Out Distance was 7th a

Czech resistance Resistance to the German occupation of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia during World War II began after the occupation of the rest of Czechoslovakia and the formation of the protectorate on 15 March 1939. German policy deterred acts of ...

group during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

sent by Special Group D of the MoD of

Czechoslovak government in exile The Czechoslovak government-in-exile, sometimes styled officially as the Provisional Government of Czechoslovakia ( cz, Prozatímní vláda Československa, sk, Dočasná vláda Československa), was an informal title conferred upon the Czechos ...

in London, operating in the

Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia The Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia; cs, Protektorát Čechy a Morava; its territory was called by the Nazis ("the rest of Czechia"). was a partially annexed territory of Nazi Germany established on 16 March 1939 following the German oc ...

(part of occupied

Czechoslovakia , rue, Чеськословеньско, , yi, טשעכאסלאוואקיי, , common_name = Czechoslovakia , life_span = 1918–19391945–1992 , p1 = Austria-Hungary , image_p1 ...

File:Operace Anthropoid - Adolf Opálka.jpg,

Adolf Opálka First Lieutenant Adolf Opálka (4 January 1915 – 18 June 1942) was a Czechoslovak soldier, member of the Czech sabotage group Out Distance, a World War II anti-Nazi resistance group, and a participant in Operation Anthropoid, the successful ...

File:Operace Anthropoid - Karel Čurda.jpg,

Karel Čurda Karel Čurda (10 October 1911 in Stará Hlína, today part of Třeboň – 29 April 1947 in Prague) was a Czech Nazi collaborator during World War II. Wartime activities A soldier of the Czechoslovak army in exile, Čurda was parachuted into th ...

, became a Nazi collaborator File:Ivan Kolařík, Czechoslovak resistance fighter.jpg, Ivan Kolařík

Operations

At 2AM on 28 March 1942, the group parachuted from a British Halifax plane that also carried the failed group Zink. Their plan had involved the sabotage of gasworks in

Prague Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 million people. The city has a temperate ...

, providing radio-sets to other resistance fighters, and navigating bombers to the

Škoda Works The Škoda Works ( cs, Škodovy závody, ) was one of the largest European industrial conglomerates of the 20th century, founded by Czech engineer Emil Škoda in 1859 in Plzeň, then in the Kingdom of Bohemia, Austrian Empire. It is the predece ...

in Pilsen. Due to a navigation error, the parachutists did not land where they had planned (they landed instead at Ořechov), and having lost a significant amount of material and being chased by

Gestapo The (), abbreviated Gestapo (; ), was the official secret police of Nazi Germany and in German-occupied Europe. The force was created by Hermann Göring in 1933 by combining the various political police agencies of Prussia into one organi ...

, the group members decided to split and operate on their own. One member of the group, Ivan Kolařík, after he lost fis fake ID committed suicide on 1 April 1942 in a futile effort to protect members of his family against reprisals after his cover was blown. First Lieutenant

, and

went to Prague and joined

Operation Anthropoid On 27 May 1942 in Prague, Reinhard Heydrichthe commander of the Reich Security Main Office (RSHA), acting governor of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, and a principal architect of the Holocaustwas attacked and wounded in an assassinatio ...

, a group preparing to assassinate

Reinhard Heydrich Reinhard Tristan Eugen Heydrich ( ; ; 7 March 1904 – 4 June 1942) was a high-ranking German SS and police official during the Nazi era and a principal architect of the Holocaust. He was chief of the Reich Security Main Office (inclu ...

. Opálka was ordered to take overall command over the parachute groups after he joined with the groups Silver A. The assassination was successful, but Čurda who was went to his mother in Nová Hlína to hide and after the mass executions started during the second martial law he did not withstand the psychical pressure and wanted to save his family so when it was announced that those who knew anything about the atackers will be spared he decided to betray his military oath and reveal to Gestapo information that led to the finding of the hiding place of the assassins (Prague's

Ss. Cyril and Methodius Cathedral The Saints Cyril and Methodius Cathedral in Nové Město, Prague, the Czech Republic, is the principal Czech and Slovak Orthodox Church. History Early history According to oral tradition, the site where Saints Cyril and Methodius Cathedral sta ...

) by the

. Following a fierce battle around the church, Opálka and others were killed in combat or committed suicide rather than be caught. Čurda helped identify the corpses of other members of parachute groups. For this he received part of 10 000 000 K reward promissed by occupiers. After the war, Čurda was captured and tried by extraordinary peoples court that senteced him to be

hanged Hanging is the suspension of a person by a noose or ligature around the neck.Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed. Hanging as method of execution is unknown, as method of suicide from 1325. The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' states that hanging in ...

for

treason Treason is the crime of attacking a state authority to which one owes allegiance. This typically includes acts such as participating in a war against one's native country, attempting to overthrow its government, spying on its military, its diplo ...

Pankrác Prison Pankrác Prison, officially Prague Pankrác Remand Prison (''Vazební věznice Praha Pankrác'' in Czech language, Czech), is a prison in Prague, Czech Republic. A part of the Czech Prison Service, it is located southeast of Prague city centre in ...

on 29 April 1947.

References

External links

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Out Distance parachute memorial
*
Who was who in Czechoslovak history
{{Authority control Czech resistance groups People killed by Nazi Germany Czechoslovak soldiers Operation Anthropoid