Apače, Lesjak Ivan - Petja

«In Black Mountain, a courier named Petja - whose real name was Ivan Lesjak, from Black Mountain in Carinthia - was waiting for me. His 78-year-old mother, a miner's widow, still lives there. His older brother also lives nearby. Petja, however, has spent all the war years living far away at the other end. For some time, he was in Upper Radgona, but now he is in Apače. […]

Let us start with the event of how Petja went to the partisans. 'I first met the partisans in Javor in September 1942. - You will go with us, we will collect those who should be in the German army, they said. I went. In the evening, actually late at night, some farmer lent me a horse so that I could get home. I slept like a bear, when someone shook me. I looked: in front of me was my father, behind him the police. - You were with the partisans yesterday, and you didn't report anything! We will kill you. At first, I didn't understand anything, but then I stammered: - I would have reported, but it seemed too harsh to wake you in the middle of the night. I was just thinking to come now. Although the excuse was foolish, somehow it worked. They did not take me away. From that moment on, I worked with Delalut for the partisans. Later, he was shot as a traitor - at that time, when I was already a partisan.'»

Neža Maurer, Zveza mora ostati, Ljubljana: Zavod Borec in Ljubljani, 1967, p. 283, 322.

Photo: Lesjak Ivan - Petja, Geneanet, Cemetery Apače, p. 33.