This is picture of my aunt Ruzena and the sitting woman is her sister Marie.
The piture was made in Cimelice where my grandparent's lived. It is in south Bohemia, where granddad had a farm with land under crop and horses that he was very proud of.
He also had a store there, which is still standing, although it now sells Dutch furniture.
My grandparents had seven children. Ota, who died in infancy, Rudolf, Emil, Ruzena, Marie, my dad Julius and another son, Ota. Marie died at a young age.
I think it was tuberculosis. She was single. Ruzena was born in 1890. She married Ota Beran, who, I think, was a coffee importer.
They were well-off financially, but their only son, who I never met, was killed in a bike crash long before the war.
Ruzena lived with her husband in Prague and later built a villa in Strancice, where we once came to visit.
I was really impressed by the place at the time, for there was a room with a door that led straight onto the garden via a staircase.
Ruzena and Ota were both transported to Terezin in September 1942 and straight on to Maly Trostenets, where they perished.
