Secret note in a guitar case
Zdeněk Mikš was sentenced for thirty years of prison for treason and theft after trying to steal an airplane in Choceň in 1949. He stayed in several prisons and labour camps including the forced labour camp in Ilava, where he worked as an assistant to the prison photographer: "We found out that if we set up a film in a dark room, we could save a single picture. I got even two illegal photos from jail." These unique negatives he managed to smuggle out from prison in his own hand made guitar case that he sent back home when the prison band was cancelled. Apart from negatives there was also a secret note in the case. "I was saying goodbye to my parents because I thought the was coming and we were all going to be shot." But finally there was no conflict between the East and West and Mikš had to serve another ten years in jail.
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Zdeněk Mikš - Biography
The bullet changed its trajectory in my shoulder joint, ripped my lungs and stopped just over my diaphragm. It has remained there until now. Zdeněk Mikš was born in Dvůr Králové nad Labem on 7th October in 1926. During the occupation of Czechoslovakia Mikš had attended a high school. In 1944 he was conscripted to a unit of "Technische Nothilfe". After the war in 1946 Mikš enlisted military air force and he studied at Air force military academy. Because of his anticommunist attitudes he was fired from the military service in November 1948. With a group of friends Mikš made an attempt to escape to the West in two civil aircrafts from the aerodrome Choceň in May 1949. Members of the group - Vlastimil Klenovský, Jaroslav Valášek, Jan Horníček, Miroslav Nový, Heda Prokopová and Zdeněk Mikš - seized two small aircrafts (type Sokol) in the middle of the night on 12th of May 1949. But just before taking off a tragedy had happened. Heda had treated overwhelmed aerodrome guard mercifully and before getting on board she had softened his shackles. When all six friends were already on board near the Mikš's aircraft the guard appeared with a rifle and shot to dead Klenovský and Prokopová. Mikš himself was seriously injured. But he was able to find a medical help in a nearby village, but the doctor reported him to police and Mikš was arrested. The second crew successfully took off but the plane crashed near the town of Sušice in Mountain Šumava. The pilot Nový was seriously injured; Valášek and Horníček were later detained while crossing the borders to Germany. On 31st of August in 1949 Valášek was sentenced to life imprisonment. Horníček, Nový and Mikš were sentenced to 30 years in prison. The first year Mikš was detained in Bory, than he was moved to Ilava prison in Slovakia. He spent 18 months there. In 1952 Mikš was transported to Jáchymov area to a punitive labor camp "L", where a tremendous hunger had ruled. In 1953 Mikš weighed only 48 kilograms. In the middle of the 50's Mikš was moved again to another labor camp Bytíz. There he worked as a welder and a repairman. The State Security had tried to recruit Mikš for cooperation twice during his imprisonment but without success. Mikš stayed in Bytíz until 1962 when he was released under the second general amnesty.
