Černá Máry, He Was a Devil

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In 1954, Jiří Lukšíček, a member of the scout resistance movement, was sentenced to six years of imprisonment for treason. Along with others he served his term in the Rovnost work camp in Jáchymov. There was a much feared warden, nicknamed Černá Máry. Lukšíček shared his room with Požár: “We called him a horse butcher; his shoulders were so wide that he had to enter the door sideways otherwise he would take it off its hinges. Such a great, stout guy. Černá Máry came when Požár was writing his letter.” According to the prison order, if the prisoners were writing letters they did not have to stand up when the wardens came. “Černá Máry started to scream at Požár: ʽStand up, stand up,ʼ after which he took Požár´s letter and ripped it up. Požár, absolutely justly, exploded and kicked him out. Požár knew it was a mistake, told the other prisoners to leave, sat down calmly and waited for Černá Máry to come back. Then six wardens flounced in and Požár beat them, but they had backup. Finally, they dragged him off and he was dead the next day, hanged. Reportedly he hanged himself. He did not hang himself; he had a family – a wife and two children. What will we cover, he was hung,” he remembered.

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Jiří Lukšíček

Jiří Lukšíček was born August 16, 1933 in Prague. In 1945, he joined Junák, (the Czech scouting organization), and he was active in troop No. 100 and later in No. 145. After 1949, when the gradual disbandment of Junák began, Jiří Lukšíček - Rys became a member of a scouting resistance group. Their illegal activities focused mainly on the distribution of anti-state pamphlets and minor sabotage actions. The members possessed weapons, which were used primarily for moral support and as trophies. Jiří Lukšíček was arrested for the first time in March 1953 and detained for two months. He was lucky that investigators did not find the weapons and that they only investigated him because of a less serious case. In 1953-54 Rys was doing his military service in the 61st section of Auxiliary Technical Battalions near Rumburk. After his previous imprisonment he was regarded politically unsuitable for any other kind of military service. He was arrested again during his military service, as the investigators have meanwhile found the weapons and related the resistance group's activities to other fabricated cases. Rys was subsequently sentenced to six years of imprisonment, during which he was forced to work in the camps Nikolaj, and later Rovnost, where he also met other scouts. After his release in 1960, he found a job as a worker in the ČKD factory, and later he completed industrial school and began teaching in ČKD. In 1968, he restored the 233rd troop within the 34th scout group Ostříž. He then tried to lead the group in spite of the subsequent ban on Junák, which came at the beginning of 1970. In the same year he was forbidden to work with the youth. After the Velvet Revolution he restored the group and also became a very active official in the restored Junák. Along with others, he served as a member of the Conciliation Board. Even now he still attends various meetings and is involved in scouting life.

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Rovnost

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The camp was established after the Second World War to keep prisoners of war there. In September 1949 it was transferred under the management of the Prison Guard Corps. Political and retributive prisoners and criminals worked at the mine Rovnost, (Equality); each day on their way to work, they had to pass a corridor surrounded by barbed wire. The mineshaft was over 660 meters deep and it was the deepest one in the region of Jáchymov. The infamous František Paleček was in charge of the mine Rovnost, who tortured the prisoners with sadistic methods, for example, by making them stand in knee-high snow for long periods of time.