Two young soldiers stood at a tram stop in Prague, each carrying a hidden weapon. One held a Sten gun under his coat, the other clutched a modified anti-tank grenade in a briefcase. Their names were Jozef Gabčík and Jan Kubiš, and they had been sent to kill the most dangerous man in occupied Europe: Reinhard Heydrich, the Nazi leader known as the Butcher of Prague. To understand what happened after that moment, you need to know why they were there and how two men from a defeated nation reached that tram stop.
Six months earlier, on March 15, 1939, German troops had marched into Prague, and independent Czechoslovakia ceased to exist. The country was split, and the Czech lands became the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. Under Nazi rule, the people faced brutal oppression, and by 1941, Reinhard Heydrich was appointed to govern the region. He was already one of the most feared men in the Third Reich, and his rule brought waves of terror.
The Czech resistance was crushed, thousands were executed, and Heydrich seemed untouchable. But to the Czechoslovak government-in-exile in London and to British intelligence, he was the perfect target. Killing him would strike a blow at the heart of the Nazi regime and restore hope to the occupied nation. The operation was given the code name Anthropoid, from the Greek word meaning having human form, a term used in zoology.
It was a fitting name for a mission that would hurl humanity into the heart of the beast. Gabčík and Kubiš were young soldiers who had escaped occupied Czechoslovakia and joined the resistance abroad. Along with others, they were selected for the most dangerous mission of the war. They were trained in Britain and in Scotland’s remote highlands at Aris and other secret schools, where they learned demolition, silent killing, and clandestine operations.
They became the most capable candidates for the task. On December 28, 1941, the two men were dropped by parachute into occupied Czechoslovakia aboard a British plane. With them were seven other soldiers from Operation Anthropoid and two related missions, Silver A and Silver B. The plan was to land near Pilsen, but instead, the Anthropoid pair landed in the countryside near Nehvizdy, east of Prague.
They were isolated, deep behind enemy lines, with no way home and a mission that seemed impossible. For months, they waited and planned, moving between safe houses and avoiding Gestapo patrols. They knew that any attempt against Heydrich’s life would bring ferocious reprisals. They were warned that the consequences for their people would be immeasurable.
Yet they were determined to complete their mission, no matter the cost. The day came on May 27, 1942. Heydrich was traveling in an open car from his home in Panenské Břežany to his office in Prague. His driver took a sharp turn near the Libeň district, and as the car slowed, Gabčík stepped out with his Sten gun.
He aimed and pulled the trigger, but the weapon jammed. Instead of speeding away, Heydrich ordered his driver to stop and drew his pistol. He made a fatal error. Kubiš seized the moment.
He threw the modified anti-tank grenade at the car. It exploded near the rear wheel, sending shrapnel through the vehicle and wounding Heydrich. Despite his injuries, Heydrich stumbled from the car and fired at Gabčík, who fled into a nearby butcher shop. Weakened and bleeding, Heydrich collapsed, but he was still alive.
The grenade had torn into his body, and some historians have speculated that it may have been coated with botulinum toxin, though this has never been proven. Heydrich was rushed to hospital, where doctors fought to save him. But infection spread, and on June 4, 1942, the Butcher of Prague died. The assassination had succeeded.
The Nazis responded with terrifying fury. Instead of destroying entire cities, the reprisals were focused but no less savage. On the night of June 9, German police surrounded the village of Lidice, just a few miles from Prague. All 173 men in the village were shot.
The women were sent to concentration camps, and the children were deported. Only a few survived; most were murdered or sent to be Germanized. The village itself was razed to the ground, its name erased from maps. A similar fate struck the village of Ležáky a few days later.
Meanwhile, the hunt for the assassins intensified. The Gestapo offered a reward and demanded information. One man, Karel Čurda, a former soldier who had been part of the resistance network, betrayed his comrades. On June 16, 1942, he walked into Gestapo headquarters in Prague and offered to tell everything he knew.
He named his contacts, and soon the Gestapo knew where the paratroopers were hiding. Gabčík and Kubiš had taken refuge in the crypt of the Church of Saints Cyril and Methodius in Prague. With them were five other resistance fighters. When the Gestapo surrounded the church, they refused to surrender.
Inside the crypt, Marie Moravcová, a resistance helper, was allowed to go to the toilet, where she bit into a cyanide capsule and died instantly. The others fought to the last. The Germans tried to flood the crypt, but the men held out until their ammunition ran out. When the final assault came, not one of them surrendered.
They chose death on their own terms rather than betrayal under torture. With bullets spent, they turned their weapons on themselves. Kubiš died from his wounds, Gabčík and others took their own lives. Their bodies were not given proper burial, but their memory did not die.
In response to the assassination, the Nazis enacted even more brutal measures. In Berlin, Hitler ordered the first death camps designed exclusively for mass murder, with no pretense of work or resettlement. These were built at Treblinka, Sobibór, and Bełżec in the months after Heydrich’s death. The project was named Operation Reinhard in his memory.
The assassination had unintended consequences, but the story of courage still stands. The traitor Karel Čurda did not long outlive his victims. After Germany’s surrender in May 1945, he went into hiding knowing the restored Czechoslovak state would hunt him down. He was captured, tried, and executed in 1947.
In a grim irony, he was buried in the same cemetery where some of his victims were later honored. Winston Churchill, furious at the scale of German reprisals, suggested destroying three German villages for every Czech village the Nazis annihilated. Communities around the world adopted the name Lidice for their own towns and neighborhoods, determined that the village would not be forgotten. The United States even named a city Lidice, and Mexico and France followed suit.
Today, the legacy of Operation Anthropoid lives on. Visitors can stand in the crypt where the paratroopers died, see the bullet holes still visible in the walls, and examine the ventilation window through which the Germans threw grenades and pumped water. It is one of the most moving historical sites in Prague. In a park near the site, a memorial stands in their honor.
The figure’s outstretched arms reference Leonardo da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man, an allusion to the operation’s code name, anthropoid, meaning humanlike. The rusted steel symbolizes the vulnerability of the Czech state, and the triangular shape echoes the design of the Czech flag. Unveiled in 1968 by Czechoslovak veterans, it bears their names: Gabčík and Kubiš. The assassination has inspired numerous films, documentaries, and books, each reflecting its era’s understanding of heroism and sacrifice.
The 1943 Hollywood film Hangmen Also Die, directed by Fritz Lang with a story co-written by Bertolt Brecht, took considerable liberties with the facts. The 1975 British-Czech production Operation Daybreak offered a more historically grounded account but still contained inaccuracies. Most recently, the 2016 film Anthropoid, starring Cillian Murphy as Gabčík and Jamie Dornan as Kubiš, was praised for its attention to historical detail, its use of authentic Prague locations, and its unflinching depiction of the raid and its aftermath. In the Czech Republic, Gabčík and Kubiš hold the status of national heroes.
One was Slovak, one Czech, and together they represent the unity of the Czechoslovak nation during its darkest hour. Streets in Prague and other Czech cities bear their names, and monuments stand in their memory. Their bone fragments rest unidentified in a mass grave at Ďáblice, but their spirit is everywhere. Their story continues in the debates about the morality of their mission, in the films and books that retell it for each new generation.
It continues in the bullet holes still visible on the walls of the church crypt, in the mass grave at Ďáblice, and in the names carved on memorials from Prague to Leamington Spa. Eighty years later, their courage still resonates, their sacrifice still inspires. Theirs remains one of the most remarkable acts of resistance in the history of the Second World War. They did not choose their mission lightly.
They knew the odds, and they accepted the cost. When the final assault came, they did not surrender. They chose death on their own terms rather than betrayal under torture. And when one of them finally spoke, it was only after horrors that would shatter anyone.
But they spoke of courage, not of surrender. The story of Operation Anthropoid is about what people will do for freedom and what freedom costs. It is about human courage and human choice.
It is a story that must never be forgotten.
