Interview with Ms. L. (translation of part of the interview)
date of interview: February 3rd 1995
interview made by Magdalena Muellner
„I must say right in the beginning that I was not born in Laa. I only moved to Laa in 1944, but I went to school in Laa and I did my final exams at the local high school here. But we only moved to Laa in 1944. I first came to school in Laa in 1938 - that was short after the Jews of Laa had to leave the town. I only know some names of families I heard people talk about. There must have lived a family Blau here. I also know that here lived a family Drill her. They were trading with horses and showed up again after the war. They were in Laa again for a few years, but I don’t know anything else. I had no contacts with any of the Jewish families since I only came to Laa in 1938.
...
There are testimonies, which state that there were Jewish, Polish forced laborers at the end of the war, which is about in 1943 and 1944, in the parsonage in Laa.
„Yes, there were Poles, I remember that my mother employed a Polish woman to come on Saturdays for tidying up. These people were looking for extra work and these people had a little daughter with them. And so this woman came once with a dress and my mother adjusted it for the daughter. My mother was very good at sewing and the woman saw that and so she asked, if my mother could change something for her daughter. That is the only thing I know. But they were Poles, I know that. We lived very close to the parsonage then and so this woman just came. That happened in 1944/45, when we lived there. She came for a few months, across the winter on Saturdays. She cleaned the floor and my mother paid her for that. She had looked for work, I guess for additional one. I guess in order to get along in a better way. I do not know where else those people worked, but they lived in the vicarage.“
Did they live there?
„Yes, yes, they were accommodated there. How they lived ... I guess not too comfortably, but they were accommodated in the parsonage.“
Were they prisoners of war?
„I don’t think so, because they were dressed in civilian clothes. There were also Russian civil workers in the surrounding villages and women from Ukraine and such – I guess they came more or less voluntarily. They were no prisoners of war, they were civilians. I never had anything to do with me, I only know about it because the woman tidied up once a week at my mother’s and washed the dishes. Otherwise I wouldn’t even know that.”
About how long were the people in Laa? Until the end of the war?
“No, they were taken away earlier, but I can’t say when. I think when the war ended, they were no longer in Laa. But I can’t say that for sure. I know though that they were there.”
I guess they did not speak German?
“They did, but only a little. She made certain requests how she wanted the dress to be and I was a bit amused by that. She said “Gloschen” when she meant “Glocken” because she wanted to have a flared skirt (= Glockenrock) at the dress. This way was all of her German.”
So they weren’t from German speaking areas?
“No, she was a real Pole, she only knew a little German. - There also came refugees from German speaking areas. Some of them lived in our house and came from parts of Yugoslavia. They went through Laa and people were asked to offer them a bed for a night. I can’t say when this exactly happened, I guess it was the fall before. I remember that there was a young girl, who slept in my room and told me about herself. She was a German, that was called “Volksdeutsche” then, but as I said she was from Yugoslavia.”