This Past Week...

Right now I'm in Budapest in Hungary. I never thought I would ever be able to say that. We traveled here by bus and tonight we have a dinner cruise on the Danue River which also runs through Vienna and Prague. This city is not quite as pretty as Prague but it's Europe so it's still pretty.

Tuesday - Ss. Cyril and Methodius Cathedral
We visited the church where men who assassinated the Nazi officer Heydrich were hidden for months from the Nazi regime. These men were Czech soldiers who were trained in England and were sent on this mission to assassinate Reinhard Heydrich. The mission was called Anthropoid. This has been one of my favorite things we have ever done on the trip so far. In all five men were hidden in the church, and a sixth who fled the scene of Heydrich's attempted murder, gave up their wherabouts to the Nazi regime because he believed he was protecting his family by doing so. The two men assigned to kill him were Jan Kubis and Jozef Gabcik. The two men were dropped off (literally jumped out of a plane) near Prague, but due to weather landed 70 miles off course. The mission took six months of planning and did not got as planned, one gun jammed and the clean shot they had of Heydrich was missed. Heydrich died because of blood poisoning a few days later in the hospital after the attempted assassination, caused by infected wounds from the hand grenade that was thrown at his car. More on his assassination can be googled if you wish.
After words both men fled the scene. Gabcik was able to shoot the driver who began to follow them and went to a safe house. Kubis did not follow protocol and fled to his mother's home. An extensive funeral service was held for Heydrich by the Nazis in Prague and Berlin. Hitler punished the Czech Republic with the liquidation of two towns, Lidice and Lezaky as well as the arrest of many citizens of Prague. More on that later.
The Nazis searched for three months to no avail. The people of Prague paid the price heavily. Finally the Nazi party advertised that if anyone with information about Heydrich's death came forward, they would not be punished. This pushed Kubis who wanted to protect his family from the Nazis to come forward. 
Along with Gabcik, four other soldiers were hidden in the crypt of the church. After Kubis gave away there whereabouts 800 gestapo surrounded the church and open fired on the church and filled the crypt with water in an attempt to flush out the soldiers. The Nazis blasted their way into the crypt. All five soldiers committed suicide rather than be captured and held by the Nazis. The bishop of the church at the time, Bishop Gorazd, was put on trial and eventually killed as were others who helped and the families of the soldiers.
When we went to the church we were allowed into the crypt which still has the bullet holes on the interior and exterior of the church. The interior of the church was repaired and it still functions today. There is a memorial outside one of the windows of crypt and there are busts of the six soldiers in the crypt as well with their names and biographies.

Wednesday - Lidice
On Wednesday we took a day trip to the liquidated town of Lidice. This town was chosen by the Nazis due to false information from the Gestapo for helping Jan Kubis and Jozef Gabcik hide there. In reality some Czech officers stationed in England had come from there, however there is no proof that there were safe houses located in that town or that Kubis and Gabcik had ever been there. Hitler wanted these towns to be liquidated with no survivors, buildings, grave sites, etc. He wanted no record of this town to remain. All 184 of the men (ages 16 and older) were shot. The women and children were sent to Chlemno concentration camp and most were gased to death. 7 children were picked for germanization. After the war 153 women and 17 children returned. The town of Lidice was rebuilt a mile from the old site of Lidice.
The memorial site is organized as a layout of the town. There is a beautiful grave site the mass grave that holds the men who were shot at the Horak family farm. The outline of the church, school and other family homes as well as the grave yard are there. The Nazis were so thorough that they exhumed the bodies of the original cemetery of Lidice and had them destroyed. The famous sculpture of the 87 children who died is based on the many descriptions of the personalities of the children. They are not made to look like the actual children since the artist did not want to inflict more pain on their surviving mothers. The museum has photos of most of the people of the town prior to the liquidation.

Photos to come soon!