220 221 letters in Russian, for instance. In the late 1950s, a Russian family with whom the Schäfers were friendly helped them submit an application for an exit visa. In 1958, they were finally permitted to leave for West Germany. The German Minority in Czechoslovakia Creating an ethnically homogeneous state for the Czech and Slovak population was built on the premise of expelling both the German and the Hungarian minorities, a process for which the Czechoslovak government- in-exile had already prepared the legal basis during the war. Between 1940 and 1945 and based on a constitutional decree about the organisation of the interim government, President Edvard Beneš issued a total of 142 presidential decrees which were to regulate public life once Czechoslovakian statehood was restored. These so-called Beneš Decrees were retroactively ratified by the Interim National Assembly of Czechoslovakia in March 1946. Some of the decrees specifically referred to the German and Hungarian THE SCHÄFERS IN FRONT OF THE LOG CABIN THEY HAD BUILT THEMSELVES Irkutsk Oblast (Soviet Union), 1954 minorities, revoking their citizenship and confiscating their property, and applied to anyone unable to prove that they had actively fought against Nazism during the war and the occupation period. Thus accusations of disloyal behaviour became the justification for repressive policies against both minorities. Immediately after the war, the Czechoslovak government implemented a number of measures against the German minority. The mood among the Czech population was fundamentally hostile to the Germans who were
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