bush it was harder
because if you didn't work you didn't make money. I
left early because I still had that excuse that my
lungs were bad.
I went for X-ray, and it was real
bad because it showed all black on one side as I'd
had pleurisy in the concentration camp.
So I came to Hamilton and worked in a steel company, and,
boy, that was hard work. But we had to take whatever
there was for the first job.
Then luckily after a
few years - we worked shifts, nights - they allowed
me to work just days so I could attend university
night courses in accounting.
I finished that and
changed the job and then everything turned OK, but it
started with a number of very hard years.
I never used my Doctor Juris because here it's completely
different. I'd have had to start all over again. It
took me twelve years to qualify in accountancy. From
'48 to '60 I was working in the steel company. The
first few years I never even thought I'd be able to
change, especially when I married after two years. I
bought a house and then you have to start, and it
took me five years to get through the course. It was
tough.
391

In the steelworks I was doing some of the hardest physical

work. Oh! That was hot! Hot! I couldn't even see
for sweat, but there were ... those fountains and I
just put my head down to cool it. But then you move
up a bit, and year after year it's a bit better. I
started steel work at about the age of twenty-nine
and did it for twelve years, from twenty-nine to
forty-one, but of course I was a farmer's son and so
basically strong. Used to working! There were a few
other Slovenes in the same steelworks, mostly
students, fellow students from Graz.
I had three children: two boys and a girl. A teacher, a
doctor and an engineer, the girl is the teacher. One
is married.
Three lovely, lovely grandchildren their father is the doctor. We're lucky, we're happy
here and we feel Canadians now more than anything
else. All three live in Hamilton so we're at least
once a week all together. It's beautiful.
So in the end it has worked out for most of us.
It's
funny.
Even the newcomers from Yugoslavia are lazy
at home but when they come here they work like hell.
Now, at least when they come, they're helped quite a
bit, but when we came there was nowhere. People are
still coming, not that many now, but almost a steady
flow. And there's a Pristava 205 in Hamilton where we
meet together and a church and a big dance hall, and
then we have the Slovenski Park, like a big Pristava
-there's another big hall there.
The presence in Halifax of Marija Plevnik and her brother Josef
made it easier for Stefania Pavlin when she moved there on her
own and with only limited English:
When

I came to Canada in 1948, I had to work under

contract as a maid in Quebec City with a French
family for a year.
After that a priest here in
Toronto somehow helped us, writing to various
Catholic universities in Canada, I think through
bishops, to see if they could assist some of these
European students.
Very few replies came back, but
some did. One was from Mount St. Vincent College in
Halifax.
The students there put on a play, HMS
Pinafore, and the proceeds went for the tuition of a
student. I was asked if I wanted to go and said yes.

205

. traditional Slovene community country club,

facilities rather similar to those of a youth hostel.
392

with

*So I went on the train to Halifax. I was entirely on my

own and the only Slovenian in the school. I met Joze
Plevnik and his sister, but they were there for only
a year and then he joined the Jesuits and she went to
Toronto, so I was once again left alone.
I had my
little piece of paper, my diploma, and they said,
that's fine with us and they accepted me.
I was
there till I graduated in 1952, and that gave me a
Bachelor of Arts degree, majoring in philosophy!
Then I went to visit my brother in Ottawa who was by that
time married and had a child, and was teaching
economics and statistics at St. Patrick's College;
and from there I went to Toronto, to the wedding of
Plevnik's sister, and then I looked around and said,
well maybe I'll stay here. So I looked for a job and
found one at Canada Life Insurance Company in the
mathematical department - mathematics was my second
major subject - and worked there for a year, but
found after a year what I was doing was ..
well,
nothing was automated so you had a calculating
machine on your desk and you were converting
mortality tables from 3.5% to 3.25% or vice-versa,
and that was it. I found that very, very dull, so I
enquired and a year later enrolled at the Faculty of
Library Science at the University of Toronto and
graduated a year later.
I didn't manage to finance that year very well, because at
Canada Life I was paid $35 a week and couldn't save
very much. So the year I went to university I moved
from a room where I was paying $7 a week to one for
$4 a week. It wasn't really heated but I had a very
good landlady: she invited me for dinner on Friday
nights because she had a priest as a guest every
Friday and didn't really want to be alone with him so
You know the lady - Denka
I was the guardadama.
Skof; and she also invited me for Sunday dinner, so
that was for $4 a week!
Yesterday I called my brother who lives in Ottawa, Antony
Stukelj, and he told me he met you in August 1945 in
Austria and was asking if there would be any
possibility for study in Graz or Vienna and you
explained that right now there were Russians there,
and possibly it might be a good idea to explore the
possibility of going to Italy. And that is what he
did, and I went with him the following September. He
studied in Bologna.
I went further south to finish
high school because I was younger than the rest of
them, and they went to Bologna, and my brother
393

finished law there, he graduated in 1947. He came to

Canada and had to work the year like everybody else,
on a farm for six months, and then as a carpenter in
a Catholic college, St Patrick's College in Ottawa,
in the workshop.
Then they said, "you're educated,
how would you like to teach something?" and he said,
"if you give me some books, I'll give it a try", and
he did.
He's a very meticulous individual so he
prepared all his lectures and was teaching there for
a few years, and in the summers worked at Central
Housing & Mortgage Corporation; and then he switched
and worked full-time at Central Housing and part-time
at the college.
I struggled to get an adequate command of English and
spent a lot of time in the library.
Yes, it was
hard, it was very difficult.
The nuns were very
helpful to me; even in Quebec City, when I was there
as a maid, there was this professor at Laval
University, her name was Ruth Robinson, she invited
six of us girls to her home once a week and had a
lovely tea prepared for us, and she would just
converse with us. This was the idea. I think I was
the only one that kept in touch with her until two
years ago when we visited her, my husband and I, in
September and she died in November. She was 90 years
old, bright as could be. We had kept in touch over
the years, and visited.
She was marvellous.
I've
kept in very close touch with people at Mount St.
Vincent College and have lots of friends there.
My
husband was in London Ontario, he went to the
University of Western Ontario, and he managed to get
good enough English the same way, just by going to
university and struggling through it, also working at
a hall run by Ursulines as a chauffeur and painter.*
Peter Pavlin now gives his side of the story, up to his
marriage with Stefania: [? retain 1/2 or 1/4 or less of the
following]
*My story starts way back at the age of seven when my
mother died and thirteen when my father died, and I
became a sort of late orphan and was housed and
educated in various colleges and institutions. This
made me street-wise from a very early age, I don't
trust people.
If I didn't know you, what you were
forty years back, I wouldn't talk freely.
In the domobranci, as a very tough sergeant-major, I was
the youngest one in the group and they trusted me
394

with all the platoon, 30 men. I was like an officer.

I went through Ljubelj and stayed in Vetrinje, and
when they were returning the domobranci from Vetrinje
I decided to take off, with three others, to Villach.
We stayed with a farmer the whole summer, and then we
found out later on that you were organising a camp in
Lienz and the school started to open and that was the
perfect opportunity for me to go back to school and
finish my high school. I arrived in August, just at
the examination time, it was the sixth grade. I then
continued in Spittal, and in the fall after the
Matura* I went to Graz, to chemical engineering.
I
only did one year there.
And after that I went to Canada, emigrated as a labourer
on
a
one-year
contract.
I
started
off
in
Kapuskasing 206 , doing an unskilled labouring job like
everyone else.
First the railroad, then lumbering.
On the railroad it was heavy labouring, fixing,
laying the tracks. Actually the tracks were laid, we
were just repairing them.
This was a private line,
from Kapuskasing to Smoky Falls.
We were using
sledgehammers.
You got tired because you weren't
used to it, but eventually your muscles got used to
it. On the railways I was one of a gang of 60, all
immigrants, half students.
40 - 50 were Slovenes,
and the others Ukrainians and Serbs, and when we went
lumber-jacking we were more or less the same group.
We were still young, and it was a tough job.
After the year, I'd saved close to $1,000, which was a lot
of money in '48, so we were very well off.
I got
this working scholarship in London Ontario at the
University of Western Ontario, where my daughter
finished her degree now, forty years after. And now
we're going to her graduation in October.
I was
together with a Polish immigrant, Paul, and we went
by train from Kapuskasing to Ottawa to see the
capital of Canada, and from Ottawa down to Toronto,
seeing the countryside, then in Toronto, Eaton's
store, we bought the first expensive jackets and
pants, you know, because before we were just
lumberjacks - we got dressed like human beings - and
then we went to London and I went to this college run
by the Ursuline Sisters, and they interviewed me and
asked me if I was alone.

206

. a small town in Ontario on the railroad, 650 km NNW of

Toronto.
395

I said, "I've a friend of mine with me", and then of

course Mother said, "we only have one position", and
I said, "I'm sure you have something for him", so she
said, "bring him up", so I bring him up and we both
got the job, we split the job, half and half, jobsharing, and ever since we worked there and attended
university. They gave us board and lodging and fees
and we did part-time work like washing the dishes,
cleaning the classrooms, working in the garden,
driving the car, we were general handymen, and of
course occasionally the Sister was arranging a blind
date for us because we didn't know anybody and there
about 300 girls there in the college and there was
always some poor soul that didn't have a date, and of
course we were the ones who were escorting them to
dances. So that was part of the college life there
and of course we had to get adjusted to the new
surroundings, to the language, and particularly I was
handicapped quite a bit because I'd never really
studied English at the university, neither did Paul.
Well, he stayed there and graduated in chemistry.
I was taking sciences like geology, chemistry, physics and
geography when my professor, a Dr Stoppl, a mining
engineer, took a liking for me and said he was going
to give me a job if I wanted.
So I said, sure, so
that's where I got the summer job which became a
permanent one, permanent until I decided not to.
It was like exploration, real pioneering work because we
were searching for minerals in places where nobody
had been before; and because we had no maps, we had
to produce our own.
The only map we had was from
aerial photography, which showed the contours of the
lakes and the rivers: they were just black lines and
the rest we had to fill in, the outcrops, the forests
and so on.
So in the 1950s we were literally
pioneers until my future wife drew me back to
Toronto. Then I started land-surveying, in '55, and
for another four years before my articles were
completed, in Ontario Department of Highways.
Our
daughter is 23 years old and not married. The first
boy is married, the second one is not.
The next five accounts of immigration to Canada are from
another family group composed of the mother, a former teacher
in Slovenia, her two daughters who obtained entry permits as
domestic workers, and the two men they married: they had both
qualified as engineers at the Technical University in Graz
while living in the special refugee camp for students there.
396

Joze Opara, one of the husbands, begins their story:

I came to Canada in 1948. The first year was very tough
indeed, the second better but still difficult, as in
1950 an engineer couldn't find work even as a
draughtsman.
Then it was OK after the Korean war
started in June 1950. Business was booming and I got
a job in Massey Ferguson, starting as a design
engineer up to 1962 when I became a senior project
engineer, until leaving them in 1970.
As a single
man I was living reasonably all right already by
1951.
I didn't have a house, because it was very
hard for houses, but I had a car and a good job. I
was able to buy our first house just before we
married in 1955: by then I was well paid and we saved
money.
I was a qualified engineer when I left Austria and all I
needed was my Canadian professional acknowledgement
which I got in no time. *I came to the examining
commission and was asked only one question: is
Professor Keurausch still teaching in Graz?
I said
he's not holding lectures but he might still be an
active member of the faculty.
That's all, because
the chairman of the commission studied in Graz and
knew the standards there, and a diploma in Graz was
as good or possibly better than the same in Canada.
I got my membership in the Canadian Mechanical
Engineers Association in 1951 and am still a member,
and I was Vice-President for all Canada for ten
years.*
When we married, Bozena's mother lived with us and took
care of the kids while Bozena continued working for
the Catholic Family Services.
For the last twenty
years she was manager of operations, a senior and
responsible post - second in command.
Bozena's
mother was a teacher, and came to Canada 1948 with
Bozena and Marija on contract.
Mother was 52 and
couldn't come on contract on her own, but was allowed
in company of two daughters.
They worked as
domestics for a year and had reasonably good
experiences, but had to work hard. In Austria they'd
been half starved, with almost no clothes and little
money, so in comparison they were very well off.
But in 1948 it was not bad in Graz.
Food was
nearly enough. We were still having ration
I went to the lecture in the morning and I
coffee, a piece of bread and a sausage.
397

enough or
cards, so
could buy
Life was

almost normal for what a poor student would expect at

university, better than in Ljubljana.
And for
clothing we were better off than in Ljubljana.
Polde Cop was Opara's fellow student at Graz and married
Bozena's sister, Marija. His route to Canada was unusual:
Some American universities offered scholarships and there
was also a possibility for anybody who had a
sponsorship, and then a bit later, in 1949 and '50,
more
people
were
admitted,
not
restricted
to
sponsorship or colleges. Canada was usually limited
to single people, unmarried, who had to be physically
in very good condition, and I remember the first
Canadian mission to the camp was atrocious.
They
were measuring people and feeling their muscles and
didn't allow you to have one filled tooth or scar!
Only physically perfect specimens!
And then the
Swedes at the United Nations said, "are you selecting
bulls for your country, or what?" and they were a bit
ashamed.
The second mission was different. It even accepted people
with tuberculosis, and later we found out why:
tuberculosis here was dying as a disease, the
sanatorium on Lake Sinko was empty and the doctors
needed customers!
The medical profession is pretty
closely connected here with politics ... So they got
people over with TB and cured them. A friend of mine
was completely cured, and he's now 76 years of age.
Some from Graz went to Argentina, but only a few because
somehow we had our own doubts whether that was a good
choice.
Our leading political group was thinking
this is the thing to do, "we get them down there,
it's all in one group and they will all work
together." We were rather saying, "we'll stay around
and maybe the US and Canada will cave in." I was the
one who had to swallow my words or pride after this;
I was always saying I'll never go to South America ..
and went to Bolivia!
But I got a job in my
profession.
I said I won't go to Canada to work a
year in the bush somewhere and lose another year.
I was offered a chemical job in Bolivia. In the Austrian
camps I was the first to get a job in his profession.
It was a success and I'm very proud about it.
In
Bolivia I'd probably go higher than here, but of
course
it's
a
different
country
altogether,
technically that is. I moved on to Canada because my
girl was there, and then the question was, who'd go
398

where?
Would she come down?
She had her mother
there and her sister ... quite a force! I knew how
that country looks, but for her it'd be a bit of a
shock, and the immigration law in Canada was that
females could get anybody over as long as they
married. Marriage was the key.
My first Canadian job was with Shell in Montreal. It was
very difficult to get work: I applied to over fifty
companies, not blindly, and the answer was, "no
vacancies available" though they were actually
advertising for staff. The Technical Service Council
was one of the organisations looking for people - and
they were the first that started doubting. "Oh! ho!"
they said, "they didn't give you a job and here you
are back again looking for one?
How come?"
The
National Employment Office was a company doing the
same thing.
I got the information from the
blackboard.
Imperial were looking for twenty
chemists, and Colgate for twelve, and all the rest,
and they replied in the same breath, "no vacancies".
Now what the hell's going on?
Finally I hit it.
An
Irishman working for a paper company said, "we need a
chemist and can't get one. I'll ask for you." And
how I knew this guy?
Maria's mother cleaned their
house now and then, and he was a chemist. He comes
back and tells me no, but then his wife couldn't be
quiet: she squeaked! She said the boss told him they
didn't hire foreigners or Catholics.
Imperial the same, I found out from the office. I found
from Shell they wouldn't have hired me three or four
years ago and wouldn't have hired a French chemist
either.
But they were strapped: Shell was doubling
the refinery's capacity and hired chemical engineers
to be ready by the time this happened, and in
desperation took anybody who'd come along. And maybe
the policy had changed at the top, because after all
you can be racial up to a point and for so long, and
then it doesn't work any more. But even then, they
couldn't overcome this business suddenly.
At that
time DP was a bad word.
When you go through
powerless in life it hurts, but it's minor.
You
expect that.
At my last position - I told the
youngsters about this and they said, we don't believe
it. Because the situation is different today.
I don't know of anybody in our group from Graz who went to
Australia.
One is in Venezuela, Vovk, and a number
are in Argentina, Buenos Aires mainly. All the rest
399

are in the US or Canada. The joke in the 1950s went:

the people went to Argentina, the opposition to
Canada and the leaders to the US! It was a very good
description, and that hurt!
Because those leaders
were pushing people to Argentina, and they themselves
finally emigrated to the US. That was bad. Not all
of them.
Bajuk and others went down there.
But
Skrbec and Basaj.
Polde's wife, Marija, describes her own emigration in 1948:
I didn't have sponsorship for Canada or come under the
quota, but came under contract for domestic work in
Fort Arthur for Mrs. T.B.Howe, a daughter of the
Minister of Trade and Commerce, and she didn't make
me work very hard.
I was able to read English and
she'd take the cookbook and say, cook this and cook
that.
I had a good time, I was my own boss, but I
think she probably realised I was following my
conscience, to see I'd done what I'd contracted.
I
stayed with her for one year - after a year we were
free. She was very easy to get along with; I usually
did her chores and when I didn't feel like doing
anything I'd ask her, what am I to do now? and she'd
say, go for a walk. So I knew! It was a very good
code!
After a year we all came to Toronto because our friends
were here and we were looking for jobs, and it was
difficult to find one.
We needed one immediately
because we'd no funds, so there was something in the
diet kitchen of the hospital and we stayed there a
few months. Then I got a job in a bank and my sister
got one in St. Anka's Hospital, because she was
involved with the medical professions.
Then we got
married.
Like Polde Cop and Joe Opara, Henry Ziernfeld also studied at
Graz Technical University, but only completed two and a half
years of machine engineering and had not got his degree.
He
had a tough time when he arrived in Canada:
We left Graz for Bremerhaven in April 1948 and came to
Halifax on May 19th and then straight to Winnipeg on
the railroad, where we got supplies and new working
clothes.
We had nothing and were taken to Eaton's
department store and got everything we needed, I mean
gloves, boots and overalls. The next day we went to
Southern Saskatchewan, where we stayed five months,
exchanging old rails with new ones.
I was pulling
400

the spikes with a big crowbar and then nailing those

rails again, and the first two weeks we broke so many
hammers you wouldn't believe!
They'd a team of two
guys just bringing new hammers from that car where
they'd the storage. Because if you missed the spike,
you hit the hammer across the rail and it just broke
off. But after two weeks we became experts: you just
looked at the spike and could drive it in with two,
three hits and it was in.
In that gang there were
about eighty people, Slovenes and some Croats and
Latvians, mostly from Graz, about twenty from the
University and sixty from the city.
After that they sent us to the bush to make pulpwood. We
went from Saskatchewan to Northern Ontario, between
Nipigon and Bildmore, a camp from which we went every
day in order to cut wood. With the railway I wasn't
too tired really, but after we came to the bush that
was terrible!
For the first five weeks I was so
tired I didn't have strength to go to eat: I just
came to my bunk bed and flopped down and that was
that, I just fell asleep, and a number of times I
went for the snack, usually at eight o'clock at
night, and just had tea and maybe some cookies. In
general so far as food was concerned, about two weeks
after we came to Canada we already came to a normal
situation, like we couldn't eat more than normal.
The first two weeks we ate whatever they brought us!
They were bringing piles of food and we were gobbling
up everything, they couldn't carry fast enough!
I
remember I asked if I could get some more canned
peaches which I liked very much, and the guy brought
me five cans and I just finished them up without any
problem.
The timber work almost killed us because we had to carry
logs, sometimes a foot and a half in diameter and
eight foot long, and bring them to a yard, and we
usually got the worst trip possible that no Canadian
would touch.
They'd say, oh! no! I'm not going to
work it for that, but we'd no choice.
We had to
clear that 66 ft strip and just cut everything down;
and whatever wood we found there we had to pile up in
the yard. Occasionally you had a big log and you had
to carry it one or two hundred feet. That was very
tiring because we weren't used to it.
After four months in the woods they gave us a choice, to
be on our own where we wanted or another job in Red
Lake in a gold mine: and there were five or six who
401

said, let's go to see what the gold looks like, and

worked there for a few months until July.
Then I
came to Toronto and applied for a job and got one
right away.
I came on a Friday and after the long
weekend went to the unemployment office and they gave
me a job down on Garton Street making toys, dolls and
things like this. I worked there two years until Joe
Opara, who was working with Massie Harris, said he
could get me a job there, so I went for interview and
got a pretty good job as a quality control inspector.
The other guys were envious and I was there for a
year.
Then I went back to university, Toronto University, and
started electrical engineering.
From mechanical
engineering I thought I liked better electrical, so I
started again but only finished two years, because
tuition was very expensive. In '52 it was $640 and
my weekly wages were only about $32, out of which I
had to pay for my room, food and clothing, so I
couldn't save much.
I was studying and working and
conditions were getting tougher and tougher, and when
I came to the third year I failed.
I was working
night shift as seamster and didn't make it so I left
school.
I repeated that third year and didn't make
it a second time, because it takes full-time
studying: you can't do a proper job and then study,
because there's so much laboratory work and homework
and so on, and I was half-asleep at the lectures. So
I had two years and after that got a job. I worked
for another company as an electrician's helper for a
few months, and then in 1956 started with a
consulting engineering firm and stayed there until I
retired two years ago.
In the beginning I probably got a lot less salary than I'd
have if I'd completed my engineering training, but
then in the last ten or fifteen years we had good
rates and bonuses so that I actually retired two
years earlier, I didn't even wait till 65, and I'd
enough money to make a comfortable living! It was a
very satisfying and interesting job, working as a
draughtsman and then as a technical designer.
My
wife was also working, for Canadian General Electric
on the assembly line. With our joint income we lived
really very comfortably and were able to afford to
visit Europe fairly frequently, twice a year if we
wanted to!
We didn't have any pension plan in our
company but I was able to save quite a lot, because
sometimes we got a very good bonus, in good years
402

sometimes amounting to two or three monthly wages,

which was fantastic.
If we'd had children things
would have been tight, but as it happened we didn't,
so things worked out financially really very well.
And because I'm a handyman I saved a lot of money
doing all the maintenance on the house and on the car
and electrical installations and plumbing.
Of my contemporaries at Graz, Kermavner, Sfiligoj and Joze
Lekan are in Cleveland: Lekan is an engineer and
Sfiligoj a chemical engineer. When they emigrated to
the States, after six months they were recruited into
the army, and after they left the army they got a
G.I. grant so that they completed their university.
And Ivan Kukovica's now in Guelph, not far, about
fifty miles from here.
The really hard period for us was the first ten years,
anyhow for me, because I was going to university for
three years. For the other people maybe it was just
a couple of years.
I remember that after 1956 - I
got married in 1959 - at that time I had practically
no money!
I still had some debts to pay back and
didn't make much money as I started rising from the
bottom, but I was happy. It was a technical job, not
something like in a factory, where I could maybe
progress a little bit.
But once I got married and
settled down, then with the two incomes we could live
reasonably comfortably.
Dr. Gloria Bratina had completed two and a half years of
studies before emigrating, just like Henry Ziernfeld, but her
subject was medicine and she did succeed in qualifying later
and is still working as a doctor:
I came to Canada as part of the quota, together with a
sister and two of my brothers.
When we arrived we
were supposed to work in sugar beet, but they found
out that is not our way of working and so it changed
very fast to the hospital and medical laboratory. I
studied besides and soon came to Toronto and did
exams for medical technologists with St Mikes
Hospital.
I was trying to get into medical school here, but there
were too many students and it was too expensive, so I
got in touch with Graz medical faculty again and they
readily accepted me and I went back and studied
there.
But I got married here first and then went
back and studied and qualified as a doctor in Graz.
403

I had to repeat one semester and do the anatomy

exams.
It was much easier to study because at the
time we were first there post-war we were very
insecure, but now there was a certain security. I'd
my husband to support me and I knew I wanted to go
back.
I'd good friends there and we studied like
crazy.
I'd some of the same professors there, and
some colleagues: Sumar Dusan, who went back too from
California, and Fritz Frank and Jurecic.
Several of us did some semesters in Graz and then came
across to Canada or the States and after some years
here returned to Graz to finish our degrees.
There
was quite a pressure at that time down there, they
said you have to decide, you have to go somewhere
because with UNRRA pretty soon you aren't going to
get support. Then we saw we cannot study here and we
wanted to finish, and there was some possibility
there.
Quite a few people.
Rak Maks stayed there
and finished and just came back to the States when I
decided I wanted to go.
He said, "it's too
difficult, don't go" and I said, "no, I'm going!" We
were financially very insecure, and then my husband
finished his PhD here and said, "now you can go."
My husband was also Slovenian.
He did two degrees in
engineering down in Yugoslavia already and then over
here did a Master's and a PhD.
He's 75 but still
teaching at the University of Toronto, Professor. He
studied first in Slovenia, then went to Italy and was
studying in Bologna - there were many down there and came to Canada in '48.
I had no children, I
missed that. I was married too late and studied too
late! When I came back I found an internship right
away at the hospital; I had some friends I taught
medical technology before, medical students, and I
came back and called the number of the residence and
they found me a place right away.
So I started at
the general hospital and finished my medical and then
opened my own practice and did a lot of obstetrics
and general medicine during the first twenty years
and then some teaching for the Women's College
Hospital.
Then I gave up teaching but my practice continues and
beside I'm Medical Director at the Senior Citizen's
Home, Lipa.
It's interesting.
Residents there,
earlier were at Peggetz too.
Mr. Ziernfeld's wife
is doing quite a bit of help, and they go there
practically every week. There are sixty-four people
404

living there, one floor each for the extended care

type of people with nursing care, and the upper part
is more like residential. The majority are Slovenian
but there are other nationalities including some
Croats. Most pay from their pensions but some cannot
pay and there are collections for them.
It's a
Slovenian community-supported enterprise.
Another Graz student, Vida Rosenberg, found a congenial job
immediately she completed her year of "directed" work:
At Graz I studied law but my heart wasn't in it because I
said, what can I do with it?
That came at a time
when we knew it was very unlikely the regime will be
toppled and
we'll return.
Not that any education
you have isn't very helpful. I had altogether, with
Ljubljana, five semesters and then I got a visa for
Canada and arrived in May '49 and stayed in Quebec
City and then came to Toronto. I needed money so I
started work right away in a hospital, cleaning the
lab ... cleaning, what else? First I worked six days
a week and was waiting for a year to go so I'd have
two weeks paid vacation to find a job. As soon as my
vacation started I went to the unemployment office.
They said the Manufacturers' Life Insurance Company
might have an opening. And what's so strange is that
the first day I came to Toronto, from Quebec City
where I stayed for six weeks, I walked on Bloor 207
and there was a beautiful building with a wroughtiron fence and a lawn like you see only in England,
and I said, if I could ever work in this building I'd
be the happiest person on earth!
So

year later the unemployment office gave me the

address, 200 Bloor Street, and I came to it.
It
can't be true! It cannot be true! And there it was,
and I was shaking, I was so nervous. I gave them my
papers and they gave an exam; and the manager of the
department came and said, no, we really cannot give a
test to somebody with that education, and I thanked
God for all those papers!
So my five semesters of
law studies were worthwhile!
The manager asked me
after a few months, do you know somebody as good as
you? I need a replacement. So I got somebody else a
job. Then he asked me, my friend in another company
needs somebody.
Do you know somebody that would be
as good as you are? So that was terrific, wasn't it?
I worked there five years in the accounts office for

207

a well-known street in Toronto

405

mortgages, and then got married and stayed sixteen

years at home. Then I went back to the company, and
when I started again I was 47, and I got quite a nice
level. So that was good! The man I married wasn't a
Slovene, but a Croat.
He escaped much later, in
1950.
He was a famous sportsman, rowing, of
international standing.
He never really quite got
settled here. He worked in despatch for a transport
company. We've two children and one grandchild.
My next "new Canadian" was a big and physically impressive man,
vigorous, simple in manner, direct and lacking in selfimportance.
Although the busiest person I saw, I never felt
pressed for time. I didn't remember him from 1945 although we
were in the same camps for two years, because in those days I
was the "important person" and he a 15 year old schoolboy - one
of eight hundred.
But I remember his father well: a squarebuilt stocky man with bristly hair, moustache, strong chin and
determined expression.
He was chairman or secretary of the
camp social welfare committee, and I imagined had been a
prosperous farmer at home.
His son, the Most Reverend Dr
Aloysius M. Ambrozic, Archbishop of Toronto, corrected me:
Not really prosperous.
The farm was extremely small and
he had to do other things: he started a grocery store
and that was our main source of income. But he was a
kind of political leader within the municipality,
involved in all sorts of things. Very much like his
own father, the same sense of humour and quick
temper!
It's interesting you remember him, because
it's a long time ago.
We came to Toronto in 1948, actually to the vicinity of
Toronto.
Somebody sponsored us.
We'd an uncle, a
208
Franciscan priest , who was trying to get us to the
States.
Thank God he couldn't,
because I know
exactly where we'd have gone. Eventually I'm sure we
wouldn't have stayed there in Wisconsin, beautiful
hunting country, but ...
Anyway, the US wasn't
allowing us to come in so he found somebody in
Toronto to sponsor us. We came as a family, as one
unit.
We were lucky, together all the way through.
My parents and five boys and two girls, seven kids,
ages nineteen to seven. I have to take my hat off to
the Canadians!
And the way our neighbours helped us! A year later two of
our friends who were domobranci who'd been sent back,
208

. Father Bernard Ambrozic, OFM.

Skof Rozman (Klagenfurt) passim.
406

See Dr Kolaric (1977)

escaped and were hiding for three years, eventually

escaped to Austria.
They wanted to come to Canada,
two young men, and we went to our next-door
neighbour, a Mr.Keeler, an Anglican I think.
So we
said, "look, somebody has to sponsor these two young
guys. We can't, we're not Canadian citizens as yet".
Yes, he signed on the dotted line without any
question!
No question, and I don't think those two
guys ever went to him to say thank you! No question!
That's the kind of thing I find so extraordinary.
We were on a farm which wasn't ours: my father was a kind
of caretaker, and the only trouble was the way he
threw himself into that job - by that time he was
over fifty and wanted to prove to himself he could
still hack it, as he in a sense lost everything at
home - and within two years he had a very bad heart
attack. He recovered but still wouldn't give in, so
he had a second heart attack, and from then on had to
take it very easy. The most difficult thing was to
accept he was no longer going to reestablish himself
to his dreams of being whatever he had.
And the
other difficulty was none of his sons really wanted
to be what he dreamt of himself being, because
farming just wasn't the kind of thing they wanted. I
left home immediately almost after we came here and
went to a seminary to do theology studies, but then
each of my brothers as they left home - it was one
more sad thing for my dad.
And they're perfectly
fine fellows, perfectly good characters.
Well, he
eventually accepted that, and actually I'd say the
last eight years of his life - he died in '71 at the
age of 76 -were peaceful, he was happy, he enjoyed
the grandchildren, some writing.
So I think that
once he accepted certain things he lived and died
happily.
My mother was a different type. I find women so much more
realistic than men.
Men are a bunch of ...
romantics! And my mother: she was mother of a family
wherever she was, and she worked, worked all the
time. She survived my father by eleven years so she
died in '82.
I think the shocks for her were more
not her own, but my father's, her heart must have
bled for him.
Materially, we survived those years
because we lived on a farm. My father was given so
much money for caretaking.
The rest was - they
worked
on
the
farm
and
sold
their
produce,
particularly chickens and eggs. We sold eggs by the
thousands.
We lived very modestly, but we were not
407

in the least hungry and had no real material fears or

anxieties.
Of my brothers, one has done well.
He's rich, I think
he's really rich, not from his law practice but from
his investments and so on!
But the others are all
well-situated,
no
problems,
no
messing
about.
Because - and I say this without any envy at all but there are some people who really make themselves
rich.
In the old country they'd be caught in the
social web and they'd not be able to rise above it,
whereas the new country does offer that possibility,
and some of these people have really done extremely
well.
In fact, now they're getting older they're
paying for it, because they'd work fourteen, sixteen
hours a day when they were younger and they could
afford it, and of course you can't abuse your system
for very long.
I have left the story of Ivan Kukovica till last because it
fittingly illustrates the resilience and tenacity of purpose of
the Slovenes. It will be remembered [p.00-00] that both Ivan's
parents and four of his eight brothers and sisters were among
the civilians who were sent back from Viktring and killed by
the partisans, but he escaped. He now continues his story:
I stayed in Viktring and Lienz until you organised the
student camp in Graz, and then I went there. I was
studying
civil
engineering,
I'd
two
years
in
Ljubljana and another two years in Graz but I didn't
finish before I migrated to Canada.
When I first
applied for Canada they asked me, "what is your
occupation?"
I said student and they said, "sorry,
we don't need students."
One of the girls in the
camp was translating there for that commission, and I
asked for my petition to be back as unsolved, and I
was called again: and next time I said, "I'm a
lumberjack", because I did have some experience of
cutting trees! Under that pretence I came to Canada.
For the first year we had to go to a government job to
repay our voyage, so I was working on an extra gang they put you on the railway tracks with the engine
and three or four cars, and we were living and
cooking there and working on the railway. Physically
the work was tough, but I was selected to be a
bullcook, peeling potatoes, bringing water and
cleaning up the room.
The rest had to go out with
pick and shovel, so I was spared the physical work.
When September came they disbanded that extra gang
and I was sent as a lumberjack to Northern Ontario in
408

the bush, cutting trees.

I liked the work outside.

After I finished that year I moved to Guelph because I

knew a lady friend who was there already.
I said,
"do you have any job for me there?" and she said, "I
don't know anything right now but come over, you'll
get it".
And I did.
Oh!
In a pickle factory
cooking the syrup for the pickles! I hated that job.
It lasted a year: I still didn't speak very well
English, and by that time I met this Dr. Anthony
Musgrave from Scotland in the church group and he
said, OK, I'll help you out, I need somebody like you
for my work. So he gave me the job as a technician.
There I learnt English properly, and so much biology
that I switched to biology and finished my degree. I
then went teaching - biology and sciences, chemistry,
whatever was necessary, because our school was a
smaller high school with fewer professors. This was
in Guelph, my first year was 1965, I was then 45.
I learnt in Austria that my family was killed in Teharje.
I didn't know exactly how, or how many at that time,
but when I came to Canada I knew already they were
dead.
When did I get married?
My wife came to
Canada six months before me, as a domestic. She was
also a student, Marija, studying maths in Graz, so we
knew each other and she was waiting for me: we were
engaged informally.
She served one year as a
domestic with a doctor there and a very nice family:
we're still sending letters at Christmas.
Her work
was easy and they respected her, they knew she was
educated and it was more like a companion and nanny
to the children than a domestic. After she finished,
she came to Guelph and we were married. Buying our
own house was very difficult.
At that time the
Canadian soldiers were just arriving back from Europe
and there was such a shortage of accommodation I
couldn't find anything. My wife became pregnant soon
after, and the landlord told us that before the child
was born we had to move out of their place, and I was
frantically looking around.
I found two rooms, a
kitchen and a bedroom, with bathroom sharing with six
other unknown people, and the running water was only
in that bathroom. It was really very difficult.
So in despair I said we had to do something about it. By
that time we'd saved $400 and with that I bought a
double lot and started to build my house myself with
cement blocks, and moved in when I had the roof and 2
x 4 partitions inside: I didn't have any plaster, I
409

could see from the kitchen into the living room and
from the bathroom!
Life was very difficult for,
maybe, the first ten years of our marriage. You see
even after I was a technician at the university I was
poorly paid. This was a temporary job, I was never
sure of anything, so because of that I also had to
decide .. well, I had to do something else, and then
I went back to classes: I started to study and my
boss there, beside Dr. Musgrave, the dean of that
department, he said, OK I will help you, and he gave
me a job paying $2000 as a librarian in his
department which was very nice: you see, that job
wasn't very demanding, I was able to study at that
time.
And he helped me: I had only $2000 to look
after nine kids; I already had the whole family by
that time. But when I started to teach, from then on
things improved.
By that time I already built the
second house, myself again, and then we built the
third one, and from then it was much easier.
All

our children except two are married, and we have

fourteen grandchildren, the youngest a month old. My
son Thomas is unmarried, and another daughter who's
just moving from Toronto to Florida with another
company.
Thomas is a chemical engineer, and he's
young. All my children have a university education.
However my wife, she had to sacrifice her career.
She was very good at maths, but having the family she
had to stay at home and look after them, and she's
quite happy doing that!

I don't intend to retire. What for? I mean, as long as I

can walk I can work. I retired at 65, a teacher has
to quit, and soon after that I joined a real estate
firm, and I'm quite happy to see it through. I'll be
75 next February. One of my children is a doctor in
Ottawa.
Marianna has a degree in commerce and is
working with a leasing company here in Pittsburgh.
Then there's another chemical engineer, in Edmonton
now.
One has a degree in English: she's not doing
anything, she's looking after her young child right
now. One of the daughters who's not married yet is
working for the Motorola Computer Company and was
sent on a loan to Florida. One's a helicopter flyer
and he's still in Guelph. One's a dentist, also in
Guelph. They're all over the place.
I'm so sorry I lost my mother for nothing, and I couldn't
repay her for anything that she's done to me. When I
learnt my mother was dead, I felt such an enormous
410

loss.
Of my brothers and sisters, Andrew, the one who got lost,
is working in Toronto.
He didn't study far around,
and he's a shipper in a biscuits company: he's
married and has three sons.
The youngest brother
stayed at home and died two years ago. I sponsored
my two sisters to come to Canada after about ten or
twelve years.
They were both married at that time,
and the two girls and their husbands came over and
are living now very close to me in Guelph.
The older one, who was fourteen at the time, married a
tailor and then he died from heart failure and she's
on her own now.
She has three children, they're
married and so on. The younger one married a cabinet
maker: she went to Germany first and he established
himself there in the same trade.
Then she came to
Canada and he established his own company, and now he
has a small company here in Guelph.
They've two
children, they're in school now. One is helping him
in the shop, the other one is in school.
They're
doing fine.
Nobody is starving now, we're all well
off - well off, I mean, comfortably, I don't say I'm
well off! But comfortable. Traditionally with nine
children one should have gone into the church, but
nothing happened this time, not even a nun! However,
one is very religious, maybe too much.
Sometimes
when you're like this, you're more catholic than the
Pope. But OK, we get along anyway.

411

C H A P T E R

1 7

United States of America

In spite of the brave promises of the President,

emigration to the USA in fact starts later than to
Canada and Argentina and is in the main limited to
families guaranteed by sponsorship.
Many settle in
and around the great manufacturing cites of Cleveland
and Chicago.
The first to tell his story is a farm worker who
loses a leg towards the end of the war, is retrained
in Austria as a tailor, spends his working life in
the States in that occupation and when reaching the
age of retirement retrains as a car mechanic. Next,
a man who loses an eye serving with the domobranci
but in spite of the disability is accepted by the
States and ends up as a machine shop worker.
Other immigrants become a NASA engineer, a quality
control technician, a chemical engineer, a clinical
pathologist, an anaesthetist and a nurse; thus making
life-time contributions of a rich variety to their
country of asylum.

412

Emigration to the United States on a substantial scale started

later than Canada, Britain or Argentina.
The Free Slovenia
Almanac for 1949 again provides a mirror to the refugee
perceptions at the time:
Only now are the United States opening their doors to
European settlers, although the Truman offer had been
published to accept 200,000 (to use his words)
"European democrats who have become victims of
totalitarianism".
In
this
manner
we
receive
satisfaction from the highest level from the USA,
when up till now the whole world abuses us as
"traitors". But so far not a single larger group of
Slovenes has gone, only individuals. These, however,
have included the best and most influential, to name
only Dr Miha Krek and his family and Bishop Dr
Rozman.
Apart from them only emigrants with
exceptional backgrounds such as priests, monks,
university professors etc. have gone to the USA.
A
major task awaits: to plead our cause with the
world's most powerful politicians and revive the old
Slovene emigration, part of which responded so
magnificently to our most urgent needs (the League of
Catholic
Slovenes,
the
American
Homeland,
the
Bishops' Welfare Conferences etc.). Let us hope that
1949 will be the year of significant group emigration
into the United States.
The Almanac for 1950 records what happened:
... The US Law Concerning Refugee Immigration authorised a
total of 205,000 individuals. Work and accommodation
for
every
European
refugee
immigrant
must
be
guaranteed by an individual called a "sponsor". This
has proved splendid for the individual immigrant whoever comes already has a roof and employment - but
it makes emigration itself more difficult, taking up
much time precisely in the search for sponsors.
The way the law has worked out is very instructive to the
Americans and to us Europeans.
Three parties
cooperate,
the
government,
IRO
and
private
organisations - denominational, humanitarian and
national.
The government is involved in (a) the
screening commission, which screens candidates with
regard to their past, specially political (b) the
consul, who only gives visas if the candidate for
immigration
satisfies
the
general
regulations
regarding health, capability to earn a living, moral
antecedents etc. (c) the immigration inspectorate in
413

the transit camp before embarkation, which checks all

documents and tests.
Most of the Canadian Slovenes I interviewed were middle class,
but those in the States formed a more representative crosssection of the refugees and the villages they came from.
I
attended the regular monthly social in Cleveland Ohio, the
principal centre for the Slovenes in the USA as Toronto is in
Canada. Those with memories of the refugee camps were invited
to come forward.
Frenc Cenkar got up: he had something he
wanted to tell me and was visibly relieved when he got it off
his chest - it had been bothering him for forty-five years.
Frenc Cenkar, like Plevnik, Suhadolc, Ambrozic and Kukovica in
Canada, came from a farming family, with a large holding near
Ljubljana. He had lost a leg in the fighting towards the end
of the war and was being treated in the hospital in Lienz.
When fit for discharge he was sent down the road to the nearest
refugee camp, but was refused admission. Probably the Slovene
receptionist had been told by UNRRA the camp was officially
full and had not been given clear instructions about what to do
with emergency cases, and I may well have been the UNRRA
officer responsible.
The twenty-two year old Frenc was
shattered by the lack of sympathy and humanity shown him by a
fellow Slovene sitting behind the desk. Dr. Mersol was the
bilingual physician who was at the time Slovene Superintendent
at the camp and Group Captain Ryder Young the well-loved UNRRA
Camp Director who died shortly afterwards.
They turned up at
the reception office just after Frenc had been refused
admission, as he recalls:
I go out and I cry, and Valentine Mersol and that English
officer that was killed in the jeep, Group Captain
Ryder Young, come up. Mersol asks me, "what happened
with you?"
I cry, "I've got nothing.
I've got
crutches, I don't have a leg, I've got no place to
go", and he asks me what had happened. I tell him,
"they don't want to take me in", and that English
officer over there say, "rightaway go back".
I go
back, and that English officer just say to that
Plesko, take him rightaway in, and he takes me in.
They later asked me what I wanted to do. For the whole of
my life I wanted to be a mechanic; but the people
from Ljubljana say you're no good for mechanic, you
don't have a leg, you must be a tailor. And I can do
nothing and I learn to be a tailor. Then I married
in Spittal in the camp church, and we got a child and
emigrated to the United States. I got a sponsor: my
cousin, a priest in Minnesota, found some sponsor for
414

me, and we came here, me and my wife and nine months

old daughter. I start working right away here, and I
work until my pension. That's it.
Already in Peggetz I started learning to become a tailor,
and by the time I left for America I was a good one.
When I was born I was just a farmer, and lived on a
big farm in Slovenia. However I left and I never go
back. I was taught in the camp tailors' shop where
there was a school.
There were maybe twenty, not
more; mostly, they don't have a leg or they are
invalids. I worked all my life as a tailor, but now
when I go on pension I quit.
I never liked
tailoring! And I go to school for three winters and
now I fix the motors.
When I arrived in America I could speak no English, not
one word. I could speak a little German, not much.
It takes me maybe five years to learn enough English
to be able to survive and then I make citizen papers.
I work thirty-three years as a tailor for a Slovenian
firm, Josef Eis on West Side Lorent 53 in Cleveland.
When I started I got 75 cents per hour and when I
quit five years ago $8 per hour.
But I worked
piecework all thirty-three years.
We could live
reasonably well on that. I let my wife work too, at
the same place also as a tailor, and my mother-in-law
watch children at home.
I've got three children, all girls, all married, and two
grandchildren.
Only the youngest one has got two
girls, one five and one two. The middle one married
a soldier that was captain in the American Air Force
for seven years in Panama Canal, well paid.
Her
husband is from Scotland, they live in Georgia now.
He bought himself out of the Air Force and once in a
while they come and visit me now. My three daughters
live very good.
One got a mechanical engineer and
one got an accountant.
They got good salary.
For
every Christmas they're given by company $6,000
bonus.
I've never been back to Slovenia, I want to go this year.
I've already bought a ticket.
I still have one
sister and one brother, and I don't know when I come
over there that I know somebody.
You know, the
people over there, they look much older!
I get
letters regularly from my brother and sister. I got
a big farm over there that was mine.
It was like
that in Slovenia, the oldest sons got the farm, and
415

then you buy

that farm was
give it to my
brother's son
the family.

out the brother and the sister.

And
mine, but I was here and I wanted to
brother. They didn't want it and his
has now taken it on, so it is still in

Before I lived in Cleveland and now I live in Geneva. I

bought a small farm house. I don't have any cows or
pigs, just got four cats and three dogs!
And my
wife.
Now we live alone but for many years my
mother-in-law lived with us. She died two years ago,
93 years old, and she was a really hard worker, that
lady. When she was 90 years old, she cut the grass
by hand!
There were I think quite a number who lost a leg. Lots.
Some didn't have an arm: I lost a leg.
They were
very good at that camp hospital. They gave us lots
to eat and nobody can complain.
I'm now enjoying
myself as a mechanic. Not before.
The next Slovene was also of farming stock and had lost an eye
while serving with the domobranci. His whole family escaped to
Viktring - parents and a sister and five brothers aged between
22 and 3.
There had been seven brothers but the eldest was
killed fighting the partisans and another had been conscripted
by the Germans and sent to the Russian front, taken prisoner
and eventually sent back home to the family farm in Slovenia.
From there he wrote to his parents that he could not manage on
his own and urged them to return, and the call of the land was
strong enough for the parents and four children to accept
voluntary repatriation in the autumn of 1946.
Only Anton
Oblak, 22, and his sister, 15, stayed on in Austria as they had
received affidavits from an uncle in Cleveland, and emigrated
in May 1949, when the USA started admitting sponsored refugees:
To start with we lived with my uncle right here in 66th
Street and St. Claire, where he had a furniture
store.
There's still the name over there, Oblak.
First, it was kind of hard to get work but I was with
my uncle for a while, helping him in his store,
deliveries and things like that.
Then I started
different jobs: I went to Fisher Body, I think for
about 85 cents an hour at that time, and then I got
work in a cafeteria, cleaning the floors and toilets
and all kind of things and stayed there about three
months. I was ready to pick up any kind of job, and
after that I changed jobs to some others, you know,
different shops, and in the evenings we went to
school for English.
And I got a job then, about a
416

year after that, at a brick yard - heavy, dirty work.

I went to machine shop evening school and started machine
shop work, and brick yard during the day. After that
I found a job in a factory which was better, and when
I told them I was at the school machine shop they
gave me a good job. So I had a good job on a good
machine making pretty good money during the Korean
War and the Vietnam War: working ten hours a day, and
at that time, $3.50 or $4.00 was a lot of money,
especially when there was overtime.
The owners of
the shop were Slovenian guys, here before the war,
but they were pretty good to me.
In 1958 we got married.
She was a Slovenian girl, her
father was here with his wife and two children. In
1957 my sister married one of the Slovenians who left
Slovenia in 1945, a domobranec.
At that time we
invited my father and mother here, so they were at
both our weddings.
It was nice.
My wife's family
had remained in Slovenia, only her father left at the
time when we left Slovenia. He was in Vetrinje and
went to Spittal.
I knew him there, but I never
expected I was going to marry his daughter!
He
eventually came here a bit later than I did, and was
organist and musical director here at St Vitus Church
as soon as he came over until he died.
We didn't
have children. We adopted a boy. My sister has got
six.
By the time I arrived in America I could speak a little
English.
We had some evening courses in Spittal.
When I arrived here I needed to go to evening classes
to improve it, to have enough to be able to work. In
the camp in Austria I had had all kinds of jobs. I
was a camp policeman while I was in the school.
I
was 22 when I started first year of that gymnasium,
and I went to school with those kids who were in
first year! But we were four of us like this. You
know, we would do that. I attended school full-time
and made first and second year, and half of the
third.
You know, the priest I mentioned before,
Jaklic, saw us standing around on the corners,
nothing to do, and said, "you boys, you shouldn't
waste your time like this.
Go to school, you'll
learn something". So we went to school. Then they
organised the agricultural school and I went to that.
At Spittal my sister was working in the sewing workshop, I
think there were about ten girls there.
Here she
417

worked for a while with my uncle, helping his wife

with the housekeeping, and then got a job in a
factory. Both of us were able to earn enough money
to be independent within two or three months. A few
years later, in 1953, I bought a house. I had $1,200
of my own money, and there were two houses on one
lot, price $15,000.
So we had to put $5,000 down,
and we had a $10.000 mortgage loan from our Slovenian
Lodge. I had only $1,200 at the time but I had a lot
of friends, and I got from them $300, $400 so that I
got my $5,000 together for the payment, and then I
paid them off. That's how it was done.
Miro Odar was one of the first to take the school-leaving
examination at the secondary school in Lienz.
This entitled
him to admission to the Technical University in Graz, where he
studied mechanical engineering for two or three years:
I came to the United States before I finished. Before I
had a chance to go back to university I was drafted,
to Korea, where the war was still on. I saw active
service.
The fighting was terrible, but not as
terrible as Vietnam, they say.
I went through two
wars, and that's enough for anybody! I was lucky, I
wasn't injured.
I wasn't even an American citizen
and I was complaining loud, because the United States
is the only country that takes non-citizens into the
army, because the old idea was that to serve in the
army is the citizen's privilege! But for us, either
you go and serve, or you go back to Europe. Quite a
choice! It wasn't easy.
So I lost two years. Then I wasn't ready to go to school
and two more years went by. After that I went back
to university and got my degree after five years
study at Case University in Cleveland under the G.I.
system, which helped financially. Once qualified, it
was easy to find work.
They got me even before I
graduated, just on my work, and I was called by NASA.
I stayed with them for fifteen years, and then they
killed the project - well, that's the United States didn't allocate any more money, and so I was out!
That's the way it goes.
I was so happy, because I
was told that in the Government you never get laid
off.
Not quite true!
Then I went to work for
C.D.Climent engineering, and I'm now retired.
I've
two children and three grandchildren.
The Slovene I worked with most closely at Lienz was Franc
Sfiligoi.
Conscientious, unselfish and always cheerful, I
418

admired and trusted him sufficiently to have a rubber stamp of

my signature made for him to use on all routine documents to
release me for other work.
I was particularly concerned to
discover how life had treated him in America, and was told this
by his son Marko and daughter-in-law Heda. There were six in
the family in 1945. Franc aged 50, his wife and four children:
the oldest son who was a medical student, then Marko aged 19
and twins, a boy and a girl, aged 15. Marko explains:
My father was a banker, treasurer in a co-op organisation
which was strongly backed by the Slovenska Ljudska
Stranka, the Christian Democrats, the central co-op
bank in Ljubljana. It served all cooperatives which
were strongly catholic-flavoured, and they had their
offices in almost every village, where they organised
the peasants and the country folk into cooperatives
to promote the economy and give them a chance to
survive.
We owned our own home and my mother, who
was a pharmacist, owned her own drug store, separate
from the home, quite an established business, and
just before the war we had started, with two other
families, the beginning of a chemical industry in
Ljubljana.
Franc escaped with his 15-year-old son to Viktring. On the way
they were captured by partisans and about to be executed when
domobranci rescued them.
The other two sons reached Viktring
with their domobranci units, but the elder was sent back by the
British and killed in Teharje.
Mother and daughter stayed at
home in Ljubljana. Marko continues:
I was with the headquarters of the domobranci and was to
go with the first truck on the Sunday morning to
"Palmanova", and we said good-bye to everybody. Then
General Krenner came, looked at us and said, "you all
get off that truck. We're going last and not first".
We were very unhappy because we thought we'd be in
Palmanova that afternoon rather than the fields of
Vetrinje. And that's how I'm here.
My younger brother and I went to Bajuk's gymnasium in
Vetrinje.
I was up in the eighth grade, and was
among the first to graduate in September. My brother
was schoolmate with my wife, and they graduated in
'48.
We started from the very first day outside
under the tree in Vetrinje! I strongly recall that.
My wife was there one day, and then their tent had
typhoid so they weren't allowed there. One girl died
in Klagenfurt in hospital.
I attended school there
about two or three weeks, and soon after we were
419

transferred. I remember the British school inspector

in Lienz, Mr Baty, because there was quite a bit of
discussion: he couldn't believe he could find such a
seriously organised school in a refugee camp.
You
knew my father well back in Lienz, you knew his
character and so on. In Austria before he emigrated
he was continuously employed by United Nations or
IRO.
He had had some very good positions up in
Judenburg
and
Klagenfurt,
so
he
spent
quite
interesting years all through this refugee time.
In

Judenburg he was secretary to the British Major

commanding the camp; his office was in front of the
Major's office. Repatriation commissions were coming
from Yugoslavia in 1947, 1948, to talk with refugees.
Through
his
office
walked
our
neighbour
from
Ljubljana, who was part of one of these Yugoslav
communist commissions, a high official in the foreign
ministry in Belgrade. He knew my father really well,
so they recognised each other: "I can't stop", he
said, "I'll talk to you when I come back through the
office".
On the way out he stopped, they chatted,
one very red, one very anti-red, but personally very
close. He asked him, his name was Drago Kunc, "tell
me, what should I do, should I return?" and he gave
him a flat no. Then he asked, "how is my wife?" and
he told him, and details of everything else, and
later on said, "do you have any contacts with her
yet?" "No", "Well, when I get home to Ljubljana on
such and such date be here in your office, and I'll
make her call you and talk to you".
And this
happened.

Anyway, he came to America and initially had to go to

North Carolina as a lift operator. He was invited by
the Craig family at weekends as sponsors and came to
Cleveland, and found a rather good job in a factory
as a quality control technician - the Korean War was
still on. So he established himself in the Slovenian
neighbourhood. Both my younger brother and I were in
the army, so he was by himself.
After we returned from the army I got married, and my
brother and my father lived very close, next door to
us. In 1955 Tito for the first time indicated he'd
let families get united when they were divided.
So
my mother and sister were living in Ljubljana and my
father was here, and that year my mother came and
joined us.
For the next 15 years they lived very
close to myself and my brother in the Slovene
420

neighbourhood in St. Clair.

In 1960 he retired and
for the last ten years was very active in the
Slovenian social clubs.
He was a leading force to
build that memorial chapel on the Slovenska Pristava,
and he organised a lot of travel for the older groups
through the United States and Canada. In 1965 he had
his first heart attack but survived, and lived a very
normal life always, and in 1968 he went back and
visited Ljubljana.
My sister didn't come with my mother because she married
already very successfully in Ljubljana and stayed in
our home, and has a very successful family back there
and is back and forth between the United States and
Slovenia all the time. As a matter of fact she just
left on Monday. In 1970 my father had a second heart
attack which was very sudden. He was normal, active
up to the very moment.
He just gasped and it was
good-bye. Beautiful, actually. Marvellous for him,
and for his wife and the family.
No one had to
suffer.
Especially when he had had one before, so
everyone was aware that the life is not for ever.
An interesting point you may be able to add as you knew
him so well, and you know how attached he was to
Slovenia and how he was suffering through those
years, and the fact that he lost his oldest son in
the massacre by Celje. After all those years that he
spent back here in the United States, he went back in
1968 to visit, but he didn't want to live in
Ljubljana any more.
He was very happy to go on a
visit, to see his old friends, my younger sister and
her family and so on.
And they made him an offer,
since my mother and my father were both retired, that
they'd live in the house again, and my sister and my
brother-in-law were wonderful people so far as my
parents and all of us were concerned, but he didn't
accept that offer, he didn't want to stay, he wanted
to return to the States.
After all that suffering,
you'd think that a man would use the first
opportunity, but that goes I think for all of us!
First my father died, then my mother and then my
younger brother, so my parents didn't experience my
younger brother's death.
I thank God that he kicked me out of Slovenia in 1945,
because he opened up the door for me, otherwise ... a
lot of people are not agreed with me, and my wife's
mad at me! She says we left a beautiful country and
all - yes, we would personally, both of us, have had
421

a very nice, soft life if this hadn't happened, but

we wouldn't have all these opportunities, we wouldn't
have such interesting careers.
We have three sons:
the oldest is a journalist in Washington DC working
for the famous Kipplinger Associate Editors, very
well-known, the second is in material management,
married here in Cleveland, very successful and nice,
the third is still unmarried. He's a chef, works at
the university and has a degree in culinary arts.
After some years of professional life he went back to
get another degree in culinary arts, specialising in
bakery and pastry, through the university.
So family-wise we have a very successful family, three
grand kids, two in Washington DC and one over here so
we can't complain.
We have a granddaughter here
nearby.
Two of our sons are married, the third
isn't. We have three grandchildren, a boy and a girl
from the oldest guy who's a journalist, and a girl
now from the second guy who lives nearby. The oldest
is seven and a half.
Our children are very well
assimilated, American born, all three speak Slovenian
which they use in their careers very successfully,
and the oldest travels zig-zag in Europe back and
forth, has wonderful experiences and memories from
London and so on, and they bask on our experience of
the
fact
that
they're
diversified
and
have
connections on both continents quite well.
We're
much happier that they've been brought up here and
not in Slovenia.
I can see even with my brothers'
and my sisters' children, I think our kids have a lot
more to go on, and it's easier for them to do what
they want and choose, much easier.
I have to say one thing.
I don't know what the other
people will say, I've never from the day I left home
felt defeated. I never felt down in Lienz, I never
felt down in the other places where we were, I never
felt defeated or miserable or that I would be crying
and envying other people for instance who were on top
of it. For some reason or other it was almost like a
challenge
or
fun,
going
through
all
these
experiences!
Even in the US army, or in my
profession here, I never felt that I was downed for
some reason or other, or my past experience or
background was really against me.
My

wife finished high school in Lienz in '48, was a

schoolmate with my younger brother - met you!
They
both went to medical school in Graz, but had to leave
422

before they could finish. She came to the States on

a scholarship to Marian College, Indianapolis, and
the College sent her on a scholarship to Graz. She
finished biology and chemistry and we got married
after I got out of the army.
We met in '48.
It seems the first moment she came to
Hochsteingasse I was the official DDT man, the
pumping man. I pumped her and she accused that I've
never left her alone any more, I was a pest! Anyway
in '53 we married here and then we had three boys.
She stayed home, and after 18 years went back to
finish her internship and medical technology, and the
last
23
years
now
she's
a
very
successful
immunologist, a clinical pathologist in the hospital.
We enjoy skiing, mountain climbing, camping, biking
and travel. We have a very happy family life,
strongly
flavoured
Slovenian,
but
completely
integrated in American life.
We've absolutely no
problems with living in the American society.
Why
should we?
We're superior!
We're from two
continents!
One of the most remarkable to go to the USA was Dr Puc.
Although he knew very little English on arrival he still
succeeded, when over 50, in passing the rigorous examinations
required to requalify as a doctor, while supporting himself as
a nightwatchman and later a hospital orderly. On top of that
he sent regular packages home to help support the three
children, who were too young to accompany their parents in 1945
and had to be left behind in the care of their grandparents.
This account has an additional interest because it is given by
his daughter (Marija Remec, nee Puc) who was only 13 at the
time, so that we see the events through the eyes of a young
teenager:
In May 1945 I left Slovenia with my father.
My younger
sister was only 4 and was seriously sick, so she
stayed at home. We walked day and night and the next
day and came to Skofja Loka. The two other children,
who were only 7 and 9 years old, just couldn't walk
any more, so my parents decided to leave them with my
dad's parents. Then we went on and were never able
to go back, and they were unable to come over until
1954, when they came to the United States. For nine
years they were living with their grandparents, and
then my aunt took them because it was all complicated
back there.
When we were in Trzic there was some
shooting and we hid among the rocks and then we just
kept on going, and at night we just slept wherever.
423

We went over Loiblpass carrying backpacks and it took

us three or four days.
So my parents, my brother who was 12 and myself 13 were in
the DP camps, first at Vetrinje and Peggetz in Lienz.
I think we were among the middle of those who arrived
in Vetrinje, and my father became involved in
sanitary conditions and the ambulanta 209 and all that.
Then we had the school start right there in Vetrinje,
the gimnazija, in the field and then in that castle.
We lived in a tent, like, in the field for the whole
time.
I don't remember getting wet but the worst
memory was the drains, that was really bad, and lice.
They came round and pumped us 210 .
I remember the forcible repatriations because we had a
girl with us whose fiance was sent back.
She was
alone without any relatives, so she stayed with us
because we knew her at home. She said, "oh, they'll
never come back", and she just cried and cried. And
I remember how sad everybody was, and when the news
came people didn't want to believe it.
In a way I
was young, I didn't really quite comprehend it, I
think.
Somehow my mother got - it was my birthday and she begged
or whatever - a couple of eggs, and a lady let her
make some kind of pastry, actually it was fried, and
brought it to me for my fourteenth birthday. I ate
it and my stomach wasn't used to it and I got so
sick! How she ever got this lady to let her into her
house and even make these things I don't know, but
she did and then she brought them over. She was so
happy that she could give me something, and I ate too
many and got sick!
We knew Dr Mersol well.
I attended the gimnazija and
after school took piano lessons with Majhenic, my
Slovenian teacher. I joined the choir and had to help
keep our room clean, and a lot of homework.
No
sport, we just had all kinds of gymnastics.
Mrs
Pernisek and my mother were good friends and they
used to correspond. We lived in the same barrack in
Spittal so I knew the two children and Mr and Mrs
Pernisek.
There was a girl working with my dad in the TB sanatorium
209
210

. camp clinic
. with DDT powder
424

in Spittal, actually the one whose fiance was sent

back and killed. She worked as a nurse, Minka Bozic,
with him a lot also in Seebach at the sanatorium. We
just saw her today, stopped at her house: she lives
here in Cleveland and we've stayed friends all the
time and keep in touch. She was a little older than
I, and remembers all that exactly.
I remained at Spittal camp until we came to the United
States in 1949.
We weren't able to go to Canada
because they found some spots on my brother's lungs,
even though it didn't turn out to be anything. But
anyway, because my dad was a doctor they said that
this time we didn't need a sponsor, so we came to New
York City but, because we didn't have a sponsor, we
didn't have anywhere to go.
Father Bernard
[Ambrozic], a friend of my parents, the same as his
brother, helped us, and we each went a different way.
My dad started as a night-watchman in a hospital, my
mother as a domestic helper and I also worked for a
family for a year, and my brother went to a turkey
farm in Pennsylvania.
We first lived in New York City and my dad worked in the
Bronx, where he had a room. I lived with the family
I worked for in Jamaica, Long Island, and on Sundays
he and I would meet, usually at the church. Then we
didn't have anywhere to go to, so sometimes we'd go
to his room and make packages to send home. That was
after a while, earlier we used just to ride subways
and visit parks.
My mother worked in Connecticut
some way away and was only off every two weeks. So
every two weeks she came down and visited my dad and
me, wherever we were.
My dad became an orderly in a hospital and then wanted to
get to schooling again. So he studied and worked as
an orderly, and studied and studied, and took the
advanced New Jersey Board exams as a physician and
passed them first time. He had to learn English and
was over 50 years old at the time, and then first had
to be an intern and then a resident and then became
an anaesthetist, so he never had his own office. He
just worked as an anaesthetist at St. Mary's
Hospital, Hoboken, New Jersey until he retired at
about 65.
Then they moved out to Chicago so that
they were near us. Dad died in 1983, he was 80.
The

family I worked for during the first year were

Slovenian people, who worked for the United Nations
425

and wanted their children to learn Slovenian because

they just spoke English. At that time I didn't speak
any English, so that was very good. They were procommunist I'm sure, they had to be, but Father
Bernard Ambrozic knew them and they were very kind.
We got along fine.
My brother, who was 17, was
working in a turkey farm in Pennsylvania, but my dad
had a cousin who was a Benedictine monk in Colorado
and taught in high school, so he took my brother into
his school there. Later he went to medical school.
I had three sisters and a brother back home in Slovenia.
So when my parents became citizens they applied for
them to come over here and the government there
wouldn't let them come. They said my brother had to
go into the army first.
Then they applied for my
sisters, separately.
They were younger, and they
could come.
Then eventually my brother was able to
come. So the whole family was here, which was fine.
I didn't have to go to high school any more as I'd got my
papers evaluated.
I got a partial scholarship and
worked for Loreto Heights College in Denver Colorado
and went into a nursing programme there, starting
from the very beginning and taking four years to
qualify.
I got my degree there, and then came to
Hoboken and worked as a nurse and lived there with my
parents until I was married.
My husband is a
chemical engineer.
He was at Graz probably only
about two years until 1949, and then finished his
schooling here in the University of Illinois.
Then
we had six children and I didn't work! As soon as we
were married we moved seventeen times because of my
husband's work - he had to start different chemical
processes in different refineries.
We ended up in
Chicago again because his parents were there.
Then
my parents moved out there too, so we were all
together, which was nice.
My brother now lives in
Chicago too.
We live only a block away from each
other. He has six kids and is a paediatrician.
The first grandchild is due next month. My youngest child
is 24, the oldest 36: he's a chemical engineer, the
next is para-legal, the third a mechanical engineer,
Martha a computer science engineer, Monica a nurse
and Carl works in sales for Michelin tyres. They all
had a college education and four are married. Martha
gets married next year and the youngest is still
single.
426

My father's youngest sister is still living, his youngest

brother just died a couple of weeks ago. I've been
back myself once, seven years ago. Dad went quite a
few times, they took one of my daughters with them
once. Three of our children went to this course they
had in Koroska 211 for the Slovenian schools and then
they also took a trip to Slovenia. So five children
were in Slovenia already, all except one, and he's
sorry he didn't go! Hopefully he'll go too.
Dad had a tough time for maybe five years. He was born in
1903, so he was fifty when he took his medical board.
Then it became, not marvellous, but OK. When he was
an anaesthetist in a hospital it was better.
He
earned some money and they bought a little house
there, close to the hospital at Hoboken, New Jersey.
Dad knew that maybe he wouldn't be alive if he had
stayed at home, and they were never sorry, I think,
that they left. They liked to go back to visit but
then they liked to come back again.
On the whole, I've maybe more happy than unhappy memories
of the camps in Austria. I really made good friends
while we were there, and I still correspond with my
classmates in Argentina.
The ones that I've over
here, we're still good friends and keep in touch. I
think it was harder for my parents.
I was young
enough not to realise how hard it really was, and for
them it was awfully hard to have three children still
back home, you know. For me, somehow, really it was
hard to get used to having brothers and sisters
again, it was hard for us to get ... we are really
close now again but it took several years, because
the three of them were close to each other, and I was
almost like an outsider to them when we met again.
School was tough and somehow I readily forget all the bad
memories.
And now when we write to each other we
just keep saying, "oh, remember when we did this and
remember when we did that, and it's amazing" .. You
probably know Marco Kremzar from Argentina? Well, he
came to our house twice in Chicago and said, "you
know I can't believe that we were apart for so many
years, and we were sitting down and talking like we
just met a week before". Probably a lot was because
we correspond, and somehow I guess we think alike a
lot and we can just carry on ... He's a little older
than my husband and I are, but we lived in the same
211

. Carinthia, in Austria.
427

barrack at Graz and he married a good friend of mine,

my class-mate, so that all helped, we stayed friends.
I really don't know why dad decided to go to America
rather than with the main group down to Argentina. I
just thought at that time that America would be
better than Argentina.
It seemed like people who
couldn't go to America had to go to Argentina, and
Argentina took everybody.
If you had a sponsor or
could come to America, it was better. That's how I
felt, I don't know if my parents felt the same way.
Of course with the three children still in Slovenia,
America is a lot closer than Argentina.
I've never
been down there myself but that's one place where we
really would like to go.
I think when my husband
retires we might just do that, because we know a lot
of people down there.
My father-in-law settled down here alright. He wasn't in
business.
He lied about his age, made himself ten
years younger and got a job, but I don't know what he
did.
He was fairly high-powered in Slovenia.
Here
no, but he was happy and cheerful. I think it was a
lot harder for my mother-in-law. She came over later
and was very bitter about having to leave everything,
everything being taken away.
By

the time my dad died the whole family was well

established. We all went through college and made it
and each one is well established.
My dad never
really had much, money-wise, but all the time he was
working at the hospital as an intern and a resident
he was sending packages of money back to Yugoslavia
to take care of my three younger sisters and brother.
My mother was 91 when she died.
They both of them
ended up reasonably comfortable and were very
thankful for what they had.
They were happy, my
mother never was moaning about what she left back
home: she had to work hard and didn't mind that.
Well before the end they had thoroughly fulfilled
lives - 17 grandchildren!

428

C H A P T E R

1 8

Britain

The jobs the Slovenes do for their probationary

period in Britain are similar to those in Canada and
the States.
Those interviewed start off by being a
coal miner, living-in domestic worker, dish-washer in
a hospital kitchen, hospital ward orderly and nurse.
The miner sets up and runs his own furniture factory
employing a hundred workers, the dish-washer becomes
a broadcaster and the ward orderly a leading
authority on the care of the mentally handicapped.
The women all too often sacrifice promising careers
to the needs of their families, but in doing so
reinforce their children's strong pride in their
ethnic identity and powerful work ethic.

The first report on emigration to Britain in the 1949 Free

Slovenia Almanac was not encouraging:
The majority of Slovene new settlers in Europe, around
600, are in England, mostly from the Italian camps
but with a good number from Austria. They started to
arrive in December 1947 under the "Westward Ho"
scheme, and around 50% of them work in the coal
mines, 20% on the land and 20% in factories, with the
remaining 10% engaged in miscellaneous jobs such as
instructors, interpreters and hotel staff. Some have
found private accommodation but most have remained in
camps set up for the purpose - hostels run by the
National Service Hostel Corporation - living together
with settlers from other nationalities such as Serbs,
Poles, Balts etc..
Their conditions are difficult
because they are paid less than the English, but have
to
pay
just
the
same
high
social
insurance
contributions.
They
find
their
environment
unfriendly and feel themselves strangers amongst the
cold English.
Dr. Kuhar cares for their spiritual
life and also celebrates Holy Mass three times a
week. They await the arrival of the curate Kunstelj,
which would revive them substantially.
They feel
they are being exploited and would be glad to move
elsewhere if they could.
They publish a duplicated
news sheet.
429

When Father Ignacij Kunstelj arrived in 1959 he sent a more

cheerful article. A Slovene coalminer told him:
The work isn't hard though it's underground, and the pay's
quite good, though rates vary a lot. Worst off are
the youngsters, if they're only on basic pay, as
they're left with little. I sometimes work Saturdays
as well, to increase my pay a bit. You have to send
money back home, where everything is lacking except
"freedom".
My needs are soon satisfied: a mug of
beer Saturday evening, writing paper and stamps.
A land worker living in a hostel told him:
I'm getting on quite well.
Work is variable, the people
the same: some friendly, others show quite clearly
that they're the bosses. You're seldom invited into
a home, and then for the most part for a cup of
English tea, the cure for all ailments at all times.
I earn more when on piece work but have to work
harder. Those who have moved onto farms say they're
doing well: enough to do but also enough to eat.
Generally they like us on the farms because we're
used to hard work. I won't change in a hurry.
The first person I interviewed came from a modest background
but ended up rich.
To understand the rugged pertinacity that
led to his later success, a brief summary of his spectacular
escape from Slovenia is essential.
Janez Dernulc was the
eldest of nine children, and his parents ran a small farm. He
was with the domobranci in Slovenia and had to escape abroad in
May 1945:
No alternative at all; I knew I'd be killed. Maybe not so
much that I was involved with the war myself but
because my family was in the opposite party, the
party the communists wanted to get rid of.
I was
twenty-four, and I left behind my youngest brother
who's here now, seventeen years younger than me - I'm
the first and he's the ninth - and four sisters and
mother at home. One brother was with me and died in
Kocevje, and one was in Buchenwald and died about a
month before the end.
After two weeks at Viktring Dernulc's unit were told they were
being moved to Italy and were loaded onto trucks:
They were not too crowded.
No, it was done the English
way, proper.
Then the truck pulled out and I knew
430

that Italy is there, and we were going the opposite

way. I think to myself, "you're going the wrong way.
How is that? Maybe the road is broken or something,
and they will take us a little bit around" and all of
a sudden there were thousands of us there in Bleiburg
station.
They said, "halt the truck" and the
soldiers searched us. If you had any money they took
it, if you had a watch, they took it. I thought to
myself, "what the hell is this, why are they
searching us?"
The English behaviour was different
straightaway. "They've sent us back, and what can we
do?"
Then on the station were partisans, and they
put us on the train, not a proper train, cattle
trucks. You felt stunned.
They were sent to Slovenia, held two nights in a school where
some were beaten up, though "not really heavily", taken by
lorry to the village of Mislinja and from there marched further
south:
We were marching six abreast, and it was maybe one o'clock
in the morning when Lad Vinko said to me and two
others, "I'm going to escape: keep near me", and all
of a sudden he said, "now or never" and we just
jumped. It was at the end of a house and the forest
after.
We jumped behind the house and were
straightaway in the forest. A lovely feeling, to be
free. But we were still 120 miles from home.
Only courage and coolness enabled them to reach home a week
later, after numerous adventures and narrow escapes, walking by
night and sleeping by day. They hid at home for two months and
then crossed the border to Italy and on to Austria, where
Dernulc rejoined his father in the camp at Spittal.
When
three years later it came to emigration he still chose Britain
in preference to Argentina or North America, in spite of his
experiences at the hands of the British. He speaks fluent but
fractured English with a strong Welsh accent:
I

didn't speak a word of English when I arrived in

Austria. I knew a little Italian and German and of
course Serbian, but no English at all, and I didn't
start learning for two years, though some started
straightaway in Austria.
But in 1947 there was a
chance we were going to England or America or
somewhere, and I told myself I'd better start. How?
A student said, "I'll show you how", and started
teaching me. And when I came to this country I knew
twenty lessons.
That student came here as well and
knew a little bit more and I said, "how am I to carry
431

on?" and he said, "you know enough to start: you

carry on now".
I've been here forty years in this house, since 1950. We
were 600 or 700 Slovenians who came to Britain 10,000 Yugoslavs altogether - and 50 or 60 in this
area then, but some went on to Canada, not a lot.
Some went up to Lancashire, some to London. In this
area there are still about 20, but a few already
died. For me coming to England was very nice, very
good, everything was so quiet and calm. In Italy you
went on the station and it was noisy: we came here in
England and there was nobody nowhere, no signs or
anything like that. People were nice. We talked to
people here and they were treating us very, very
nicely, we were like one of them straightaway. Some
started talking, "it's better living in America, we
go there, or we go to Canada," but somehow I never
really wanted to go.
When they brought us to England they sent us near York.
The doctors checked us and we stayed about a week,
and then they sent us down near Cambridge to
Bottisham and said, "now you're going to learn basic
English".
Before that they examined everyone and
asked, "do you speak English?" and some said, "a
little bit." They went straight to the work, to the
pit. But the main group went down to Bottisham and
were there twelve weeks and learnt English. When he
asked, "do you speak English?" I said no because I
thought I needed a little more.
A few knew a bit
more than just nothing, and the teacher came in the
evening and gave us private lessons and we have to
pay him ,1 each for about four or five lessons. So
after twelve weeks we come to Wales here, to Ogden, a
group of 20 of us, all Slovenes, all friends of mine.
Some went to Yorkshire, some to other parts.
The pit instructor straightaway spotted I knew a few words
and then it was like I was his interpreter. When we
went down in the pits, him and I were talking and the
others were working! That was no problem with me - I
knew about shovels and all those things.
I didn't
know about pits really but I guessed a lot, and the
boys wanted to know what this means and that means,
and I just explained it probably means that and that.
Technical words, and things we didn't see before,
conveyor belts and things like that.
My programme was to work in the pit, but in the first
432

twelve months I had to learn English.

I had an
afternoon shift, and in the morning I got up at nine
and wrote and read and wrote and read for one or two
hours every day. At the week-ends I went to Barker's
and had a little bit of dance, relaxation and a good
meal.
That was for twelve months.
Then I stopped
learning and was just reading and talking to people.
I got on very well with the miners - they called me
"John the Pole the Madman". At the beginning I was
labouring, and they gave me some parking and things
like that to do, but after I came on the coal. Other
miners had 18 feet of stand and I had 22.
The
minimum wage was still ,6.50 but the top wage for the
colliers was ,17 a week and I was already knocking
,23.
I worked seven days a week and nights and
Sunday afternoons, and that's why they called me
"John the Pole the Madman" and never showed any
resentment.
Never.
They said we are cleaner and
tidier than anybody else!
I never had any problems
in the shops, never needed to pay in advance and in
1950 I bought this house.
I started my own business about 1954. I and my partner,
Mr. Jug, were working in the pit and we married two
sisters.
He was good with wood, and made a little
table lamp at home in the kitchen. Somebody saw it,
"ooh! This is very good!" and so on. In the end we
have a chat and he said he wanted to go out from the
pit, because he had a problem with his chest and the
pit wasn't good for him. One morning he said, "let's
go tomorrow morning and buy a machine."
"Where are
we going to put it?"
We knew there was a garage
empty down here in Park Road and I said, "we'll ask
him.
Maybe we can put it there."
We bought the
machine for ,165 and it was called The Super Seven;
you could adapt a couple of little things on it, and
because he was so clever I think we done fifty jobs
on it after! He made it a guard here and there.
Then him and I work in the pit, I had a day shift and he
had afternoon, and he done a little bit of work in
the morning and I in the evening, and we were doing
that for about two years. We didn't have orders or
anything and started slowly, making a bit of articles
and selling it.
Then a couple of people came,
friends of ours, and said, "you should have British
Home Stores for that."
I wrote a letter and they
replied, "will I come to London and bring the table
lamp with me?"
I went and they said, "oh, no, no,
no, no; that's no good.
But what about this?" and
433

gave me a sample of a barrel table lamp.

"Yes", I
said, "we can do that", and went home. I went back
to British Home Stores as the Western Woodcraft
Company, and they gave me the order for 1,200 of
those table lamps, and straightaway we had to leave
the pit and start work and from then on we gone on
and on and on, so that in 1958 we had 60 people
employed, in 1963 we had 128 and kept between 95 and
120 until 1976. After this time it declined, and in
1981 we closed down.
We Slovenes meet every year, once up in Rochdale and once
here in Bedford.
But it seems to me, there's not
really business genius amongst us.
Not many, very
few.
What have they done?
A couple of doctors, a
couple of surveyors, all the ones who were students
qualified.
There's Dr.Jancar, he's become a senior
doctor in the end, and when he come here in Bristol
he was a nurse.
He couldn't go to university here
and somehow by-passed it, went to Ireland and got a
degree there, came back and was consultant and on and
on.
My children have been no problem.
The boy didn't speak
English at all when he went to school five years old,
and three days after he didn't want to know anything
about Slovene. He spoke English. Unbelievable! It
was just like overnight he knew English!
He speaks
Slovene as well, no problem.
The children speak
English so well that when they were in grammar school
their language was the nicest.
They passed their
exams and went to university, got degrees.
They are
very interested in my background and went to
Yugoslavia for Easter. We are quite a close family.
Very much. That's my grandson. Three years old.
My father came here three months, I don't know how many
times. We visit them some time, and they come here.
All his wish was that he would come to England once,
as a young boy and then after.
Maybe that was the
reason I came to this country; otherwise I might have
gone somewhere else.
When I came here and saw
January, February, no snow outside, no winter, I
thought to myself, where are we now?
This is
unbelievable!
In our area at home there is heavy
snow in the winter for three months and you are cut
from everything, frost, 30 below freezing Centigrade.
And here it is summer all the time, and it somehow
stuck in my head that it is stupid to go anywhere
else.
434

The secret for somebody adapting to another country is

hard work, being tolerant and trying to use a little
of your savings to bring you a little bit of rewards.
There are really no poor Slovenes here. They've all
got their houses and they are all practically welloff insofar as they've all got a pension, most of
them extra pensions, there's no real poverty as far
as we're concerned.
There's one or two who've gone
back and they're very disappointed: one went home
because there was a family there and he was by
himself.
I only know for two really.
Most of our
people here are really happy, as far as I can say.
When we came to Britain we were treated very fairly by the
British, we came and were one of them straightaway,
no problems at all.
In the Union, in the pit, the
Secretary, a communist, always wanted to talk with me
- no problems whatsoever.
Most of those who came to Britain did so under the EVW or
European Voluntary Worker scheme.
They had to be healthy and
under thirty-nine. The men went to the pits, farming or heavy
industry and the women to hospitals, textiles or domestic work.
The two Guden sisters - the sisters Dernulc and his partner Jug
married - volunteered for domestic work.
They had been
overtaken in Slovenia by such an appalling family tragedy and
been so deeply traumatised aged 16 and 19, that the UNRRA camp
welfare
officer
took
special
pains
to
find
them
an
understanding and supportive family where they could stay
together.
Anica Guden had witnessed her mother, father and three brothers
being killed by the partisans and had only escaped their fate
by feigning death when shot in the shoulder and hand.
Her
sister Marija escaped because the partisans had taken her away
an hour earlier to show them where the family kept their
livestock.
For the next two years the sisters survived the
German occupation on their own as best they could and then fled
to Austria in May 1945 and spent three years in camps before
they emigrated:
We were told we were going to Cambridge to Professor and
Mrs Steers.
His subject was geography and she was
teaching and lecturing at St. Catherine's College.
They had James aged three and Gracie aged one, a
professional nanny in the house, two gardeners, a
woman to clean and a special woman only to do the
silver; and my sister was cooking and I was to help
nanny with the children and Marija in the kitchen.
435

Eventually I took over the children. When we arrive

Mrs Steers say, "Anica and Marija, we know all your
tragedy. You come to this house, this is your home.
We are your new mother and father, and address us as
such".
They give us the front door key, we go
anywhere we like.
But we make straightaway a good
impression because we didn't go out, we didn't go to
any mischief, we always stay home.
Mrs Steers sent
me to the British School of Motoring so that I can
drive the car.
I then drove the Professor when he
went to some lectures to London, take him to the
station.
The children by then go to school and I
take them, one this way and one that, so I did a lot
of driving.
I got married there as well. The Professor give me away
as my father, didn't cost us not a single penny. Then
Mrs. Steers would like that my husband would get a
job in Cambridge.
For this we could have a flat
because it was a very big three storey house, but by
then we thought the sooner we go on our own feet the
better.
She was sad to lose us, but my husband
starts working in the pit in Wales and so we got
married in March, and by December I come because he
had to find accommodation first.
We have the most wonderful life there, Mrs Steers was a
proper mother.
She was a most marvellous woman.
Life really started there, really from the beginning,
because we was for such a long time in such poor,
such humble circumstances, and when we come into a
house where the table was covered with a tablecloth
and all things were for breakfast, I cried, cried.
For three weeks I cried because I can't think that
this could be true.
And then I think, why I have
this such a good life there, when my brother and
sister at home, what do they have? Have they still
got anything? But she was a most marvellous person,
she was really.
We have visitors every Sunday, and
they come in the kitchen and she said, this is our
Marija and this is our Anica. She was always calling
down, you know, to have a glass of sherry. She was
more than mother to us, really more than mother to
us.
In fact the sisters did not need to feel isolated, because they
regularly saw some other Slovenes who had been with them in the
same refugee camp in Austria, and were now in Cambridge, one
married to an Englishman and the others doing domestic work in
one of the women's colleges. Marija Guden continued:
436

We

entered
England
as
European
Volunteer
Workers.
Technically we had to remain in the same employment
for two years, and after that we were free. We only
have ,2.50 a week but we have twice a year holiday
separate, and also wherever they went, we go.
Oh
yes, we know Scotland very well, and Norfolk, Cromer.
When they have holidays we take the children with us.
The children, a nanny, my sister and home help, went
on the night train, and Mrs Steers and I would go by
car, a miniminor, with all the luggage.
We would
stop and spend the night at Darlington and then the
next day continue.
We stay in Dunbar.
Mrs. Steer
have four sisters, one married to a Harley Street
doctor, another working in the Home Office, and we
each year holiday in Scotland, and we was living in a
castle!
And every family brings a cook with them,
they were all working. Oh, we have unbelievable, it
was a dream life we have in Cambridge.

And

while we was in Cambridge too she have important

guests there. One day Fieldmarshal Alexander comes.
She bring him in the kitchen and he was in uniform,
and she just said again, this is Anica and this is
Marija. I'm sure she explained to him where we came
from because she explained to everybody our story.
That's what I mean, you see, she really feel us, that
we part of family.
It was different when I have a
job in Ljubljana with children, and that was Slovene,
my people. But when I come into complete strangers,
to Cambridge, she bring any guest, everyone she bring
in the kitchen to say this is our Marija and Anica.
That really was something you feel, you begin to feel
that you belong somewhere again.
Very, very kind
people, very kind.

So you can see from all this we telling you that she was
really marvellous, a mother, and every night she go
kiss her children and she come in and kiss us
goodnight and we would have radio on and she would
say good night darlings, and she'd kiss us both.
Every night.
That

time we couldn't speak English at all and she

communicated with German. We understanded German but
can't speak, I still can't speak and read German. We
never gone to any English school, that's why our
English is still ..., but if you listen hard you can
understand! She was speaking fluently German, that's
the only way we communicated, but she said, "after
437

you decided that you stay in England, you better

start to speak English". Her children started young
to talk and they had a nanny who can't speak any
other language, and then Mrs Steers says would you
like to have some newspaper to read and probably you
will be learning more and then she did order some
newspapers and we started.
Now I read paper very
well but as I say the English is still not so correct
because we didn't have no school at all. We speak no
Welsh but the Welsh people here are speaking slowly
and they think we are Welsh!
In Cranmer Road the children was very nice, no worries at
all, but dreams was very bad.
We dreamed, we
dreamed, and when I wake up I remember we were in
England, in Cambridge, and nothing to worry about.
But when they go for holidays and leave us once by
ourselves in charge, then I was afraid again in the
night, I somehow thought I have no anybody now to
tell a noise, to protect me.
That dream is still
there, not for very often, nightmares, that the
partisans come in and want to .. . When we heard the
dog barking we was both shaking, Mrs Steers always
comes and she say, don't worry, you in a safe place
here, no harm will come to you two. The nightmares
were very, very, very strong when we were in Austria,
in Cambridge they were still very, very, very strong.
Now they declined, but sometimes they come and my
husband, he come down in the morning and he said, you
know, I was dreaming that the partisans are after me.
And I'm still frightened, I'm still very frightened
if I'm by myself at home.
Franjo Sekolec and his wife Bernarda were as content as the
Dernulces and Jugs that they had chosen Britain rather than
America or Canada, although aware that they might have been
better off financially if they had crossed the Atlantic.
For
brevity I have attributed all their words to Mr Sekolec:
The last time I saw you I was interpreter to Mr Newsham,
the administrative officer in the UNRRA camp at
Spittal.
One day he was absent, and you wanted
something from one of our workshops for which he was
responsible and said, could you have that and that,
and I said, yes of course, and you said, but I
haven't spoken to Mr Newsham, and I said, it's
alright because I've authority from him to sign
anything I like!
**I was among the early ones to arrive at Viktring with
438

the soldiers, the domobranci. We were convinced, the

first few days, that the domobranci were being sent
to Italy. But the day before we had to go, we learnt
that in fact the transports are going to Slovenia, to
Yugoslavia. So that evening we told all the soldiers
the truth.
Some decided to go back to Yugoslavia:
they said, "it's the Lord's will, and we go as well".
And some said, "no, we'll hide in the civilian camp",
and that's what I did. I remember some people said,
if everybody went, then why shouldn't we go? I got
some civilian clothes from Dr Handjelic, the priest,
who died in Argentina, and I disappeared into the
civilian camp.
It was a pleasant life, I must say, in the camp. The only
thing was, we were worried what is going to happen,
about the future, and of course occasionally we were
hungry, but the worst thing was the worry. We didn't
suffer from direct fear that we might be sent back,
it was about the whole future, how we are going to
live.
Because there was not much future for us in
Austria, because its economy was ruined and they
couldn't find enough of a living for their own
people, so how could they possibly for us as well?
And what to do with the children?
How to get the
children out?**
In April 1948 I applied for permission to go to England as
an EVW, a European Voluntary Worker - not for the
coalmines or anything in particular, just generally and attended a commission sent by the Ministry of
Labour.
In May I got the message I had been
accepted. I arrived in London on the 19th June and
on the 21st June in Eastleigh near Southampton where
there was a camp. On the 2nd July I went to Sandtoft
hostel, Doncaster, a YMCA hostel.
I'll explain how it happened. I remained in touch with Mr
Newsham when he left back for England. When I heard
I had been accepted for work in England I wrote. He
answered that I should inform him immediately I came
to England and he could help me find a job. So when
I arrived in Eastleigh I went the same day to the
post office and sent a telegram that I am here. He
was already warden of Sandtoft YMCA hostel and went
to the Labour Exchange and said, "I need an
assistant, there's too much work", to which they
answered, "we have already told you we haven't got
anybody". He said I'd just arrived, was in Eastleigh
and was willing to come to him, and they said, "fair
439

enough, we will send a message to the camp".

So I
was called to the labour office in Eastleigh.
The
camp were quite surprised that I got this invitation
to Doncaster to start work, but that was it!
That
was how I came to England.
Why,

when most Slovenes went to Argentina, America or

Canada, did I choose England?
Ah, now that's a
different, a romantic story.
I had already applied
to go to America, had written to Dr Miha Krek, who
was the Deputy Prime Minister 212 , to find a sponsor
for me.
Then my Bernarda - we were not married at
that time, we married here in England - went to
England, and what I think is, I go too: because we
already planned to marry when we settle down
somewhere.
Dr Thompson 213 thought wrongly Bernarda
could get on to the medical register, and didn't know
that the regulations were changed a month before.

There was a medical check, but not as stringent as for

Canada.
Canada was the cattle market!
And I had
worked already for nine or ten months as a heavy
worker, a platelayer.
The member of the commission
from the Ministry of Labour said, show me your hands,
and I showed him the callouses.
So my first job in England as assistant warden of a small
YMCA hostel was a good one. But it was soon closed
down and I was moved to another hostel near Lincoln
with about 200 or 250 people, all Ukrainians. They
were members of a Ukrainian division under the
Germans taken to England as prisoners of war. I saw
the closure of all these hostels was coming, and
managed somehow to get permission from the local
labour office to move to London: there I could only
get a job in a hospital and was washing up dishes for
about two years, and then - we were under restriction
I think for four years - found a job as a porter in a
chemical factory and then gradually got into the BBC.
I took an examination and started work as a parttimer, and that went on and on and on. Eventually I
was doing broadcasting in the Yugoslav section,
Slovene subsection, and got more and more work and
was able to leave the regular job and live on what I
earned at the BBC.
I worked about ten years as a
part-timer and then in '63 or '64 got a full-time,
212

. in the war-time Yugoslav Government in Exile in London

. a Scottish UNRRA camp medical officer who had
befriended Bernarda, who was then still Dr Bernarda Rihar
213

440

pensionable job and am now a BBC pensioner!

Quite happy, you know, and very glad I came to England.
My adopted country has treated me better than my own
native country, I can say that. Those who settled in
Canada and America are probably on average materially
better off than those in England, that's true, but
all other things are different.
I mean you don't
take anything with you once you die. We married at
the end of April 1949 and had our wedding breakfast
in the house of Dr Thompson, a lovely person. On a
small scale she was very careful with her money, on a
large scale very generous. Her home was in Scotland
in Edinburgh, she had her father there, but she lived
in Leyland, and later on in London.
Bernarda was a widow and I was a widower.
We met in
Slovenia, before Vetrinje. My first wife was killed
during the war when the Germans bombarded the town
because the partisans had infiltrated it after the
collapse of Italy, and Bernarda's husband died at the
same time from enemy action. I had a son and she had
a daughter by our first marriages.
In 1954 the
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees gave a
lecture here in London which I attended. I explained
to him the position and asked him about it and he
said, "I personally went to Tito and he promised to
allow these people to go out to join their fathers
and mothers and whatever".
A few months later in
fact the Yugoslav authorities allowed people to go
out, so we immediately applied for both of our
children. By that time they were already living with
one of her sisters, and after a few weeks we got the
permission. They were about ten and a half years old
and continued their education here. My wife was not
yet working as a dietician but was still studying at
Queen Elizabeth College at Campden Hill. She had to
study for a year and a half to qualify as a dietician
- she was a fully qualified doctor from Slovenia but
only half her qualifications were recognised.
It was very hard for the children because they didn't
speak English. But they soon learnt, especially the
daughter
because
she
liked
talking,
was
very
talkative, and that's how you learn the language!
For the boy it was harder.
At that time we were
living in Holland Park, a lovely flat with six rooms
for ,2.50 a week, a controlled rent.
I got the
address through the BBC Welfare Officer.
There was
plenty of room for the children, with just one
441

tenant: we let one room and got for it nearly as much

as we paid for the flat!
They went to the local
primary school.
Then we managed somehow to get
Milena into a grammar school, a Catholic convent
school, which was a good education, but Luca had to
go to a secondary modern school.
Milena
qualified
in
Russian
Studies
and
European
Literature at the University of Sussex and met her
husband on the train to Cambridge: he finished his
first degree in London but took his doctorate in
Cambridge.
So they met when they both travelled to
Cambridge because Milena was teaching Russian at
Bishop's Stortford, near Cambridge, and living in
Cambridge.
She was teaching at the only grammar
school teaching Russian language, and was very
successful because all her students managed to pass
their examinations.
Now she's teaching French and German and English as a
foreign language in Australia and her husband is
teaching modern history at the University of New
South Wales. They've been in Australia for 15 years
but have not taken Australian citizenship, and
they've three children aged 22, 20 and 18.
Luca is a physicist.
He studied at the Regent Street
Polytechnic for both his bachelor's degree and his
doctorate in physics but now works in computers for
the Swiss near Zurich. He married a Slovene who came
here about sixteen years ago from the new Yugoslavia
as an au pair to learn English.
They've two
children, 17 and 15, and they speak Slovene. We go
to Switzerland nearly every year and we've been to
Australia. We have lived 28 years in this house and
have marvellous neighbours.
They're all good,
they've accepted us as a matter of course.
The two strongest groups of Slovenes in Britain are in
Rochdale, Lancashire and in Bedford.
More in
Rochdale because of textiles. Those in Bedford went
because of the brickworks, but most got out of them
and went to Luton in the car factories and some in
gardening. There are not much more than about 20 or
25 in the London area, but of the new ones we don't
know how many. Some worked in families as domestics
and most of them married.
There were quite a few
boys here who wanted to marry. A lady suggested that
girls from Primorje should come over here, and some
of the so-called Venetian Slovenes did come to London
442

as domestic workers and married our chaps! But many

Slovenes married English or Irish wives because there
were no Slovenes left.
The Katoliska Misija 214 in
South-East London near the Oval has a Mass once a
month; we bought the house 30 or 35 years ago and
there's a chapel in the basement.
Dr Bernarda Sekolec added:
When I was working in a hospital I was supervising staff
and sitting together with one of them drinking tea
and he asked me, "and who are you really?" I didn't
know what to say, so I said, "I'm a DP, displaced
person", and he looked astonished: "So you are DPs?
And I thought DPs were half savages!"
Four names recur repeatedly in this study - Pernisek, Mersol,
Bajuk and Jancar.
Remarkably, two of them are still alive Franc Pernisek in Buenos Aires and Joze Jancar in Bristol.
Jancar was the student leader. He was interviewed three years
ago, not by me, but by a fellow psychiatrist for a profile in
the Bulletin of the Royal College of Psychiatrists. His story
is remarkable for the picture it gives of his life before World
War II, during the war, in the refugee camps and in emigration.
His origin was as modest as that of Dr Mersol. The latter was
the son of a low paid railway worker, while he was the son of
an also modestly paid village organist:
I was born in Slovenia and had a very happy childhood and
young adult life until 1941.
I attended a grammar
school in Ljubljana and travelled by train to the
city every morning from home in a village nearby,
earning my keep by helping other pupils who were not
doing so well at school.
I became head boy and
received quite a few prizes, but the most exciting
was when I was invited by King Peter, with the other
40 best pupils in Yugoslavia, to stay with him for a
week in Belgrade at his White Court. The school made
sure we were smartly dressed, giving us each a new
suit and new shoes. The Court sent a royal railway
carriage to Ljubljana and five of us, with a
professor, went in this, attached to the Belgrade
train.
Yugoslavia was then divided into eight
provinces, and from each the five best pupils had
been selected. When we arrived in Belgrade, we were
taken to a hall, where each of us was fitted out with
a Crombie overcoat.

214

. [Slovene] Catholic Mission

443

The next day we went to the Court where we met the King
and received a silver and gold medallion of Peter II.
We visited the grave of King Peter's father and went
to the theatre, to the Mint and to the airport to see
the first German Junkers passenger plane.
Every
night we went to the Court to visit the King.
The
final day there was an assembly of ambassadors to the
Court, and it was a really beautiful evening, with
Court music and presents from the Queen Mother. The
press had been with us all along, and Fox Movietone
News were filming. It was a fantastic experience.
During the summer I travelled a lot, learning about people
and life; I cycled along the Dalmatian coast and in
late summer I used to climb, as well as participating
in athletics and winter sports. Unfortunately when I
started medicine in Ljubljana the war began in the
spring of 1941 and we were occupied by the Italians.
They let us study for about two years and then the
university was closed.
We students were helping in
various hospital departments; I was working in the
Eye Department with the famous Professor Jevse, who
had
an
international
reputation
and
was
very
encouraging to young people.
Unfortunately I was
taken to a concentration camp in Gonars, Italy, in
1942, and when Italy collapsed in 1943 the Germans
occupied us.
Once again we were working with the
underground, helping in hospitals and treating people
who had been involved in fighting against the Nazis,
the Communists and the Fascists.
The war taught me a lot about psychiatry, particularly in
the concentration camp, when men's masks dropped, and
you see each man as he really is.
There were both
university professors and road sweepers who were most
helpful and real people; while others, without their
masks, weren't really the people we had been seeing
before.
I spent a week in the death cell at
Ljubljana.
They said that if any Italian was shot
outside, they would take people from our cell to
shoot
them.
We
were
hostages.
It
seems
unbelievable, but we became stoically indifferent.
They would come at 4 am and call out names and these
people would be taken out and we just put their names
on the wall and went to sleep. Everybody who walked
out neither cried nor swore - just defiantly walked
out.
When we were being taken to the camp they chained us
together and put us in cattle trucks. We sang on our
444

way to a concentration camp because we were out of

the death cells.
At St George's station, near
Gonars, we were thirsty and you know how the railway
engines used to be fed with water; we put our hands
out to catch some, but the soldiers beat us back wouldn't allow it. When we were walking towards the
camp people spat at us and called us "banditi". Yet
two years ago, I went to visit Gonars and met the
people there, and they were so nice! We went to see
the memorial to the people who died in the camp and
it is very well kept. I said to myself, how can man
be so excited for religion, politics or nationality,
to do such cruel things? This was a great school of
experience for me - one which I don't want anybody to
repeat or go through, but I learnt a lot from it.
Our Bishop from Ljubljana 215 intervened through the
Vatican to release the Slovene students, pressure was
brought on Mussolini and we got free.
At

the end of the war I went to Austria as an

anticommunist refugee, where we were in camps, hoping
one day we would be able to restart our studies.
Eventually the Russians left Graz.
It was much
easier for us to study there than in Italy because,
Slovenia being such a small nation, we couldn't
produce our own medical textbooks, and so we used
German ones.
It was terribly difficult to find
anywhere to stay there because there were thousands
of refugees.
I met Captain Ryder, chief of that
sector for UNRRA, and he was very sympathetic.
We
went round and round Graz to see if there was any
place that could accommodate students and found an
empty grammar school and moved into it just before
Christmas.

Soon after we were moved into ex-German barracks and were

able to start studying, but life was hard. The first
Christmas we only had 600 calories a day - a bit of
soup with cabbage in it.
Then a young lady came
along - Iris Murdoch, a student herself.
She was
deputy director in the refugee camp and we became
very friendly; she is the godmother to my daughter
and we are regularly in touch.
When I was in the
final year we had to do three weeks' residency in the
neuropsychiatric department.
The professor had left
through
denazification
and
they
had
recalled
Professor De Gasperi who was nearly 90 years of age.
He was a contemporary of Adler, Jung and Freud but
215

. Bishop Rozman.

See pp. 00 and 00.

445

didn't belong to any of these schools, he was

independent. He said, "psychiatry has a great future
providing you remain a doctor first, then a
neuropsychiatrist. You have to examine each patient
carefully because he has both a mind and a body, and
you have to know which is affecting which". He was
an excellent lecturer and I got so involved then that
I decided to do psychiatry.
In 1948 we landed in West Wratting, near Cambridge, and
again Iris Murdoch was there as a student and was
very anxious I should restart my medical studies.
She took me to London to meet the Duchess of Atholl.
I was very impressed to meet a Duchess for the first
time; she spoke very good German as well as French.
Of course, I didn't have any English then. She said,
"if you go away for a year somewhere to learn
English, then we'll be able to get a place for you
either at Oxford or Cambridge".
But I had come to
England as a European Voluntary Worker and there were
only two places to go - either the mines or
agriculture. I had to get out of these, though, if I
was going to continue medicine. One day an ex-Indian
Army Sergeant Major came along, looking for someone
as a male nurse in the YMCA camp at Gloucester.
I
went but there was really nothing to do, because they
were all healthy people.
They spoke every language
from Europe except English, so I didn't learn any
English and I was getting quite frustrated.
I went into Gloucester one day looking for a Catholic
church, hoping that somebody would know some language
other than English. There was in fact a young priest
who spoke Italian, and I asked him if I could get a
job as a nurse in Gloucester.
He said, "no, it's
impossible", but added, "I know a doctor near Bristol
who is in charge of mentally handicapped people;
would you like to work with them?" I said of course
I would, because I wanted to do psychiatry. One day
he collected me, and we went to see Dr Lyons at
Hortham Hospital near Bristol, where he was the
medical superintendent.
This was the longest
interview I have had in my career, it took nearly
three hours. He wanted to know all about the war and
what was happening in Europe; his wife knew a bit of
German and the priest translated into Italian. Then
he said, "I'll take you, providing you don't wear the
clothes you're wearing now" - I was in my best suit "you are kind to the patients and you learn the
English measures of medicine". These were the three
446

conditions, and I was appointed to the highest

possible grade, which was nursing assistant Grade I.
I then asked if he could also give a job to my wife. He
asked, "does she speak better English than you?"
I
said she did and he accepted us. When I'd been there
over a year, he called me into the office one day and
said, "now, you are finished here", and I was worried
because I thought I'd got the sack. "No", he said,
"you're going to be all right. You've learnt enough
about mental handicap, but you'll need a lot of
terminology in English and Latin so you must go to a
general hospital". I went to Bristol Royal Infirmary
where I worked for a year and was rotated through
every department, on both day and night duty, so that
I had really great experience. I came to think that
every medical student should have at least six months
working as a nurse.
When I became a doctor I was
able to ask nurses what I knew they could do, and
also criticise what I knew they were doing wrong.
I

wrote to all universities in England and Ireland.

Bristol were willing to accept me, but I would have
to wait two years, because there were so many exservicemen who had priority.
However I got very
friendly with Professor Darling, who was in charge of
the Dental Department where I was nursing his
patients. He said, "would you like to do dentistry?"
and I said I would; I had given up hope of doing
medicine.
He arranged an interview with the
professor from Newcastle, who accepted three years of
my medical studies, with some extra time to qualify
as a dentist.

Just then a letter arrived from Professor Shea, who was

Dean at Galway, and he offered me a place there.
This was in January, and he said could I come as soon
as possible, so that I wouldn't miss a term.
Of
course I had to get a visa, and somebody had to give
a guarantee for me. My wife and I were able to save
some money, and with the help of friends I managed to
scrape together enough for the journey and off I went
to Ireland.
There, the Rector asked me if I had
means to support myself; I said yes and I started,
but it was very hard work. I remember reading Boyd
for the first time, until about 3 o'clock in the
morning, and I had only got through about 20 pages.
I realised how much English I lacked, so I went to
Professor Kennedy and asked if I could do my exams in
October, but he said I should do them in June.
He
447

told me he'd studied in Heidelberg and agreed that

what I didn't know in English I could do in German.
We had to do philosophy and psychology, for which we
had a Franciscan priest as professor. I went to see
him and told him about my difficulties with English.
He said, "are you a Latin scholar?"
When I said
"yes", he told me that what I didn't know in English
I could put into Latin, and this would be acceptable.
This was another encouragement, but then there came a
crisis.
I remember vividly that it was St Patrick's day when I
walked along Galway Bay wondering what to do next.
My landlady was asking me for money and I owed her
two weeks' rent already.
I thought the best thing
would be to go to the Police and ask them to deport
me. I didn't know anybody to borrow money from, and
there seemed to be nothing else I could do. The next
day, Iris Murdoch sent me ,100, and this saw me
through.
At that time, all Galway students had to go for their
final year to Dublin.
This was really important to
broaden our knowledge.
There are three medical
schools there and one examining body, each with their
own professors and hospitals. We Galway people could
travel round them, and we found out from the Dublin
students which were the best in the various
specialities.
We made our own timetables, and the
standards were very high; the schools were competing
and the senior professors had all had experience in
Europe. One course in particular I enjoyed very much
was obstetrics and gynaecology, and I became very
friendly with the Master. He called me in and asked
what my plans were when I qualified.
I said, "I'm
going into psychiatry" and he said, "You're wasting
your time".
He offered to appoint me Assistant
Master, which at that time was a big job. I thanked
him, but let him know I would stick to psychiatry.
I had my wife and daughter in Bristol, and had to find a
secure job.
They advised me to try Ballinasloe,
where I obtained a job. It was a 2,000 bed hospital.
In 1950 special services for the mentally handicapped
were poorly developed.
However I've visited and
lectured in west of Ireland more recently, and
they've developed very good services now.
After some time I felt so tired of books that I wouldn't
attempt any other qualifications; it had been such
448

hard work, struggling to get my degree.

However a
new medical superintendent was appointed, Dr Shea,
the brother of the Dean who had accepted me.
He
said, "look, you have to get your Diploma in Public
Medicine or there is no future for you, you will
always be junior".
So I started again, but the
requirement for the DPM then was that either you
passed the lot, or if you failed any part you failed
it all. It was very hard, and there was no time off
and no tutorials; I had to take the exams in my study
leave.
After

As

the DPM I thought I was lacking in medical

experience and went straight to the Mercers Hospital
in Dublin, where I had been a student. They offered
me a post as a senior house physician and I spent a
very happy year there.
After a few months they
called me to the board room and I was worried as to
whether I had done anything wrong.
There was a
colonel, ex-British army, who was the chairman, and
he said to me they were watching my progress, and
would I be happy to accept the post of registrar in
charge of the hospital? Nobody was actually running
it then. There were students and junior doctors, and
the senior staff were coming and going, but there was
no organisation.

registrar I organised both the students and the

housemen, so that every consultant had a student and
a junior doctor. Unexpectedly I had a call from Dr
Lyons in Bristol, who asked me to come and see him.
I went, and he said, "if you want to succeed, you
must come back to England and prove that you are
capable of doing the job". So on 15 May 1956 I came
for an interview at Stoke Park.
There were five
people with the DPM for one JHMO position. After we
had been interviewed I was told I had got the job.
Just before I left Ballinasloe Dr Shea produced a
book and said, "read this, and you will see where you
are going; how lucky you are.
It is a very famous
hospital".
It was the first Stoke Park Studies by
Professor Berry.

In 1988 Dr Jancar was elected an Honorary Fellow of the Royal

College of Psychiatrists. In his citation he was described as:
one of the College's most senior and distinguished members
in the field of mental handicap.
He has been a
distinguished member of the College since its
inception and has served on all major College
449

Committees.
He was Vice-President 1981-1983 and an
outstanding
Chairman
of
the
Section
for
the
Psychiatry of Mental Handicap when he was a pivotal
force both within and without the College in
establishing the specialty of the Psychiatry of
Mental Handicap on a firm footing at a time when its
very survival was being seriously questioned.
The
four years of his Chairmanship 1979-1983 saw a
remarkable turn-around from uncertainty, low morale
and apathy to a new found enthusiasm, optimism and
improved recruitment with mental handicap once again
raised to a high profile.
A much loved figure in Bristol where he was consultant at
the Stoke Park Hospital Group for 25 years until his
retirement
in
1985,
Joze,
together
with
his
colleagues, built on the long and distinguished
tradition which Bristol has in research and service
provision
in
mental
handicap,
pioneering
new
approaches and establishing an enviable service with
some of the best facilities in the country.
Equally
active
and
influential
at
national
and
international level, he was a member of the Mental
Health Act Commission from its inception, Chairman of
the Mental Health Group of the British Medical
Association, Council Member and Chairman of the
Research Committee of the International Association
for the Scientific Study of Mental Deficiency and a
Member of Council of the Psychiatric Section of the
Royal Society of Medicine. A researcher himself he
has contributed extensively to the literature on
mental handicap and is author and co-author of a
number of books and chapters and many scientific
papers.
His book with Dr Eastham on Clinical
Pathology in Mental Retardation is a recognised
classic which has been translated into Italian.
Joze

has been variously honoured in this country and

abroad.
By any standards his achievements are
considerable, but they are made all the more
remarkable when one learns that he came to this
country in 1948 a young, married, final year medical
student with no more than a smattering of English and
a very uncertain future.

The Slovenes shared three characteristics: devotion to their

faith, a passionate love of their country and a determination
that their community should survive and flourish, especially
through their children's
education.
The Bajuk family
450

epitomises all three: the grandfather Marko was the dynamo

behind the unique educational achievement in the camps, the
father Bozidar the archetypal devoted schoolmaster and the four
sons professionals who have embarked on socially useful
careers. Three generations of Bajuks were part of the Slovene
Saga. It is fitting to close this account with the tribute one
of the grandsons recently paid to his father Bozidar Bajuk, who
died in Argentina in 19xx at the age of xx:
"You are sorry I'll soon be departing to the
Kingdom but I tell you I'm happy! You can't imagine
the clarity with which I take leave of life.
I
understand that all the things I've lost and suffered
have led to this one result: I can contemplate the
outcome of my life, and I've won!
I've saved my
family, have four children in professions and
eighteen grandchildren all well launched in life,
preserved faith and freedom and, above all else,
handed on all the values to you -my children. Thanks
be to God!"
These were my father's words a few days before he died:
Bozidar Bajuk, secondary schoolteacher of Latin and
Greek in Slovenia, bricklayer, carpenter, librarian,
translator and above all educator, not only of his
children but of several generations of young Slovenes
in Mendoza 216 , choir director and, most recently,
again teacher of Latin in the Archdiocesan Seminary
of Mendoza.
In my earliest memory of him he is sitting in his study in
Ljubljana, a large room, or so it seemed to a 5 year
old, its only furniture a desk and chair in one
corner surrounded by walls lined with books.
The
library was his world to which he was devoted, and
its loss the cause of bitter sorrow.
One Sunday in May 1945, in an atmosphere of uncertainty
and prolonged anxiety, we found ourselves on the road
to Austria. The war had ended but a new chapter of
Slovenia's sad history had begun; communism and the
danger it brought.
My parents and grandparents
decided to leave the soil of their fatherland to save
their families and find, who knows, the long-awaited
peace and freedom. At the time I didn't realise what
our journey meant, a journey lasting days and nights.
What is stamped on my memory is my parents' fear,
216

. the city in north-western Argentina where many Slovenes

settled
451

anxiety and exhaustion, and seeing them cry and pray

devoutly, searching counsel and light.
The exiles'
procession was endless, their fears increased by
uncertainty and by the partisans' seizure of power
and approach in pursuit of us.
Our crossing of the Alps lasted several days! The picture
that remains is of a gigantic encampment of awnings
and shacks improvised from every kind of material,
carts, horses, stew-pots with meagre food and a
chapel in which everyone prayed, imploring the
Almighty's protection for their families, their
soldiers and the homeland left behind.
I remember
the bells calling us to Mass and the heartfelt, sad
hymns loaded with devoted faith and hope. The Virgin
Mary was our hope - the steady companion of our
pilgrimage.
Weeks later we were transferred to the refugee camp in
Lienz, and now started perhaps the happiest days of
my childhood. At once all the activities of the new
community were organised: the first days at school,
the first luncheon and distribution of clothing.
Food was sufficient and life seemed normal but our
elders were not happy: they longed for news of their
families and what was happening at home.
Then came
confirmation of the hand-over to the communists of
our army from Vetrinje and the massacre of 12,000
youths and men in Teharje and Kocevski Rog.
Many
mourned the feared loss of loved ones, and the
Calvary continued.
Then we were in the camp of Spittal, and there I was
prepared for my first communion.
Once that lovely
ceremony was completed they served us children an
unforgettable feast; for the first time we received a
large piece of white bread, but few had the heart to
eat it. I hid mine under my shirt, to share it with
my brothers and parents. It was a great day.
But

happiness didn't last long.

The English camp
administration
was
in
communication
with
the
communists, who were circulating lists of the men
they wanted, and a few days later armed soldiers and
officials appeared in the morning and searched all
the huts. I remember the shining boots of an officer
who pointed his revolver at my mother and asked where
my father was - he was listening from his hiding
place above the wooden ceiling of the room. Again we
saw our parents weep!
The officer repeated his
threat next day, and my brother Marko and I threw
452

ourselves against those boots and that officer,

trying to drag him to the ground - our first
intervention in defence of our family.
Thanks to
Providence and to brave friends we left the British
zone of Austria and after days of uncertainty met up
in Salzburg with our father who'd crossed the
frontier with his brother independently of the rest
of the family group. We then passed a peaceful time
in the camp of Asten.
Every so often groups of families and sometimes unmarried
sons on their own left the camps for the Americas and
Australia in search of a new homeland, of the
Promised Land: we all wanted to leave a Europe in
convulsions. How can I forget the blackboards which
appeared early in the morning with the host
countries' details and conditions for aspiring
emigrants?
In 1946, 1947 and 1948 we saw father
return home sad and worried; clearly having four
children and being a classics teacher were not
qualifications for aspiring emigrants.
Our friends
went off and we remained, burdened by the fear we'd
not be able to leave.
But the day came even for us.
The Argentinean Consul
looked at uncle, aunt, parents and finally the four
children forming a perfect human staircase, and said,
"my country needs lots of people, lots of children there's lots of work to do there!"
How happy we
were! The next day he escorted us personally to the
train which would take us on a thirty-day journey to
Genoa, our point of departure.
On board, father
spent the whole time studying a booklet, "I speak
Spanish."
We children became aware of what I now
know to be the everlasting conflict - between the
hope and happiness of arriving in our new homeland
and the burden of uncertainty and of the unknown.
In the Immigrants' Hotel the question was: and now where?
Someone asked if any corner of the country had
mountains.
The answer was Mendoza.
We didn't know
where it was, but we left for there in October 1948.
On arrival we all combined in the task of producing
mountains of wooden crates for Tunuyan cider, and
with our earnings bought our first kerosene heater
for cooking, winter overcoats and the first mattress
for granny, who was ill with rheumatism and suffered
greatly from the hard ground.
We then made light
folding bedsteads which increased daytime floorspace
in the room of 3 x 4 m, all we had for eight people.
453

On the 15th March classes started and for the first time
they dressed me in a white dust-coat, the primary
school uniform, and the first expressions we were
taught were, "good morning" and "I don't understand".
At eight one adapts very quickly to new ways of
learning and those first years of primary school are
a mass of beautiful memories, of happiness and
enthusiasm.
As children we always felt "different"
and I didn't like this at first, but it became more
bearable as time passed and in the end it changed
into pride and a part of our personality which
continued to mature, within the aim of always
excelling.
We four brothers followed secondary studies in the Central
University College, which had a bias towards the
humanities.
At the same time, and particularly on
Saturdays, we took part in the meetings and cultural
activities of the Slovenian Society of Mendoza, where
we had contact with the mother tongue and the
history, geography and culture of the fatherland.
Speaking in Slovene was always encouraged at home.
Reading took the place of systematic study of Slovene
grammar and made it possible not only to preserve the
language but also the love of Slovene culture.
Our
parents
encouraged
us
to
integrate
into
the
institutions of the new environment in which we were
growing up, and we took part in the religious
institutions, student organisations and all the
cultural life of Mendoza.
Each of us chose his own university career with complete
freedom.
Father divided his day between work as a
bricklayer and activities for the Slovene Society,
the choir, youth and student organisations, Slovene
language classes and the many tasks linked to his
love of country.
Because of the costs of our
studies, ours was the last family that arrived in
Mendoza to achieve its own house.
Our life at university progressed. Marcos, the oldest, in
the agricultural faculty, where he's continued as its
professor of Special Agriculture; Jorge, the third,
completed medical studies and works as a clinician
and surgeon; while Andres has devoted himself to
economics.
For seventeen years he's been based on
Washington and worked with the BID (the Interamerican
Bank of Development) and will move to Paris, where
he'll be responsible for the management of the
454

countries which are members of the Bank.

My life steered itself in the direction of architecture.
My first commission was the family home, the joint
efforts of all the brothers enabling us already
during our university studies to acquire the site and
with official finances build "the house". In this way
we could recognise the sacrifices our parents made
for so many years on our behalf. The vital cycle of
our family progressed, and the new house witnessed
the creation of four new hearths and four new
families; while our parents looked with pride from
their own new hearth and revived library on the
growth of their offshoots.
All my life I saw how my parents confronted every job including physical work which was totally opposed to
their natural bent - with the same optimism and
cheerfulness.
Something always impelled them, an
ultimate aim gave them the courage to achieve their
goals.
What drove them was a deep love for their
children and their country and a rock-hard faith in
the Lord and total submission to His will. They were
devoted to the Virgin Mary, Mother of the redeemed
and Protectress of the sufferers.
When father died
in 1989, mother told us how he always prayed that the
Virgin should guide and accompany him, also at the
time of his death. He died on the first Saturday of
December, the day dedicated to the devotion of the
Virgin which both followed all their lives.
This account is not simply a succession of memories but
has another contribution to make, a deep and
heartfelt tribute of gratitude to all those who
worked together for the success of this adventure: my
parents, bold friends and the international and
religious organisations who knew how to listen and
respond to this generation's appeal for help.
The
richness of so many experiences march in review
before my mind and I've an ever clearer feeling of
the important influence they have on my life today.
I feel the wish to give, to my family and to society
as a whole, the great wealth I've received.
Above
all, to achieve good architecture for those most in
need of it, is what I find most satisfying.
I'm
happy to be sharing with my wife and our six children
the commitment of life in this Argentina of today and
the challenge of the search for freedom in the new
Slovenia. This is my time of sowing!
455

Just as three of the Kremzars' five children, all born in

Argentina, have returned to Europe, accompanying their SlovenoArgentinean husbands to settle in Trieste or back in Slovenia,
or in the case of the son continuing his studies in Austria; in
the same way a grandson of the great Director Marko Bajuk has
returned to Ljubljana to pursue a successful career as a
singer, together with his Slovene wife, equally busy as a
psychologist. Thus two families, which played prominent roles
in Austria and in Argentina, have reestablished personal links
with the home country and are contributing to the ever
increasing two-way traffic within the modest Slovene world
community.

456