Who exactly was Heydrich, the architect of the Holocaust?
Reinhard Heydrich, one of the darkest names in Czech modern history, was a man full of paradoxes. On one hand, he was a brilliant musician and a talented fencer; on the other, he was the ruthless architect of the Holocaust and the acting Reich Protector, whose presence in Bohemia and Moravia left indelible marks. How did a promising musical virtuoso become a man feared even by his own SS colleagues? Let’s explore this today.
Btw, Perhaps you have seen Anthropoid with Jamie Dornan and Cillian Murphy, which deals with the assassination. Historically quite inaccurate, but sufficient to give an idea:
According to all available sources, Heydrich was part of a generation of educated young men from “good” German families who, in Germany shaped by the defeat in World War I, hyperinflation, and economic crisis, believed that a better world had to be built at any cost, even if it meant disregarding all moral norms.
Music, Military Discipline, and a Naval Career
Reinhard Tristan Eugen Heydrich was born on March 7, 1904, in Halle an der Saale into a musically inclined family. His father, Bruno Heydrich, was a composer and founder of a conservatory, and his mother, Elisabeth, came from a notable family of opera singers.
The names Reinhard and Tristan were given in honor of the heroes of the operas Amon (by Richard Heydrich) and Tristan und Isolde (by Richard Wagner). The name Eugen was after his maternal grandfather—her father, Eugen Krantz, held the position of director of the Dresden Royal Conservatory. Reinhard inherited musical talent, mastered several instruments, and aspired to become a professional violinist.
According to available sources, Reinhard was stubborn and defiant in his childhood years. He had no friends, and his classmates mocked him for his high-pitched, warlike voice and his nickname “Icik,” which led to suspicions about his partially Jewish ancestry.
However, Heydrich’s life path changed when he joined the Reichsmarine, the German Navy, after World War I. His career in uniform was marked by discipline and the reputation of an arrogant perfectionist.
He then met his femme fatale, the woman who changed his life. Her name was Lina Heydrich, or Lina Mathilde von Osten. On December 6, 1930, at the age of 19, she attended a rowing club ball in Kiel, where she met then naval lieutenant Reinhard Heydrich. They soon announced their engagement, which took place on December 18, 1930. However, Heydrich was subsequently accused of misconduct unbecoming an “officer.” He was alleged to have promised marriage to another woman even before meeting Lina. Based on this, Heydrich was discharged from the navy, destroying his prospects for a planned career. The young Lina, however, supported Reinhard. She warned him against self-pity, directed him to the Nazi Party, and contributed to his successful acceptance by SS Chief Heinrich Himmler.
It was in Nazi service that Heydrich soon began to fulfill his destiny.
Rise in the SS: From Patronage to Power and the Title of Prague Executioner
Heydrich’s career in the SS began thanks to the patronage of Heinrich Himmler, who entrusted him with organizing the intelligence service. Heydrich quickly proved himself an ambitious and cold-blooded strategist, leading to his promotion to head of the Sicherheitsdienst (SD). Gradually, he became one of the most powerful men in Nazi Germany, responsible for the repressive apparatus including the Gestapo and the planning of the Holocaust.
In 1941, Heydrich was appointed Acting Reich Protector of Bohemia and Moravia. He settled in a castle in Panenské Břežany near Prague, where around 150 prisoners from the Terezín ghetto and the Flossenbürg concentration camp were forcibly made to work in poor living conditions for his family’s personal needs.
Shortly after his appointment, he eliminated the entire first generation of Czech resistance fighters, including the chairman of the Protectorate government, Alois Eliáš.
Heydrich arrived with a clear objective. His task was to suppress any resistance and increase the Protectorate’s production efficiency for the Nazi war machine. Czechs were to be transformed—at least for the time being, as long as they were needed—into soulless working puppets.
He even mentioned this in a speech at the residence of the Reich Protector in Prague on October 2, 1941: “My unequivocal and resolute task in this area is to ensure that the population, if of Czech nationality, understands that one cannot avoid the reality of belonging to the Reich and obedience to the Reich.” Many soon “understood,” such as the pre-war publicist and legionary Emanuel Moravec. And he was not alone.
Heydrich considered the long-term task to be the expulsion of Czechs. According to him, they had no rightful place in this area because they were “undoubtedly German.” Czechs were to be partially germanized or expelled as soon as the situation allowed.
Heydrich’s Protectorate: Terror and Propaganda
In Bohemia and Moravia, Heydrich notoriously gained fame for his brutality and ability to combine terror with pragmatism. He introduced martial law, under which hundreds of Czech patriots were executed. On the other hand, he tried to appease the working class with minor concessions, such as better food rations and entertainment programs. According to Heydrich himself, it was necessary “to feed the Czech worker” so that he would produce weapons. Therefore, he increased the workers’ allowances of rum, cigarettes, canned fish, lard…
At the same time, Heydrich was intensely involved in Nazi propaganda aimed at the germanization of Czechs. For many, he became the embodiment of Nazi power and cruelty, which ultimately led the foreign Czechoslovak resistance to decide to eliminate him.
However, he was not only concerned with Czechs. Among other things, he chaired the Wannsee Conference, which on January 20, 1942, outlined the so-called Final Solution to the Jewish Question within just 90 minutes, thus putting the deadly machinery of the Holocaust into practice.
And Heydrich himself? In his free time, he played the violin and practiced fencing, in which he was even a multiple-time SS champion.
Not only is this discussed in the book Death in Prague: The Assassination of Reinhard Heydrich by Hellmut Haas, which states: “He preferred the sabre over swords or foil, liked hard, direct combat techniques without elegance. Just as in politics, he recognized only brute force and technical perfection, not fine elegance or reserved nobility. Heydrich reached his peak as a fencer only at the beginning of the war; it seemed that the restless atmosphere was giving him wings. When soldiers rushed to the battlefield, he wanted to perform his duty, at least in the field of fencing. It is quite clear that this was a form of compensation. Just as in politics, he could not lose; during competitions, he repeatedly protested against the judges’ statements. When he succumbed, he could angrily hurl his weapon at the ground—a childish behavior, entirely in line with his nature. Very soon, he did not want anyone to be a judge in his duels. Yet Heydrich was quite a successful fighter, meeting his high standards, according to which SS members always had to be among the best in all areas. He confused military qualities, as proclaimed by the state of warriors, with sports. He instilled in his operational groups the obligation to be tough before exterminating Jews, speaking of ‘the ungrateful task we must fulfill.’”
Assassination and Retribution
On May 27, 1942, Czechoslovak parachutists Jan Kubiš and Jozef Gabčík carried out an attack on Heydrich’s car in Prague’s Kobylisy. Heydrich was wounded by shrapnel and died a few days later from sepsis. The topic is also addressed in the film Anthropoid:
Nazi retaliation was horrific. It was followed by mass executions, the burning of Lidice and Ležáky, and other reprisals that left deep scars in Czech history. During the so-called “Heydrichie,” people were shot without trial, and the villages of Lidice and Ležáky were massacred. In total, at least 1,585 people were killed in the immediate retaliation for his death, according to the number of martial courts, though the actual number of victims is significantly higher.
Nevertheless, the assassination of Heydrich was considered the most significant act of resistance in occupied Europe and had such an impact that Britain and France withdrew their signatures from the Munich Agreement, which in 1938 deprived Czechoslovakia of more than a third of its territory. In the entire history of World War II, it was an entirely unique case where a high-ranking Nazi official was successfully assassinated by force, making it a completely unique action. The cruel Nazi reprisals intended as revenge for Heydrich’s death greatly facilitated the later recognition of the forced expulsion of the German population by the Western Allies.
And What About Heydrich’s Wife?
From a former Nazi and wife of an SS-Obergruppenführer, she became a refugee after the war. After several months, she eventually arrived with her children on her native Fehmarn in the second half of 1945. During the following decade, she had limited income and for some time even had to hide from authorities for fear of being extradited to Czechoslovakia. The local extraordinary people’s court had sentenced her to life imprisonment in 1948 in absentia. However, British authorities ultimately refused the Czechoslovak government’s request to extradite Lina Heydrich to Czechoslovakia. She repeatedly applied for a general pension, even though Heydrich, as an SS general, was not considered a “soldier” by German authorities but rather a war criminal. Eventually, she was granted a widow’s pension. She nostalgically recalled her time in Bohemia repeatedly. Even at the end of her life, she showed no remorse and refused to admit any of her husband’s guilt in Nazi crimes. She died in August 1985.
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