In the course of the Slovak National Uprising, Tisovec, in the south of what was then the Slovak state, became the scene of a massacre of the local Romani population.
According to a statement made by a municipal employee in October 1972, members of Einsatzkommando 14 of Einsatzgruppe H shot numerous Roma on the spot on 21 November 1944 and deported the women and children, who were also eventually shot. A total of 44 Roma are believed to have been murdered on that day.
Course of Events
According to the testimony of Július B., a resident of Tisovec, which is kept in the archives of the Slovak National Uprising, two ‘agents’ or ‘provocateurs’ are said to have come to the Roma settlement in Tisovec, known as ‘U Papírny’ [At the Paper Mill], and pretended to be partisans. According to the findings of an investigation conducted by the General Prosecutor’s Office (the highest public prosecutor’s office in the former Czechoslovakia) in the early 1970s, these individuals were members of the security service. The two men managed to obtain information about weapons caches and resistance activities from Roma living there who were collaborating with partisans. They were also privy to plans to blow up a bridge near Rimavská Pila.
Shortly afterwards, at around 4 p.m. on 20 November 1944, all Roma in Tisovec were driven from their homes by members of Einsatzkommando 14 on the orders of SS-Obersturmführer Otto Mayer (biographical data unknown). Women and children were separated from the men.
In the early hours of 21 November 1944, fourteen men were forced to prepare a mass grave in a meadow below the Tisovská Hradová hill under the pretext of digging a trench. After completing their work, they were given cigarettes and, according to an unknown Yugoslav soldier, were shot while still smoking.
Mária B., who worked in the municipal administration at the time of the crime and was an eyewitness to the shootings, stated that 14 identity cards belonging to Roma people from the village whom she knew were subsequently handed over to the Slovak municipal administration. The municipality made the shootings public by posting a notice on the door of the municipal building.
The women and children of the settlement, probably 30 people,1The figures are based on the municipality’s list of people affected by the war, which names a total of 44 Roma: 14 adult men and 30 women and children. The sole survivor, Ema Mušuková, also speaks of around 30 women and children. Nečas, Slovenští Romové v letech 1939–1945, 162, gives a different figure of 34 women and children. Halaj, Fašistické represálie na Slovensku, 43, speaks of 64 women and children and 14 men as victims, but does not provide a source for this information. were deported to Banská Bystrica and murdered either in Kremnička or Nemecká. The crime was covered up by an official announcement from the municipal administration stating that the ‘families had been taken to Germany for work’.2Czech National Archives, Fond ČSVKSNVZ, Box No. 244, File No. S a, b Tisovec.
The only survivor—thanks to her mother’s quick thinking—was Ema Mušuková (1923–unknown). When her mother left the house, she locked the door. Ema Mušuková, who remained behind, initially hid under a bed, then climbed out of a window the next day and ran towards the nearby forest. Some German soldiers observed her escape and shot at her. Despite being wounded in the foot, she managed to reach the forest, where she encountered a group of partisans. She was able to stay with them until liberation.
Exhumation in 1945 and Investigations
Immediately after the war, the murder of the Roma from Tisovec was included in the list of crimes against humanity compiled for the trial of former President Jozef Tiso (1887–1947). However, only the killing and mass grave of the fourteen Roma and another Slovak partisan who had been staying in the settlement at the time were mentioned.
In the spring of 1945, the mass grave in Tisovec was opened and the 15 recovered bodies were reburied in the local cemetery. The husband of the witness Mária B. documented the exhumation photographically. Later, the couple handed over the photographs to the Museum of the Slovak National Uprising and the Historical Institute of the Slovak Academy of Sciences.
The burial place of the bodies of the murdered women and children remains unknown to this day.
In the early 1970s, the crime was investigated by the Attorney General’s Office and witnesses were interviewed. The outcome of the investigation is unknown.
Monument
A monument to the victims of World War II was erected at the site of the crime (now Malinovský Street) in Tisovec.3The date of the inauguration is unknown. Since Mária B. mentions it in her witness statement from October 1972, it must have been erected before then. The names of the 14 murdered Roma are also inscribed on it as follows: Dono Ondrej (1910–1944), Ľudovít Horváth (1904–1944), Aladár Mušuka (1914–1944), Dezider Mušuka (1929–1944), Ladislav Mušuka (1894–1944), Bartolomej Oláh (1906–1944), František Oláh (1927–1944), Ľudovít Oláh (1907–1944), Gejza Oláh (1913–1944), Ján Oláh (1886–1944), Ján Oláh (1901–1944), Ján Oláh (1909–1944), Ján Oláh (1929–1944), Matej Oláh (1912–1944).
