July 7.(1916)

At 4 o'clock the anchor's lifted and we are leaving ...

Good bye Asinara - good bye Italy. You gave us much - good and bad - but didn't give us the freedom we longed for!

Thank God, you cleansed us from lice and diseases - the worst things we could encounter.

I thank you, my God, for protecting me here for 6 months from all diseases. Now I am looking towards the future with a new hope.

We sail slowly, the last contours of Asinara and Sardinia disappearing slowly. The sea is calm and we on the upper deck suffer from heat, but those down below are much worse off. They are crammed much worse. - My old friends Roubik and Ferdinandi from Veltrusy are with me.

At 6 o'clock, we got a command: No smoking, no speaking aloud. They must be afraid.

The night was real bad - it was rather cold at times, and no space. We sleep sitting, cringed and twisted one over another.

I woke up in the morning with a strong head and stomach ache. I ran to a latrine seasick for the second time - the fit lasted about two hours. A half a cup good coffee put my stomach in order. At about seven we approached forested coast and arrived in port Toulon. A little more certainty - when you are on the sea and see nothing but water all around, it seems to you that the ship is not moving and that you can never get out of those waters. There are festungs and lighthouses on both sides. There is a large hospital ship with red cross in the port, a man-of-war, 5 monitors and some submarines. Right at the pier there are five huge steamers, high as 6-storey houses and long as a street. People on them look like ants on a railway car. We get bread.

At half past seven we got off and went through a cordon of French soldiers, all youngsters aged about 17. Their uniforms are dark blue, their officers' are colored as our field uniforms, and higher ranks have white uniforms of cloth.

We get on 2^nd class railway coaches, elegant outfit - plush seats. It's always 9 prisoners and 1 soldier. Well, being a soldier, I haven't traveled in such a luxury so far! What a difference - 2^nd class or cattle van! The soldiers are smart - they bring water to our field flasks. We haven't drunk such cold water for very long.

A hydroplane flies fast over us, landing every now and then. We see huge factories and storage facilities, huge pyramids of briquettes. A huge military transport is passing by with horses. We leave Toulon at night.

Notices in coaches are in French, German and English. Passing through Toulon suburbs, seeing civilians again after 8 months and forest green we missed so much at Asinara. But, most important, we watch women. Each of us is just gazing at those lush daughters of the French south, and our thoughts are so strange! Small wonder - none of us has even approached a woman in 23 months, none of us has tried the pleasures of love.

Just to be free at home - it is now that we feel the full weight of our fate. A soldier with bayonet is placed 5 steps from another one, every move and step are commented upon.

I must admit that French girls are really pretty! The train passes through beautiful gardens and well kept vineyards. Figs, olives and fine spruces swish by our windows. Some mountains are approaching slowly, and a longer tunnel. Tired from the ship, I fell asleep. Now I am awaken - by the command to get off. A small village named Cassis, it's 12:15. From here, we walk a great but dusty road, and can see a sea bay in an hour. The road goes along the shore climbing so it reminds us of the wild Albania. A milestone at the crossroads says 18 km to Marseille. It's very hot, we're fatigued. We branch off at the 6^th km and arrive in a prisoner camp in an hour.

It is in a valley, surrounded by bare hills, and the old building is a forsaken monastery. Beautiful park and buildings. Cells for 14 people are in a huge square. Some 500 steps further there are 15 houses with German prisoners. They hand us over, line us up and bring to cells - I fall asleep immediately. The camp is surrounded by guards with bayonets, we feel like being in animal farm. They don't take a single step without bayonets here. They go for water, to canteen, for meals or bread - always lined up perfectly and with bayonets. The Germans look real good in their brown uniforms and wide straw hats.

Blouses and hats bear large printed letters P. G. plus a number. You can tell a Prissonier de Guerre - war prisoner - from afar. There are 3 big canteens where you can buy bread, anchovies, cheese or lemonades - all adequately expensive. 3/4 liter of lemonade is 60 Cts., i.e. 1 Lire. They deduct 25 % from Italian currency. It's a strange charge. What is worse, they give us Italian coins as change, thus stealing from us twice.

Incredible stuff: Every now and then, they do Verkaterung or Sur Eptenut as they call it. They line us up for hours, then count us and line us up again. They keep counting us and can't seem to be done.

We wake up at half past 6, get a cup of canned coffee (not worth saying much about). At 9, we get approx. 600 g of bread; at 11 we get a great soup - made of potatoes with peas or lentils, a piece of meat as big as a finger. We like it, it's well spiced, tasty and there's a lot of vegetables. They serve it in dishes for ten men.

600 to 800 people leave every day. Our turn is tomorrow. They get furnished for 2 days - bread, a piece of bacon and one can of fish is a one day portion. They divide us by trades but then they send people out mixed again.

French soldiers are a strange mixture - 65-year-olds with 18-year-old recruits. The uniforms vary - black, blue, brown, white and green. It pleases eye to look at all the colors within one unit. Officers are mostly pensioners or disabled. But they're intelligent and much more polite than the Italians. I must admit that they treat us well, it's a pity we don't understand them - everything would be much easier. As everywhere, Serbs are the worst crew here, too. They want to get everywhere just like cattle. They pulled out their Serb chaykashes which we generally hate. It's hot here as at Asinara - it's a pity we cannot hide under the trees that are around the camp.

We miss our memories from home here so much. They have always given us comfort - but where do I get a chance? 
We play cards every day.

July 13.

Verkaterung, then we get food for 3 days - a loaf and a half, 4 bits of bacon approx. as big as those at Asinara for 1 L, and 3 cans of fish. At 10, we get the last tasty meal and marsch to the Cassis station. From afar, we see an new transport from Asinara that has just arrived. They go a different way so we won't meet. There is a large transport of blacks who show us their white teeth.

They are in uniforms - they will escort us. Their fingers are full of rings, and they show off.

We are in tens in 2^nd or 3^rd class coaches, going to Marseille.

Departed at 2 - passed 2 big tunnels, and at 4, we are leaving Marseille station over the P/LM route (Paris-Lyon-Marseille). There are two tracks, built expensively - long tunnels and lofty bridges are there. Wayside signs show its length 834 km.

Passing along the sea for a moment - then hillside, rocks, meadows, grazing flocks, fields, vineyards.

The train goes very fast, brick and ceramic factories pass by our windows. A large city on 802^nd km (Miramar?) and an unending flat behind it. We have our supper and I fall asleep sitting. Station Orange at night.

Morning, half past 7 and we are at 582^nd km - Roues, so we have traveled more than 200 km overnight. Then there is 778^th km - Arles, passing through vineyards. At night, our black guards were replaced by 320^th battalion - all are old geezers. We feel like broken, having slept sitting.

Station Wienne with ceramic factories.

509^th km - Lyon, a huge city, lovely wide streets, great palaces, many factories.

Leaving at half past 8, each of us got a trinkbecher (a cup) of coffee. So far we are satisfied with the French. They treat us decently, pass us water to the coaches and girls wave and even send us their kisses. Maybe they mistake us for Italians as we still wear Italian uniforms.

We like the French women, they are jolly and dressed tastefully. They do care about fashion. As everywhere, anyone with straight legs was drafted from age of 16 to 60. Women replaced men on the railroad, trams and everywhere.

482^nd km - Lozane, all meadows around the track with grazing cattle. It is noticeable that we are moving northwards, the harvest hasn't even begun here whereas down south, it was over. Cold cloudy day, the guard is replaced again by Battalion 85.

380^th km - Taras-le-Mars - we get coffee from the Red Cross.

349^th km - Moulins, large station at quarter to four, hundreds of cars with corn, huge storage halls.

314^th km - St. Pierre, we meet a Red Cross train with the hurt. Half past six: Sangaze, guards replaced again - Battalion 123. Coffee. It's comic how at each stop we jump off the coaches and run to toilets. It's a real sturm and schwarmlinie (attack and extended order).

The tracks branch off at 275^th km - one goes to Paris and the other to Bordeaux. We passed a large city at night after St. Pierre, we didn't learn its name.

5 o'clock in the morning: Tours. The guards are replaced by 3^rd regiment of French cavalry with helmets and long horsehair tails. Our transport is divided here. I part with Roubik and Ferdinandi, and we leave. Guards change again at 9, we pass through a town where women really gaze at us. It's humiliating to be looked at as wild animals. Oh when will our ill fate turn good, when will we be free again?

At 3 p.m. we arrived in a large town Les Sables de Otone near the Atlantic. That is, from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic! This town is our destination. A huge industrial town with a forest of factory chimneys and ships.

They lead us to a briquette factory where smoky faces of the Reichsdeutscher (German) prisoners welcome us. They work here, and reportedly they're quite satisfied. They welcome us friendly and start to collect mattresses. We sleep in a huge storage facility, and they're kind to us. They have their own canteen, library and band here; the band performed Radetzky Marsch to greet us. They give us good meal and coffee. I lay down, happy to stretch my aching and twisted limbs. We will never forget how friendly they welcomed us, they divided all they had for us like real brothers. We talk long into the night.

Today is rasttag (day of rest) for us. The Germans are very kind to us - they gave us 3 meals today although they received nothing for us. They give us bread and treat us like brothers. A French corporal asked them: "Didn't you fight Austriaci?" The fools! they count us three times a day. There was a big concert in the evening, we sang Austrian anthem, Deutschland über alles etc. Their meals are very good and the bread is great.

They divide us in groups of 20 and take us to the station after lunch. We get on the train, it passes through the city more like a tramway, everybody frowns at us as at cruel monsters; they clench their fists and swear: Bosch!Kraut! - we do not know what it means, but it certainly isn't nice. My team has 2 Czechs, 6 Germans, 1 Rusin, 3 Dalmatians, 8 Croats - 20 citizens, an illustration of our loved Oesterreich! At 4 we get off and walk 8 km to a village with a nice castle and church. They take us to a house of 3 rooms - 2 for us and 1 for the guard: There are 5 guards for 20 prisoners. Planks and straw are ready, but no blankets - they haven't arrived yet.

While we were making beds, 4 civilians come to choose workers from us. It's a hard deal - none of us can speak French and they can only speak French. German doesn't help, nobody understands it. It's typical of French education. Everyone of us can speak 2 languages besides our mother tongue. We speak one by one, trying to communicate - in Czech, German, Hungarian, Croatian, Romanian, Italian and even a little English. All in vain, as my father says. Finally we are divided by 5 and it's done.

We get up at four and us 5 go to work in the castle. First we clear a shed - our future dining room, and then we get our first breakfast: A cup of sweet coffee and lovely white bread. Then we get pitchforks and go to work the hay in the mead.

They brought us lunch to the field at noon: Beans that were really nice and then some mixture that looked awful but was edible, especially when you're hungry. A nice view - five men sitting around the dish and feeding. Great white wheat bread, huge loaves and 1 liter of white wine. There should be more of that. 2 hours rest. Supper is that mixture again - boiled bread, carrots, beet, beans, potatoes and cabbage - all together.

That white wheat bread, the fact that we always got enough of it and the good wine reconciled us with the French village. These two things healed us. We worked out under the hot southern sun, slept tight (sometimes there was very little sleep as we started work at 5, got up at 4, worked till 7 and rested (slept) for two hours at noon when the heat was peaking. The meals of south French villagers - beans, pork, poultry, eggs, butter, vegetables and the good wine gave us strength. I don't know how the comrades in the factory camps were doing but we wanted to finish war working in the country. We got used to farm works, the inhabitants got used to us, and some even liked us. Every time, they got on better with us than with Germans. They gradually understood who we were and learned to differentiate between an Autrichien and a Bosch. And later still, when we learned to understand them and communicate with them, they really liked us and tried to make our fate easier for us as much as they could.

And our boys, handsome and strong, got into good shape: They shaved, went around clean and neat with their beards under bands. They even started intimate relationships with girls and soldier wives. That was forbidden and punished severely; this is why the guards were alwas with us - going to work and home from work, locking us up at night: Certainly not for fear that we might run but to prevent us from contacting the civilians.

But gradually the discipline loosened, the guards also started to find their interests, and as our boys were together with workers for all days - in the fields, barns, sheds and stables, it was difficult to prevent this contact. Many a friendship and love affair was started, and when the matter became too widely public, the prisoners were just relocated to another village say in a different district, and gone was the love affair. The persistent ones, though, found their ways even so: They found a good-hearted Frenchman who delivered a letter secretly. We had a trouble writing these letters, but finally we made it. I wrote so many of such love letters for my friends, always following a single formula: "Ma cherie Viktorine, Germaine, Lussete etc. Je pense - je ne - obtie jamais etc." My friends Valdeman, Novacek: What's left of these promises? But never mind, it improved our miserable lives, that daily contact with the village people who were kind and sympathetic. They often kept our minds busy with their "Pauvre enfants" and their kind inquiries as to where we are from, what it is like in our home, how we live. Communicating with them was hard, we spoke using our hands. Anyway, those good villagers were completely ignorant of where our homeland is. And when we made a mistake telling them that we were neither Bosch, nor Autrichiens, but that we were de la Boheme, it was all over. Le Boheme is a Gypsy - so they kept wondering why we are not black but blond. Sometime a Gypsy with a bear came to the village; we had hard work explaining to them who we were. When we learned French and explained that we were Czechs - le Tcheque, it was good. But then we had to move and arrived in a completely new environment. They asked us about our families, we showed them the photographs and explained what life is like at home. Our boys boasted, everything was better, smarter and perfect.

But then again, we could boast justly: We are ahead of them in everything: land cultivation, household, cuisine, education. There are very many people here who cannot read, who have open fireplaces in their houses with a kettle on a chain, burning shrubs and dried cow waste that they collect, dry and stack in the summer. They don't know dumplings or cakes, their soups are only of bread or vegetables; they eat pork boiled - never roasted; poultry boiled and beans for breakfast, lunch and supper. And they eat a lot of bread for every meal. They don't eat much potatoes, and if they do, they're only baked. But all cooking is done with good butter, and no beer - just wine, morning, noon and evening. And what a wine! When we got home years later, we never liked any wine because it could never be equal to the homegrown south-French natural wine. And it was cheap! 1 chop, i.e. approx. 4/10 liter was for 15 Cts., but you didn't even need those 15 Cts., they offered you to taste some and kept pouring in again and again.

And there was one more specialty in the coastal areas where we worked for farmers: fish, oysters and snails. When they first gave us a dish full of snails, none of us would even touch them - we loathed them. It made us sick to see them eat and suck their oysters. It took us very long to learn how to open them with a knife and suck them out. Snails were boiled in garlic sauce or roasted on tin pans, and then there were things like spawn and other sea beasts that we didn't know. But we got used to it, as well as to clogs that replaced leather shoes.

And the menu was all the same - cabbage, very tasty, beans, pork, eggs and bread, and we always had appetite. At first we ate separately as prescribed - and we ate all that was brought. If farmer's wife was careless and left a whole butter lump on the table, she would not find it again. We cut it with spoons or hid it in empty cans. Later they were more careful and separated a portion for everyone.

This was the whole week - on Sundays we had a day off and cooked for ourselves. The mayor brought us bread, meat, grease, beans and salt and we took turns to be Sunday cooks. Everyone tried hard to earn praise for their lunch. We often greased the lunch with what we kept for the whole week - a bit of grease here, some beans there or a piece of meat there. And later still, the wife would give the cook something secretly so that our Sunday lunch could be even more substantial.

One cooked and others washed clothes. We wetted them on Saturdays in the nearby pond, using stones as weights so that it would not float away. Sunday was the washing day - with brush and soap, we ground our miserable shirts and underwear, then rinsed them in the pond and dried them on the fence.

The first four who were done with washing sat down to play cards, the others shaved, twisted their mustaches under the bands and wrote home.

After the lunch, we would sit in the garden, remember and sometimes sing - that was when village beauties walked by our house and peeped in over the fence.

After about three weeks home, we received an order to stamp all underwear and clothes. The guard brought tin forms and Yara, who was home as he was sick, got the forms and paint and started printing P. G. and a some 6-digit number. Yara was very skilful: He could do anything in the world - repair watches and ploughs, shoes and stoves, but could not read or write. But we only learned that much later - he concealed it well as he was ashamed of it. He would get no letters and wrote to no one so we never learned anything. So Yara printed and printed. But alas, when the guard came back from his stroll in the evening and found that Yara had also painted their underwear that was being dried in the garden. They could do nothing, erase nor wash it off as the paint would outlive the shirt.

Waking up at 4, then coffee and then haymaking. We work as if we were paid 5 Crowns a day. Lunch at noon as yesterday, that mixture for supper, then potato goulash and finally milk pap. It was dark when we got home (July), a bit too much work for 20 Cts. daily. They guard us, we cannot leave them for a single step and they are with us in the field all day.

They don't fuss around with us at night. To avoid having to watch, they lock us, give us a nachttopf - a big tub into which we do it, and as the door and windows are sealed, there is a wonderful aroma all night.

We yielded our Italian money and got various instructions. We can write a card home one Sunday and a letter the next. Doctor came today and inspected our two sick men. At night I feel like beaten, I'm not used to such hard work.

Still haymaking, meals are getting better day by day. Coffee, bread and butter in the morning, bread soup, beans, bread and butter and a glass of wine at noon. Bread soup, potato goulash, milk pap, salad and bread in the evening. We must hand in all money, we can't even keep a penny, maybe so we can't buy a car and flee.

We got straw hats with P. G. painted on them. Great sausages for supper today.

Sunday. We sleep longer, make coffee, I write a card home, and we wash. What a difference - a Sunday two years ago and now. I long for freedom so much. A barber came and shaved us all.

Days pass in work. Digging vegetables, beet, harvesting wheat etc. Lots of work. I am always glad when the evening comes. Food is good and abundant. Bread is great and abundant, meals are various, such as I have never seen. Boiled green beans with butter, beans, green peas and a salad twice a day. Sometimes even meat. We can't buy anything, they took our money. And then we cannot communicate - if we could, we would be much better off, they are not bad to us. In farming they are backward. Their kitchens look like Albanian ones - no ceiling, smoky beams, Serb fireplace, chain with a kettle and fire under it.

Sunday again. We look forward to those few moments of rest so much. I wash, stitch, write home and 4 cards to Usti - F.T., A.S., A.M. and Kohn & Kornfeld.

I long for home, for you, my dear parents! I am losing my hope to ever return. How happy I was two years ago, and now? A sad anniversary was that of the recent days - 2 years of war! When will that poor, damned war end?

It is extraordinarily hot today.

Sunday again - service in the local church - we are a beautiful sight: Lined in pairs, a soldier in front and back - bayonet auf - the locals looked at us as at wild animals.

The church is nice - the farmer wives in black, with white caps and - clogs. I pray for my parents and for my happy return home.

A strange habit - during sacrifice, a boy walks there with a basket and everyone takes a bit of white bread and eats.

We got lohnung for 12 days, Fr 2.40 in vouchers that we use to pay.

A barber comes and shaves us every Sunday.

Working hard all week, it's harvest. Harvesting wheat with obsolete sickles and tying it without wisps. We sweated pretty much.

We worked at the neighboring farm for three days, the food is better here. We threshed on Saturday and got a great supper.

This country reminds of us Albania and Arnauts again and again. The rooms, fireplaces, carts, ox yokes and hip bands.

The people are not bad and we would certainly have good times if we could communicate.

I weighed myself yesterday - 63 kg.

I bought a knife for 50 Cts. - 2 1/2 day of drudgery in the fields.

Another six days of plod are over. I'm real glad when Sunday comes. I'm tired up to here for all the week. This weeks we harvested and tied corn, and had pretty bad meals. Only on Saturday we got back to work for our old lord.

What I regret most is being with Croats - they're worse than animals. The French tell us about big defeats of the Austrians; in Galicia, they say, General Bothner gave up with an entire corps.

We got paid for 9 days Fr.1.80.

The Day of Our Lady, no work, going to a service. The way that local people look at us really annoys me. They're not bad, they want to talk to us, and offer us snuffs and smoking. A strange habit in the progressive France - boys from about 14 or 15 all have their own snuff-boxes and they snuff. Girls from 7 years up wear stays and clogs only.

Sunday - we love to rest - worked with thresher for 2 days, much work and much food, much wine and that counts.

Our team goes round all houses, stack to stack, with the thresher. They have no barns here - the straw stays stacked in the fields. Passing crops up to the machine in heat and dust is real hard work.

Threshing here is a feast when the patron tries to out-feast the neighbor.

Soup, 2-3 roast meats - mostly mutton, vegetables, salads, eggs, butter and, on top of it all, snails, oysters and fish. When they first gave us snails, we did not know what to do with them and one exceptionally clever Croat wanted to crush them with his fist on the table like walnuts.

I can't stand them Croats, and they know it and repay me when they can. How on Earth did I get among these bastards?

Thresher menu: white coffee and bread and butter in the morning; pauper's snack is bread soup, duck with carrots, potatoes with butter, mixed salad and pap.

Lunch and supper: pap (milk and semolina, the pap is very sweet). Snails in great sauce - we have learned how to eat them and we enjoy them. They start to treat us differently - they eat in the kitchen and we sit in an extra room. There are huge beds made up high, one lies right next to the ceiling - I wouldn't like falling down at night. The bed has a huge canopy in Louis XV. style, great lacquered chests, clock and ... floor of stomped clay.

32 persons are at the feast, including all our guard and corporal. They go with us and with the thresher from house to house and eat with us. Local workers: Boys and girls aged 7 - 12.

We drink much wine every day.

They exchanged my Lire for Francs at the ratio of 35 : 29.80, i.e. charge of 15 %.

They divided us today - 10 men left for the next village, the worse hell raisers - thank God.

The day after tomorrow it will be 2 years that I have been on duty for the Emperor here with the thresher in the field.

I bought butter, bread, anchovies, make coffee and have a nice Sunday. I write letters to F., A.M. and cards to F.T. and K. & K.

They gave me light pants, blouse and shoes with wooden soles. The tops are from old leather military boots. Local people have a nasty habit - chewing tobacco and spitting it out.

Saturday - surprise for us: not going to work, a doctors came to vaccinate us. This week we worked 3 days with the thresher and ate well; now we are with the castle, sawing timber.

Women in the castle keep looking at us, we don't know who they are. They change clothes 7 times a day, look sharp with much make-up. But we couldn't fall in love with any of them. Our desires are elsewhere, we are not interested in anything here. Today they brought one who spoke German, she asked me just about everything. The coquettes!

A servant brought me a bottle of great wine in his pocket, he said his son is a prisoner in Germany. He feels very sorry for us - well, common suffering puts people closer.

A news - Romania is in war against Austria. My lohn from August 10 to 20 was Fr 1.40.

Today we saw the countess, the owner of the manor: a slim brunette; her daughter the comtesse is blonde and she is dressed beautifully

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My address: Josef Sramek, en equippe agricolete, Porroux par Avrile, Vendee-France.