European Resistance Archive/European Resistance Archive (ERA)

and I was made to taste some food, to test whether it was really edible.

I don’t know if later they ate that food or not.

They chased me three or four kilometers away.

But even before I was taken prisoner, the watch was taken off my hand.

I remember thinking how it made no difference.

When they caught me, they took me to the village called Balakleja and they locked me up in a hen coop.

Perhaps it was two by two meters, or one by one.

I just know that I was locked up for an eternity, at least it seemed that way.

I don’t know whether it was afternoon or the next day, but two soldiers came in and asked me if I’m German or not.

No, I’m not, I’m Yugoslavian.

They knew nothing of any Yugoslavians.

They tied me up with some wire and shoved me to some headquarters.

There was a huge table in a very large room, and the officers were sitting over there.

I don’t know what kind of officers they were. They asked me all sorts of things.

Perhaps I’d been thinking about it in the hen coop, I was asked for my surname.

I said Ivan Ivanovic Srcnikov.

That was almost my death, although I didn’t know it.

And then one of the officers, he says to me in Russian what’s your surname?!

I responded Ivan Ivanovic Srcnikov. He said I’m not Yugoslavian, but rather a Vlach.

The Vlachs were Russian soldiers who had gone over to the enemy side, or who had been taken prisoner.