Jozef Gabčík


Jozef Gabčík was a Slovak soldier in the Czechoslovak Army involved in Operation Anthropoid, the assassination of acting Reichsprotektor of Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, SS Obergruppenführer Reinhard Heydrich.

Life

Youth

Gabčík was born 1912 in Poluvsie, part of town Rajecké Teplice, Trencsén County, Kingdom of Hungary. He learned to be a farrier, as well as a blacksmith. He was also taught clock making at the village of Kostelec nad Vltavou. He was taught by local master blacksmith J. Kunike. He lived with the Kunike family in their house of which still stands together with the outbuilding and yard which was used as a smithy. In 1927 the school records show that he attended school in business studies at village Kovářov near to Kostelec nad Vltavou. The building which housed the school is today the municipal office.
In 1937, he began work at a military chemical plant in Žilina; after an accident, however, he was transferred to the gas storage facility in Trenčín.

In exile

The breakup of the Czechoslovak Republic and the subsequent emergence of the clero-fascist and anti-Czech Slovak State he didn't accept – when German Wehrmacht took over the military depot and sabotaged it. To escape punishment, he fled to Poland and joined forming Czechoslovak military unit in Polish service. Then, with other comrades, was transferred via ship to France and there entered the 1st Regiment of the Foreign Legion. In 26 September 1939 he was drafted in Agde into the emerging Czechoslovak foreign army in France and included as deputy commander of the machine gun platoon at the 1st Infantry Regiment of the 1st Czechoslovak Infantry Division in France. Three months later, he was promoted to the rank of četař and participated in the Battle of France during the Spring of 1940.
Following France's surrender, together with remnants of Czechoslovak troops, he evacuated to Great Britain where he was trained as a paratrooper. He became a rotmistr in rank. The Free Czechoslovaks, as he and other self-exiled Czechoslovaks were called, were stationed at Cholmondeley Castle near Malpas in Cheshire.

Assassination of Reinhard Heydrich

Jozef Gabčík and Jan Kubiš were airlifted along with seven soldiers from Czechoslovak army-in-exile in the United Kingdom and two other groups named Silver A and Silver B by a Royal Air Force Halifax of No. 138 Squadron into Czechoslovakia at 10 pm on 28 December 1941. In Prague, they contacted several families and anti-Nazi organisations who helped them during the preparations for the assassination.
On 27 May 1942, at 10:30 am, Heydrich proceeded on his daily commute from his home in Panenské Břežany to Prague Castle. Gabčík and Kubiš waited at the tram stop on the curve near Bulovka Hospital in Prague 8-Libeň. As Heydrich's open-topped Mercedes-Benz neared the pair, Gabčík, who concealed his Sten gun under a raincoat, dropped the raincoat and raised the gun, and, at point black range, tried to shoot Heydrich, but the gun jammed. Heydrich ordered his driver, SS-Oberscharführer Klein, to stop the car. As the car braked in front of him, Kubiš threw a modified anti-tank grenade at the vehicle; he misjudged his throw. Instead of landing inside the Mercedes, it landed against the rear wheel. Nonetheless, the bomb severely wounded Heydrich when it detonated, its fragments ripping through the right rear fender and embedding shrapnel from the upholstery of the car into Heydrich, causing serious injuries to his left side, with major damage to his diaphragm, spleen and lung, as well as a fractured rib. Kubiš received a minor wound to his face from the shrapnel. Heydrich and Klein leapt out of the shattered limousine with drawn pistols; Klein ran towards Kubiš, who had staggered against the railings, while Heydrich went to Gabčík who stood paralyzed, holding the sten. Kubiš recovered and, jumped on his bicycle and pedaled away, scattering passengers spilling from the tram, by firing in the air with his Colt M1903 pistol. Klein tried to fire at him but dazed by the explosion, pressed the magazine release catch and the gun jammed. A staggering Heydrich came towards Gabčík, who dropped his sten and tried to reach his bicycle. He was forced to abandon this attempt, however and took cover behind a telegraph pole, firing at Heydrich with his pistol. Heydrich returned fire and ducked behind the stalled tram. Suddenly, Heydrich doubled over and staggered to the side of the road in pain. He then collapsed against the railings, holding himself up with one hand. As Gabčík took the opportunity to run, Klein returned from his fruitless chase of Kubiš to help his wounded superior. Heydrich, his face pale and contorted in pain, pointed out the fleeing Czech, saying "Get that bastard!". As Klein gave pursuit, Heydrich stumbled along the pavement before collapsing against the bonnet of his wrecked car. Gabčík fled into a butcher shop, where the owner, a man named Brauer, who was a Nazi sympathiser and had a brother who worked for the Gestapo, ignored Gabčík's request for help, and ran out into the roadway, attracting Klein's attention by shouting and pointing. Klein, whose gun was still jammed and useless, rushed into the shop and collided with Gabčík in the doorway. In the confusion, Gabčík shot him twice, severely wounding him in the leg. Gabčík then escaped in a tram, reaching a local safe house. The assassins were initially convinced that the attack had failed. Heydrich was rushed to Bulovka Hospital, where it was discovered that he was suffering from blood poisoning. There Heydrich went into shock, dying on the morning of 4 June 1942.

Death

A rigorous investigation of the assassination determined that it was planned and executed by the Czech Resistance with assistance of the British. The oppression and persecution of the defiant Czechs reached its peak following the failure of Nazi soldiers to capture the assassins alive. More than 13,000 people were ultimately arrested and tortured, including the girlfriend of Jan Kubiš, Anna Malinová, who died at Mauthausen-Gusen concentration camp. First Lieutenant Adolf Opálka's aunt, Marie Opálková, was executed in Mauthausen on 24 October 1942. His father, Viktor Jarolím, was also killed. Among the unfortunate was the native of Kostelec nad Vltavou, JUDr. Jan Fleischmann. It was known locally that Jozef visited Jan Fleischmann who was a friend in Kostelec nad Vltavou before the assassination of Heydrich. After the assassination, the visit was found out as Karel Čurda had informed Gestapo and the Nazis arrested Jan Fleischmann and took him to Pankrác where he was tortured and finally executed.
The Nazi officials in the Protectorate carried out an extensive search for the two men. Eventually, the Germans found them, along with other paratroopers, hiding in Cyril and Methodius Cathedral in Prague. After a six-hour gun battle, in which the Germans lost 14 and sustained wounds to 21 others, Gabčík and the others, with the exception of Kubiš, who was seriously wounded by a grenade, committed suicide before the Nazis could take them alive in the church catacombs. Kubiš was wounded in the gun battle and died shortly after arrival at the hospital.

Posthumous recognition

The town of Gabčíkovo in southern Slovakia is named after Gabčík, and one of the biggest dams on the Danube next to the village is named after the town. Jozef Gabčík's name was also given to the 5. pluk špeciálneho určenia part of the Armed Forces of the Slovak Republic, based in Žilina.
With the aim of commemorating the heroes of the Czech and Slovak Resistance, the Slovak National Museum in May 2007 opened an exhibition presenting one of the most important resistance actions in the whole Nazi-occupied Europe.
Coinciding with the release of the 2016 film Anthropoid, campaigners called for Gabčík's and Kubiš's bodies to be exhumed from the mass-grave at the cemetery in Ďáblice, northern Prague, and to be given a dignified burial fitting "the heroes of anti-Nazi resistance".

Gabčík in film and fiction

Gabčík is portrayed in four films which describe the assassination of Heydrich: