On 25 June 2024, the Commission for solving the issues of mass graves at Ďáblický Cemetery presented its first results.
After more than a year, on Tuesday 25 June 2024, the members of the Commission for solving the issues of mass graves at Ďáblický Cemetery presented the first results of their work at the Liechtenstein Palace. The Museum of Memory of the XXth Century, the Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes, the Military History Institute and the Association of Former Political Prisoners participated in the preparation of the seminar.
The Commission was headed by Jana Kotalíková on behalf of Prime Minister Petr Fiala. A number of new or hitherto neglected archival documents were studied, which yielded a number of significant findings, especially for the period of the communist regime. It was possible to identify the exact location of the remains of 20 former political prisoners who were either executed or died in prison after February 1948. Historians have also determined in which shaft graves the remains of 87 other former political prisoners were probably interred during this period.
The honorary burial place of executed and martyred political prisoners and members of the Second and Third Resistance is located at the northern wall of Ďáblický Cemetery in Prague. Already during the Second World War, burials were made in mass graves, then known as shaft graves. When studying the files, it was found that remains were deposited in the same way at Ďáblický Cemetery also at another place. The beginnings of this method of burial can be dated back to August 1943. During the research, a recently found original index book was studied, which lists the names of persons whose remains are or were deposited in shafts number I-XIX, i.e. in the period up to the beginning of 1951. The exact locations of the coffins are also listed.
The thesis that Czechoslovak soldiers and members of the anti-Nazi resistance who died as a result of the repression following the assassination of the acting Reich Protector Reinhard Heydrich have not yet been confirmed. On the other hand, research has revealed clues suggesting that the final resting place of some anti-Nazi resistance fighters may be in another part of the Ďáblice cemetery or in other Prague burial grounds.
So far, it has also been possible to determine with high probability the numbers of specific shaft graves in the case of 87 other former political prisoners from the communist regime. Historians Petr Blažek and Alena Šimánková, who worked on this research with other colleagues, consider the new research results to be quite groundbreaking: "After many decades, it has finally been possible to determine the specific location of the remains of members of the anti-communist resistance. Some of them also fought in the domestic or foreign resistance against the German occupation. These are heroes who deserve our respect and a dignified burial," they both said.
📷Marta Myšková
🎥Tomáš Karabela