The smuggler left her alone in the middle of the forest
On March 21, 1949, Irena Šimonová attempted to cross the border and get into West Germany. She had a legitimate fear of being arrested and thus wanted to follow in the footsteps of her friend František Smrček, who by then had already been in exile. Operating from Germany, Smrček arranged a smuggler for her to make sure the nineteen-year-old inexperienced girl safely passed through the forests full of border guards and treacherous swamps. The contracted smuggler indeed contacted Irena and they set out on the journey together. However, the smuggler suddenly stopped in the midst of the forests beyond Nýrsko and refused to go any farther. Irena Šimonová recalls: "He told me that I should continue on my own. I knew that he was supposed to safely pass me on to someone. But I was afraid to argue with him - I mean I was alone there with him in the forest. We were somewhere in the middle of the woods, I had absolutely no idea where I was. He tried to explain the way to me but I knew that I would never be able to find it on my own. So at least I asked him to show me the direction. He just pointed his arm somewhere like this. And then he was gone. And suddenly I heard voices and barking dogs." The smuggler probably heard the sounds before Irena did and decided to save his own skin. "So I ran into the bushes and I felt I was sinking into the earth. I had heard that there were places in Šumava where you could drown in the swamp. I stayed hidden and prayed that the dogs won't find me. Luckily, they didn't. Probably the wind was blowing from the other side. I couldn't do anything else but get out of the bog and try to get somewhere," she recalled. At dawn, Irena - dirty and with her clothes torn - got back to Nýrsko. She groomed herself as much as she could and got on a train back to Prague. On the train, she was arrested by the police and subsequently ended up in prison for 11 years.
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