A commemorative mass at St. Vitus Cathedral on Saturday paid tribute to the
victims of the Heydrich Terror, the Nazi backlash following the
assassination of Reich Protector Reinhard Heydrich by Czech paratroopers in
1942.
In the aftermath of the attack, the paratroopers hid in the crypt of an
Orthodox church in Prague for three weeks until their hiding place was
betrayed. Three were killed in crossfire with the Nazis; the other four
took their own lives rather than surrender. The priest and bishop who
sheltered the soldiers were later murdered.
Some 13,000 people who were suspected of having helped the paratroopers
were imprisoned and interrogated, many of them were transported to the
Mauthausen concentration camp and subsequently executed. 300 people were
killed.
The tradition of holding a mass in memory of the victims of this heroic act
was established in 1945, broken off by the communist regime three years
later, and re-established in 2011.