The Assassination of Reinhard Heydrich

By Erin Naillon

Reinhard Heydrich, “The Butcher of Prague”

In 1941, after the Nazis had taken Czechoslovakia into their iron grip, Hitler appointed Reinhard Heydrich as Deputy Reich Protector. The truly scary Heydrich, who viewed the Czechs as “garbage”, had 92 people executed within three days of his arrival in Prague. He was appointed on September 27, 1941, and his own estimates state that four to five thousand people had been arrested by February of the following year. Of these, some were executed and the rest were sent to the Mauthausen concentration camp. Heydrich was known, appropriately, as “The Butcher of Prague”.

“The Final Solution to the Jewish Problem”

In 1942, Heydrich was the chairman of the horrifically insane Wannsee Conference, organized to discuss “the final solution to the Jewish problem”. The deportation and murder of millions was the topic under discussion. Heydrich was named chief executor, a fitting title. The Butcher of Prague also planned to deport or murder at least two-thirds of the Czechs after the end of the war, which he fully expected to end in a Nazi victory.

Czechoslovak Government-in-exile

The brutality and repression of Heydrich’s regime virtually paralyzed Czech society. Unknown to the Butcher and his victims, the Czechoslovak government-in-exile was planning his assassination. On December 28, 1941, Jan Kubiš and Jozef Gabčík, specially trained by the Special Operations Executive in Britain, were parachuted into the country by an RAF plane.  They planned to assassinate Heydrich on May 27 of the following year. In the meantime, they contacted various families and organizations who agreed to help them. After discussing and rejecting plans to assassinate Heydrich on a train or on a forest road, they decided to carry out Operation Anthropoid, as it had been named, in Prague.

Operation Anthropoid

According to plan, the two men lay in wait at a hairpin bend of a street in the Prague suburb of Libeň, knowing that Heydrich would be traveling to Berlin to meet with Hitler. Heydrich customarily drove in an open car, such was his confidence in his authority over the Czechs. As the car approached the bend, Gabčík aimed a submachine gun at Heydrich, but the gun jammed. Heydrich ordered the car to halt so that he could pursue the men, whereupon Kubiš threw a bomb at the car, wounding himself as well as Heydrich.
Heydrich emerged from the wreckage with a pistol and chased Kubiš, attempting to shoot him, but was forced to return to his car, weakened. He ordered his driver to go after Gabčík, who shot the driver in the leg and escaped

Reinhard Heydrich – Dead

Heydrich was taken to Bulovka Hospital, where, he was found to have suffered injuries to his left lung, spleen, and diaphragm. He was treated and, to all appearances, was on the road to recovery. On June 2, Himmler visited Heydrich in the hospital; not long afterward, Heydrich lapsed into a coma. The Butcher of Prague, the Blond Beast, the Hangman died on June 4, 1942.

Lidice and Ležáky – Hitler’s Revenge

Hitler was overwhelmed with rage at the death of one of his favorites, and the small towns of Lidice and Ležáky will forever bear the wounds of his anger. Both towns were taken over, the citizens rounded up, and the men shot, while the women and most of the children were sent to concentration camps. The towns were then razed.

The Final Showdown in Prague

The assassins, along with other Czech partisans, took refuge in the crypt of the Cathedral of Saints Cyril and Methodius, in the Prague 2 district. They were betrayed by two Czechs, and the Germans promptly surrounded the Cathedral and opened fire. Gabčík and Kubiš held out as long as they could, but when it became clear that the Germans were going to take the church, Gabčík committed suicide. Kubiš, who was wounded in defending the church, died shortly after the Germans took over the building. The leader of the church, Bishop Gorazd, took blame for the events in the church. He was arrested on June 27, 1942, then tortured. On September 4 of that year, he and the priests of the church were executed by a firing squad. A street nearby is now named for him (Gorazdová).
Heydrich was given a lavish funeral in Prague, with another one in Berlin. Allied leaders, appalled by the brutalities following the assassination, decided against making attempts on the lives of other Nazi figures.

The church in which Gabčík and Kubiš took refuge still stands, on a busy Prague street. Lidice and Ležáky are now monuments to Nazi atrocities.