"We were afraid that the Russians were coming..."

"We were terribly afraid that the Russians would come to this part of Austria. This was fear that is impossible to describe to someone who didn't experience it. We listened to the radio to find out how far the Americans had advanced and how far away the Russians were. And we hoped that somehow the Americans would be faster - we knew that they wouldn't be as bad as the Russians."

Gertrude B., born 1930, at the end of the war a 15 year old schoolgirl in Radstadt/Salzburg (Boltzmann-Institut/Steinocher-Fonds Interview Archive, Salzburg )