Franja

Hospital Franja began operating for the first time on 23 December 1943, when it received seven wounded in care. In April 1944, German patrols first attacked the hospital, the wounded and staff withdrew, but they resettled again after a few months. After the attack, the hospital operated until liberation, although it was attacked again on 24 March 1945. On 5 May 1945, the wounded and staff left the hospital and the village of Pasice – from that time onwards, it has served as a historical memorial and tourist attraction. Hospital Franja was one of the few well-preserved partisan hospitals from the Second World War in Slovenia. Credit for the uninterrupted operation of the hospital also goes to the villagers, who helped with care by providing food, medical treatment and sanitary supplies. The builders of the hospital initially planned only a few barracks, but it turned out that the needs of the wounded were much greater. The wounded were blindfolded before entering the hospital, so that in case of possible torture by the occupiers, they could not reveal information about the location. The route to the hospital during the war, due to safety, led along the Čerinščica stream, which flows through the village of Pasice.

The hospital consisted of 14 barracks of different sizes and purposes. In addition to barracks for the wounded, there were also other rooms in the hospital, such as an operating room, isolation room, X-ray room, room for doctors, barracks for staff, invalid home, food storage, kitchen, laundry room and bathroom, carpentry workshop and even an electrical power station.

Initially, the dead were buried at the Vrba cemetery, then on the left bank of Čerinščica, just before the entrance to the village of Pasice. The deceased were placed in a grave with a glass containing information (name, surname, possibly also date of birth and death and cause of death). After the war, they were reburied in a common grave at the cemetery in Cerknica. The hospital also published its own newspaper, Bolniški list. Although Hospital Franja was a Slovenian military hospital, people from other countries were also treated there, including Italians, Frenchmen, Russians, Poles, two Americans and two Austrians, which proves respect for the Geneva Convention, since at that time Italians and Austrians were allies of the Germans. Fifty-two years after the war, that is, in 1997, the American Air Force Veterans Association awarded the Partisan Hospital Franja recognition for assistance and treatment of its member Harold Adams.

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