Germans in Czechoslovakia (1918-1938)

From 1918 to 1938, after the breakup of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, more than 3 million ethnic Germans were living in what became the Czech lands

Czech lands

Czech lands is an auxiliary term used mainly to describe the combination of Bohemia, Moravia and Czech Silesia. Today, those three historic provinces compose the Czech Republic. The Czech lands had been settled by the Celts , then later by various Germanic tribes until the beginning of 7th...

of the newly created state of Czechoslovakia

Czechoslovakia

Czechoslovakia or Czecho-Slovakia was a sovereign state in Central Europe which existed from October 1918, when it declared its independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, until 1992...

. Ethnic Germans had lived in Bohemia

Bohemia

Bohemia is a historical region in central Europe, occupying the western two-thirds of the traditional Czech Lands. It is located in the contemporary Czech Republic with its capital in Prague...

, a part of the Holy Roman Empire

Holy Roman Empire

The Holy Roman Empire was a realm that existed from 962 to 1806 in Central Europe.It was ruled by the Holy Roman Emperor. Its character changed during the Middle Ages and the Early Modern period, when the power of the emperor gradually weakened in favour of the princes...

, since the 14th century (and in some areas from at least the 12th century), mostly in the border regions of Sudetenland

Sudetenland

Sudetenland is the German name used in English in the first half of the 20th century for the northern, southwest and western regions of Czechoslovakia inhabited mostly by ethnic Germans, specifically the border areas of Bohemia, Moravia, and those parts of Silesia being within Czechoslovakia.The...

. They were called Sudeten Germans

Sudeten Germans

- Importance of Sudeten Germans :Czechoslovakia was inhabited by over 3 million ethnic Germans, comprising about 23 percent of the population of the republic and about 29.5% of Bohemia and Moravia....

since the beginning of the 20th century; the name was derived from the Sudeten (Czech: Sudety) Mountains. Many German ethnics of Bohemian, Moravian or Silesian origin prefer the expressions German Bohemians (Deutschböhmen), German Moravians (Deutschmährer) or Silesians to avoid to be associated with German nationalistic tendencies among many Sudeten German institutions. Another German ethnic group, the Carpathian Germans

Carpathian Germans

Carpathian Germans , sometimes simply called Slovak Germans , are a group of German language speakers on the territory of present-day Slovakia...

, lived in the territory of modern Slovakia.

History

The end of World War I, in 1918, brought about the breakup of the multinational Austro-Hungarian Empire into its historical particles. One of them being Czech kingdom, forming western part of newly created Czechoslovakia. They insisted on the traditional boundaries of the Kingdom of Bohemia

Kingdom of Bohemia

The Kingdom of Bohemia was a country located in the region of Bohemia in Central Europe, most of whose territory is currently located in the modern-day Czech Republic. The King was Elector of Holy Roman Empire until its dissolution in 1806, whereupon it became part of the Austrian Empire, and...

and Moravia

Moravia

Moravia is a historical region in Central Europe in the east of the Czech Republic, and one of the former Czech lands, together with Bohemia and Silesia. It takes its name from the Morava River which rises in the northwest of the region...

, according to Uti possidetis juris
Uti Possidetis Juris
Uti possidetis juris is a principle of international law that states that newly formed sovereign states should have the same borders that their preceding dependent area had before their independence.-History:...

. This meant that the new Czech state would have defensible mountain boundaries with Germany

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

, but also that the highly industrialized settlement areas of 3 million Sudeten ethnic Germans would be separated from Austria

Austria

Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...

and put under Czech control.

After the Czechoslovak Republic (ČSR) was proclaimed on 28 October 1918, the Sudeten Germans, claiming the right to self-determination

Self-determination

Self-determination is the principle in international law that nations have the right to freely choose their sovereignty and international political status with no external compulsion or external interference...

according to the 10th of President Woodrow Wilson

Woodrow Wilson

Thomas Woodrow Wilson was the 28th President of the United States, from 1913 to 1921. A leader of the Progressive Movement, he served as President of Princeton University from 1902 to 1910, and then as the Governor of New Jersey from 1911 to 1913...

's Fourteen Points

Fourteen Points

The Fourteen Points was a speech given by United States President Woodrow Wilson to a joint session of Congress on January 8, 1918. The address was intended to assure the country that the Great War was being fought for a moral cause and for postwar peace in Europe...

, demanded that their homeland areas remain with the Austrian State, which by then had been reduced to the Republic of German Austria

German Austria

Republic of German Austria was created following World War I as the initial rump state for areas with a predominantly German-speaking population within what had been the Austro-Hungarian Empire, without the Kingdom of Hungary, which in 1918 had become the Hungarian Democratic Republic.German...

. They relied on peaceful opposition to the occupation of the Sudetenland by the Czech military, a process that started on 31 October 1918 and was completed on 28 January 1919. Fighting and bloody attacks took place only sporadically, resulting in the deaths of a few dozen Germans and Czechs.

On 4 March 1919, almost the entire Sudeten German population peacefully demonstrated for their right of self-determination. These demonstrations were accompanied by a one-day general strike on the part of the Germans. The German Social Democratic Workers Party in the Czechoslovak Republic, which was the largest party at the time, was responsible for the demonstration initiative, but it was supported by the bourgeois German parties. These mass demonstrations were put down by the Czech military, involving 54 deaths and 84 wounded.

The Treaty of St. Germain of 10 September 1919 confirmed the Sudetenland to Czechoslovakia. The new Czechoslovak state regarded ethnic Germans as a minority. Nevertheless, some 90 percent lived in territories in which they represented 90 percent or more of the population.

In 1921, the population of multi-ethnic Czechoslovakia comprised 6.6 million Czechs, 3.2 million Germans, two million Slovaks

Slovaks

The Slovaks, Slovak people, or Slovakians are a West Slavic people that primarily inhabit Slovakia and speak the Slovak language, which is closely related to the Czech language.Most Slovaks today live within the borders of the independent Slovakia...

, 0.7 million Hungarians, half a million Ruthenians

Ruthenians

The name Ruthenian |Rus']]) is a culturally loaded term and has different meanings according to the context in which it is used. Initially, it was the ethnonym used for the East Slavic peoples who lived in Rus'. Later it was used predominantly for Ukrainians...

(Rusyns), 300,000 Jews, and 100,000 Poles

Poles

thumb|right|180px|The state flag of [[Poland]] as used by Polish government and diplomatic authoritiesThe Polish people, or Poles , are a nation indigenous to Poland. They are united by the Polish language, which belongs to the historical Lechitic subgroup of West Slavic languages of Central Europe...

, as well as Gypsies, Croats

Croats

Croats are a South Slavic ethnic group mostly living in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and nearby countries. There are around 4 million Croats living inside Croatia and up to 4.5 million throughout the rest of the world. Responding to political, social and economic pressure, many Croats have...

and other ethnic groups. The Germans represented one-third of the population of the Czech lands

Czech lands

, and about 23.4 percent of the population of the republic (13.6 million).

The Sudetenland possessed huge chemical works and lignite

Lignite

Lignite, often referred to as brown coal, or Rosebud coal by Northern Pacific Railroad,is a soft brown fuel with characteristics that put it somewhere between coal and peat...

mines, as well as textile, china, and glass factories. To the west, a triangle of historic ethnic German settlement surrounding the town Cheb

Cheb

Cheb is a city in the Karlovy Vary Region of the Czech Republic, with about 33,000 inhabitants. It is situated on the river Ohře , at the foot of one of the spurs of the Smrčiny and near the border with Germany...

(Eger in German) was most active in pan-German nationalism. The Bohemian Forest

Bohemian Forest

The Bohemian Forest, also known in Czech as Šumava , is a low mountain range in Central Europe. Geographically, the mountains extend from South Bohemia in the Czech Republic to Austria and Bavaria in Germany...

extended along the Bavaria

Bavaria

Bavaria, formally the Free State of Bavaria is a state of Germany, located in the southeast of Germany. With an area of , it is the largest state by area, forming almost 20% of the total land area of Germany...

n frontier to the poor agricultural areas of southern Bohemia

Bohemia

Bohemia is a historical region in central Europe, occupying the western two-thirds of the traditional Czech Lands. It is located in the contemporary Czech Republic with its capital in Prague...

.

Moravia

Moravia

contained patches of ethnic German settlement to the north and south. More characteristic were the German "language islands", towns inhabited by ethnic German minorities and surrounded by Czechs. Extreme German nationalism was never typical of this area. The ethnic German nationalism of the coal-mining region of southern Silesia

Silesia

Silesia is a historical region of Central Europe located mostly in Poland, with smaller parts also in the Czech Republic, and Germany.Silesia is rich in mineral and natural resources, and includes several important industrial areas. Silesia's largest city and historical capital is Wrocław...

, 40.5 percent German, was restrained by fear of competition from industry in Germany

Germany

.

Not all ethnic Germans lived in isolated and well-defined areas; because of historical development, Czechs and Germans were mixed in many places, and many of each group had at least partial knowledge of second languages. Since the second half of the 19th century, Czechs and Germans had created separate cultural, educational, political and economic institutions which were kept (by both sides) isolated from each other. This separation continued until the end of WWII.

Politics

Sudeten German nationalist sentiment ran high during the early years of the republic (their representatives wished and tried to join Austria, Germany or at least obtain as much autonomy rights as possible). The constitution of 1920 was drafted without Sudeten German representation, and the group declined to participate in the election of the president. Sudeten German political parties pursued an "obstructionist" (or negativist) policy in the Czechoslovak parliament. In 1926, however, Chancellor Gustav Stresemann

Gustav Stresemann

was a German politician and statesman who served as Chancellor and Foreign Minister during the Weimar Republic. He was co-laureate of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1926.Stresemann's politics defy easy categorization...

of Germany, adopting a policy of rapprochement with the West, advised the Sudeten Germans to cooperate actively with the Czechoslovak government. In consequence, most Sudeten German parties (including the German Agrarian Party, the German Social Democratic Party, and the German Christian Socialist People's Party) changed their policy from negativism to activism, and several German politicians accepted cabinet posts.

At a party conference in Teplitz/Teplice in 1919, the provincial social democratic parties of Bohemia, Moravia and Sudeten-Silesia united to form the Deutsche Sozialdemokratische Arbeiterpartei (DSAP). They elected Josef Seliger as chairman. After Seliger's untimely death in 1920, Ludwig Czech

Ludwig Czech

Ludwig Czech was a Sudeten German politician of the Jewish background member of Deutsche sozialdemokratische Arbeitspartei who actively participated in the Czechoslovak politics of the so-called First Republic. He was a Minister of Social Care...

became party chairman, who was succeeded in 1938 by Wenzel Jaksch

Wenzel Jaksch

Wenzel Jaksch was a Sudeten German Socialdemocrat politician and the President of the Federation of Expellees in 1964-66.-Biography:...

.

Already in 1936 Jaksch, together with Hans Schütz of the German Christian Social People's Party

German Christian Social People's Party

German Christian Social People's Party was an ethnic German political party in Czechoslovakia, formed as a continuation from the Austrian Christian Social Party. It was founded in November 1919 in Prague. The party had good relations with its Czechoslovak brother party.In the summer of 1919, a...

(Deutsche Christlich-Soziale Volkspartei) and Gustav Hacker of the Bund der Landwirte (Farmer's Federation), formed the movement of the Jungaktivisten (Young Activists). They sought agreement with the Czechoslovak government on a policy that could withstand the Nazi onslaught from within and from outside Czechoslovakia. At simultaneous mass rallies in Tetschen-Bodenbach/Děčín

Decín

Děčín is a town in the Ústí nad Labem Region in the north of the Czech Republic. It is the largest town and administrative seat of the Děčín District.-Geography:...

, Saaz/Žatec

Žatec

Žatec is an old town in the Czech Republic, in Louny District, Ústí nad Labem Region. It has a population of 19,813 .The earliest historical reference to Sacz is in the Latin chronicle of Thietmar of Merseburg of 1004. During the 11th century it belonged to the Vršovci - a powerful Czech...

and Olešnice v Orlických horách/Gießhübl im Adlergebirge

Olešnice v Orlických horách

Olešnice v Orlických horách is a village and municipality in Rychnov nad Kněžnou District in the Hradec Králové Region of the Czech Republic. -References:...

on April 26, 1936, they demanded equal opportunities in civil service for Germans, financial assistance for German businesses, official acceptance of the German language for public servants in the Sudetenland, and measures to reduce unemployment in the "Sudetenland". (At the time, one in three was unemployed in the "Sudetenland" compared to one in five in the rest of the country.) Improving the quality of life of the Sudeten Germans was not the only motivation of the Jungaktivists. For Jaksch and his social democratic compatriots, it was a question of survival after a possible Nazi takeover. Of some 80,000 social democrats in Czechoslovakia, only about 5,000 managed to flee the Nazis. The rest were incarcerated and many of them executed. Many of those who survived Nazi persecution were later expelled together with other ethnic Germans on the basis of the so-called Beneš decrees

Beneš decrees

Decrees of the President of the Republic , more commonly known as the Beneš decrees, were a series of laws that were drafted by the Czechoslovak Government-in-Exile in the absence of the Czechoslovak parliament during the German occupation of Czechoslovakia in World War II and issued by President...

.

By 1929 only a small number of Sudeten German deputies, most of them members of the German National Party (propertied classes) and the German National Socialist Workers' Party

German National Socialist Workers' Party (Czechoslovakia)

The German National Socialist Workers' Party was a protofascist party of Germans in Czechoslovakia, successor of the German Workers' Party from Austria-Hungary. It was founded in November 1919 in Duchcov. Most important party activists were Hans Knirsch, Hans Krebs, Adam Fahrner, Rudolf Jung and...

(Deutsche Nationalsozialistische Arbeiterpartei), remained in opposition to the Czechoslovak government. Nationalist sentiment flourished, however, among Sudeten German youths, who were organized in a variety of organizations, such as the older Deutsche Turnverband and Schutzvereine, the Kameradschaftsbund
Kameradschaftsbund (Czechoslovakia)
The Kameradschaftsbund was a Völkisch organization, founded in 1920s Czechoslovakia. It was a meeting ground of Sudeten German intellectuals, preparing them for taking up leadership roles in a possible future independent Sudetenland....

, the Nazi Volkssport (1929), and the Bereitschaft.

Policies affecting Sudeten Germans

Early policies of the Czechoslovak government, intended to correct social injustice and effect a moderate redistribution of wealth, had fallen more heavily on the German population than on other citizens. In 1919 the government confiscated one-fifth of each individual's holdings in paper currency. Those Germans constituting the wealthiest element in the Czech lands were most affected. The Land Control Act brought the expropriation of vast estates, many belonging to German nobility or large estate owners. Land was allotted primarily to Czech peasants, often landless, who constituted the majority of the agricultural population. Only 4.5 percent of all land allotted by January 1937 was received by Sudeten Germans, whose protests were expressed in countless petitions.

According to the 1920 constitution

Czechoslovak Constitution of 1920

After World War I, Czechoslovakia established itself and as a republic and democracy with the establishment of the Constitution of 1920. The constitution was adopted by the National Assembly on 29 February 1920 and replaced the provisional constitution adopted on 13 November 1918.The introduction...

, German minority rights were to be protected; their educational and cultural institutions were to be preserved in proportion to the population. Local hostilities were engendered, however, by policies intended to protect the security of the Czechoslovak state: border forestland, considered the most ancient Sudeten German national territory, was expropriated for security reasons. Czech soldiers, policemen and bureaucrats were stationed in areas formerly inhabited only by Germans.

Minority laws were most often applied to create new Czech schools in German districts, sometimes only for civil servants who had relocated to the area. Government contracts in the area were frequently carried out by Czech companies. The use of the Czech language in the German-speaking regions was actively promoted, which led, among other incidents, to a "sign war" between the Czech Hikers Club (KČT) and local Germans in the Krkonoše. Sudeten Germans, owning numerous subsidized local theatres, were required to open them to the Czech minority one night a week.

Sudeten German industry, highly dependent on foreign trade and having close financial links with Germany, suffered badly during the Depression

Great Depression

The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...

, particularly when banks in Germany failed in 1931. Czechs, whose industry was concentrated on the production of essential domestic items, suffered less. By the mid-1930s, unemployment

Unemployment

Unemployment , as defined by the International Labour Organization, occurs when people are without jobs and they have actively sought work within the past four weeks...

in the Sudetenland was at about five times the level as that in the Czech lands. Tensions between the two groups resulted. Relations between Czechs and Germans suffered further when Sudeten Germans were forced to turn to the Czechoslovak government and the small loans bank (Živnostenská banka

Živnostenská banka

Živnostenská banka was a major commercial bank operating in the Czech Republic. Since 2002 it has been a member of the Italian UniCredit Group...

) for assistance. These authorities often made the hiring of Czechs in proportion to their numbers in the population a condition for aid. Czech workmen, dispatched by the government to engage in public works projects and border fortification in Sudeten German territories, were resented by local populations.

Rise of the Nazi party

The Sudeten German nationalists, particularly the Nazis, expanded their activities during the Depression years. On 30 January 1933, Hitler was appointed chancellor of Germany. The Czechoslovak government prepared to suppress the Sudeten Nazi Party. In the Autumn of 1933, the Sudeten Nazis dissolved their organization, and the German Nationals were pressured to do likewise. The government expelled German Nationals and Sudeten Nazis from local government positions. The Sudeten German population was indignant, especially in nationalist strongholds like Egerland

Egerland

The Egerland is a historical region in the far north west of Bohemia in the Czech Republic at the border with Germany. It is named after the German name Eger for the city of Cheb and the main river Ohře...

.
On 1 October 1933, Konrad Henlein

Konrad Henlein

Konrad Ernst Eduard Henlein was a leading pro-Nazi ethnic German politician in Czechoslovakia and leader of Sudeten German separatists...

with his deputy Karl Hermann Frank

Karl Hermann Frank

Karl Hermann Frank was a prominent Sudeten German Nazi official in Czechoslovakia prior to and during World War II and an SS-Obergruppenführer...

, aided by other members of the Kameradschaftsbund
Kameradschaftsbund (Czechoslovakia)
The Kameradschaftsbund was a Völkisch organization, founded in 1920s Czechoslovakia. It was a meeting ground of Sudeten German intellectuals, preparing them for taking up leadership roles in a possible future independent Sudetenland....

, a youth organization of mystical orientation, created a new political organization. The Sudeten German Home Front (Sudetendeutsche Heimatfront) professed loyalty to the Czechoslovak state but championed decentralization. It absorbed most former German Nationals and Sudeten Nazis.

Czechoslovakian Chamber of deputies 1920-1935 - German and German-Hungarian parties or lists

Party/List	seats 1920	seats 1925	seats 1929	seats 1935	votes 1935
Sudeten German Party	-	-	-	44	1.256.010
German National Party German National Party The German Nationalist Party was a First Republic political party in Czechoslovakia, representing German population of Sudetenland. Its chairman and political face was Rudolf Lodgman von Auen....	-	10	7	-	-
German National Socialist Workers Party Sudeten German National Socialist Party The Sudeten German Party was created by Konrad Henlein under the name Sudetendeutsche Heimatfront on October 1, 1933, some months after the state of Czechoslovakia had outlawed the German National Socialist Workers' Party...	15	17	8	-	-
German Social Democratic Workers Party	31	17	21	11	300.406
German Christian Social People's Party German Christian Social People's Party German Christian Social People's Party was an ethnic German political party in Czechoslovakia, formed as a continuation from the Austrian Christian Social Party. It was founded in November 1919 in Prague. The party had good relations with its Czechoslovak brother party.In the summer of 1919, a...	7	13	14	6	163.666
German Union of Farmers	11	24	-	5	142.775
Hungarian Parties and Sudeten German Electoral Bloc	9	4	9	9	292.847
United German Parties	6	-	16	-	-
Total (out of 300 seats)	79	85	75	75

Hungarian Parties and Sudeten German Electoral Bloc (1935): German Democratic Liberal Party, German Industrialist Party, Party of German Nation, Sudeten German Land Union, German Workers Party, Zips German Party, Provincial Christian Social Party, Hungarian National Party

In 1935 the Sudeten German Home Front became the Sudeten German Party (Sudetendeutsche Partei) (SdP) and embarked on an active propaganda campaign. In the May election, the SdP won more than 60% of the Sudeten German vote. The German Agrarians, Christian Socialists, and Social Democrats each lost approximately one-half of their following. The SdP became the fulcrum of German nationalist forces. The party represented itself as striving for a just settlement of Sudeten German claims within the framework of Czechoslovak democracy. Henlein, however, maintained secret contact with Nazi Germany

Nazi Germany

Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...

and received material aid from Berlin. The SdP endorsed the idea of a Führer and mimicked Nazi methods with banners, slogans, and uniformed troops. Concessions offered by the Czechoslovak government, including the installation of exclusively Sudeten German officials in Sudeten German areas and possible participation of the SdP in the cabinet, were rejected. By 1937 most SdP leaders supported Hitler's pan-German objectives.

On 13 March 1938, the Third Reich annexed Austria

Austria

, a "union" known as the Anschluss
Anschluss
The Anschluss , also known as the ', was the occupation and annexation of Austria into Nazi Germany in 1938....

. Immediately thereafter many Sudeten Germans threw their support behind Henlein. On 22 March, the German Agrarian Party, led by Gustav Hacker, fused with the SdP. German Christian Socialists in Czechoslovakia suspended their activities on 24 March; their deputies and senators entered the SdP parliamentary club. Only the Social Democrats continued to champion democratic freedom.

Final crisis in 1938

Konrad Henlein

Konrad Ernst Eduard Henlein was a leading pro-Nazi ethnic German politician in Czechoslovakia and leader of Sudeten German separatists...

met with Hitler in Berlin on 28 March 1938, and was instructed to raise demands unacceptable to the Czechoslovak government. In the Carlsbad Decrees

Carlsbad Decrees

The Carlsbad Decrees were a set of reactionary restrictions introduced in the states of the German Confederation by resolution of the Bundesversammlung on 20 September 1819 after a conference held in the spa town of Carlsbad, Bohemia...

, issued on 24 April, the SdP demanded complete autonomy for the Sudetenland and freedom to profess Nazi ideology. If Henlein's demands had been granted, the Sudetenland would have been in a position to align itself with Nazi Germany.

As the political situation worsened, the security in Sudetenland deteriorated. The region became the site of small-scale clashes between young SdP followers (equipped with arms smuggled from Germany) and police and border forces. In some places the regular army was called in to pacify the situation. Nazi German Propaganda accused the Czech government and Czechs of atrocities on innocent Germans.

On 20 May, Czechoslovakia initiated a so-called "partial mobilization" (literally "special military precaution") in response to rumours of German troop movements. The army had moved into positions on the border. The Western powers tried to pacify the situation and forced the government of Czechoslovakia to comply with most of the Carlsbad Decrees. The SdP, instructed to push towards war, however, escalated the situation with more protests and violence. With the help of special Nazi forces, the Sudetendeutsche Freikorps (paramilitary groups trained in Germany by SS

Schutzstaffel

The Schutzstaffel |Sig runes]]) was a major paramilitary organization under Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party. Built upon the Nazi ideology, the SS under Heinrich Himmler's command was responsible for many of the crimes against humanity during World War II...

-instructors) took over some border areas and committed many crimes: they killed more than 110 Czechs (mostly soldiers and policemen) and kidnapped over 2,020 Czechoslovak citizens (including German anti-fascists), taking them to Nazi Germany

Nazi Germany

.

In August, UK Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain

Neville Chamberlain

Arthur Neville Chamberlain FRS was a British Conservative politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from May 1937 to May 1940. Chamberlain is best known for his appeasement foreign policy, and in particular for his signing of the Munich Agreement in 1938, conceding the...

, sent Lord Runciman

Walter Runciman, 1st Viscount Runciman of Doxford

Walter Runciman, 1st Viscount Runciman of Doxford PC was a prominent Liberal, later National Liberal politician in the United Kingdom from the 1900s until the 1930s.-Background:...

, a faithful appeaser

Appeasement

The term appeasement is commonly understood to refer to a diplomatic policy aimed at avoiding war by making concessions to another power. Historian Paul Kennedy defines it as "the policy of settling international quarrels by admitting and satisfying grievances through rational negotiation and...

, to Czechoslovakia to see if he could obtain a settlement between the Czechoslovak government and the Germans in the Sudetenland. His mission failed because the Sudeten German Party refused all conciliating proposals (on Hitler's command). Runciman reported the following to the British government regarding Czech policy towards the German minority in the preceding decades.:
Britain and France then forced the Czechoslovak government to cede the Sudetenland to Germany (21 September). The Munich Agreement

Munich Agreement

The Munich Pact was an agreement permitting the Nazi German annexation of Czechoslovakia's Sudetenland. The Sudetenland were areas along Czech borders, mainly inhabited by ethnic Germans. The agreement was negotiated at a conference held in Munich, Germany, among the major powers of Europe without...

(signed on 29 September) only confirmed the decision and the negotiated details.

Under Nazi rule

As a result, Bohemia and Moravia lost about 38% of their combined area, as well as about 3.25 million Germans and approximately 250,000 Czechs to Germany. Some 250,000 Germans remained on the Czech side of the border, which later became part of the Reich by the establishment of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia

Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia

The Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia was the majority ethnic-Czech protectorate which Nazi Germany established in the central parts of Bohemia, Moravia and Czech Silesia in what is today the Czech Republic...

under German governors and the German Army. Almost all the Germans in these Czech territories were subsequently granted German citizenship, while most of the Germans in Slovakia obtained citizenship of the Slovak state.

With the establishment of German rule, hundreds of thousands of Czechs who (under the policy of ‘Czechification’) had moved into the Sudetenland after 1919 left the area – more or less willingly. They were, however, permitted to take away their possessions and to legally sell their houses and land. Some Czechs, however, remained.

In elections held on 4 December 1938, 97.32% of the adult population in Sudetenland voted for the NSDAP (the rest were almost only the Czechs who were allowed to vote as well). About half a million Sudeten Germans joined the Nazi Party - 17.34% of the German population in the Sudetenland (the average in Nazi Germany

Nazi Germany

was 7.85%). Because of their knowledge of the Czech language

Czech language

Czech is a West Slavic language with about 12 million native speakers; it is the majority language in the Czech Republic and spoken by Czechs worldwide. The language was known as Bohemian in English until the late 19th century...

, many Sudeten Germans were employed in the administration of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia

Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia

as well as in the Nazi oppressive machinery (Gestapo etc.). The most notable was Karl Hermann Frank

Karl Hermann Frank

Karl Hermann Frank was a prominent Sudeten German Nazi official in Czechoslovakia prior to and during World War II and an SS-Obergruppenführer...

: the SS and Police general and Secretary of State in the Protectorate.

During the war

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

, German men in Slovakia usually served in the Slovak army, however, more than 7,000 were members of paramilitary squads (Freiwillige Schutzstaffeln) and almost 2,000 volunteers joined the Waffen-SS
Waffen-SS
The Waffen-SS was a multi-ethnic and multi-national military force of the Third Reich. It constituted the armed wing of the Schutzstaffel or SS, an organ of the Nazi Party. The Waffen-SS saw action throughout World War II and grew from three regiments to over 38 divisions, and served alongside...

. After the beginning of the Slovak National Uprising

Slovak National Uprising

The Slovak National Uprising or 1944 Uprising was an armed insurrection organized by the Slovak resistance movement during World War II. It was launched on August 29 1944 from Banská Bystrica in an attempt to overthrow the collaborationist Slovak State of Jozef Tiso...

in late 1944, most of the young Germans in Slovakia were drafted in the German army, either with the Wehrmacht or Waffen-SS. The very young and elderly were organized in Heimatschutz - an equivalent of the Volkssturm
Volkssturm
The Volkssturm was a German national militia of the last months of World War II. It was founded on Adolf Hitler's orders on October 18, 1944 and conscripted males between the ages of 16 to 60 years who were not already serving in some military unit as part of a German Home Guard.-Origins and...

in Germany. The Nazis ordered some of them to take action against the partisans; others participated in deportation of Slovak Jews. The Nazis evacuated about 120,000 Germans (mostly women and children) to the Sudetenland

Sudetenland

and Protectorate

Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia

Expulsion and transfer

In the aftermath of WWII, when the Czechoslovak state was restored, the government expelled the majority of ethnic Germans, in the belief that their behavior had been a major cause of the war and subsequent destruction. In the months directly following the end of the war, "wild" expulsions happened from May till August 1945. Several Czechoslovak statesmen encouraged such expulsions by polemical speeches. Generally local authorities ordered the expulsions, which armed volunteers carried out. In some cases the regular army initiated or assisted such expulsions. Several thousand Germans were murdered during the expulsion, and many more died from hunger and illness as a consequence of becoming refugees.

The regular transfer of ethnic nationals among nations, authorized according the Potsdam Conference

Potsdam Conference

The Potsdam Conference was held at Cecilienhof, the home of Crown Prince Wilhelm Hohenzollern, in Potsdam, occupied Germany, from 16 July to 2 August 1945. Participants were the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States...

, proceeded from 25 January 1946 till October 1946. An estimated 1.6 million ethnic Germans were deported from Czechoslovakia to the American zone of what would become West Germany

West Germany

West Germany is the common English, but not official, name for the Federal Republic of Germany or FRG in the period between its creation in May 1949 to German reunification on 3 October 1990....

. An estimated 800,000 were deported to the Soviet zone (in what would become East Germany). Estimates of casualties related to this expulsion range between 20,000 and 200,000 people, depending on source. Casualties included primarily violent deaths and suicides, rape, deaths in internment camps and natural causes.Z. Beneš, Rozumět dějinám. (ISBN 80-86010-60-0)

About 244,000 Germans were allowed to remain in Czechoslovakia, but many Germans who initially stayed later emigrated to West Germany

West Germany

West Germany is the common English, but not official, name for the Federal Republic of Germany or FRG in the period between its creation in May 1949 to German reunification on 3 October 1990....

. Many German refugees from Czechoslovakia are represented by the Sudetendeutsche Landsmannschaft
Sudetendeutsche Landsmannschaft
The Sudetendeutsche Landsmannschaft is an organization representing Sudeten German refugees from the Sudetenland. Most of them fled to West Germany from Czechoslovakia during the Expulsion of Germans after World War II....

. In the 2001 census, 39,106 people in the Czech Republic and 5,405 people in the Slovak Republic claimed German ethnicity.

Notable Sudeten Germans

Guido Beck
Guido Beck
Guido Beck was a physicist born in what was then the town of Reichenberg in Austria-Hungary, and is now Liberec in the Czech Republic. He studied physics in Vienna and received his doctorate in 1925, under Hans Thirring. He worked in Leipzig in 1928 as an assistant to Werner Heisenberg...
Gustl Berauer
Gustl Berauer
Gustav "Gustl" Berauer was an ethnic German Czechoslovak nordic combined skier who competed in the 1930s. He was born in Petzer, Bohemia, Austro-Hungarian Empire, which is now known as Pec pod Sněžkou, Czech Republic....
Alfred Biolek
Alfred Biolek
Alfred Biolek is a well-known German entertainer and television producer...
Ferdinand Blumentritt
Ferdinand Blumentritt
Ferdinand Blumentritt , was a teacher, secondary school principal in Litoměřice, lecturer, and author of articles and books on the Philippines and its ethnography...
Johann Böhm
Johann Böhm
Johann Böhm was a Bohemian German chemist who focused on photochemistry and radiography. The aluminum-containing mineral boehmite was named after him....
Rudolf Burkert
Rudolf Burkert
Rudolf Burkert was a Ethnic German Czechoslovak Nordic skier who competed in the 1920s and 1930's. He won a bronze medal in the ski jumping individual large hill competition at the 1928 Winter Olympics in St. Moritz...
Hanns Cibulka
Hanns Cibulka
Hanns Cibulka was a German poet and diarist.- Works :* 1954 Märzlicht. Gedichte* 1959 Zwei Silben. Gedichte* 1960 Sizilianisches Tagebuch...
Ludwig Czech
Ludwig Czech
Ludwig Czech was a Sudeten German politician of the Jewish background member of Deutsche sozialdemokratische Arbeitspartei who actively participated in the Czechoslovak politics of the so-called First Republic. He was a Minister of Social Care...
Rudolf Dellinger
Rudolf Dellinger
Rudolf Dellinger was a Bohemian German composer and Kapellmeister. He almost exclusively composed operettas and was considered to be among the most outstanding composers of his time....
Willen Dick
Willen Dick
Willen Dick was a Czechoslovakian ski jumper who competed in the 1920's. He won two ski jumping medals at the FIS Nordic World Ski Championships with a gold in 1925 and a silver in 1927....
Peter Ducke
Peter Ducke
Peter Ducke is a Sudeten German and a former East German football player. He was born in Bensen, Sudetenland, Germany during World War II. His older brother Roland was also a successful footballer....
Roland Ducke
Roland Ducke
Roland Ducke was a German football player. His younger brother Peter was also a successful footballer....
Heinz Edelmann
Heinz Edelmann
Heinz Edelmann was a German illustrator and designer. He was born in Ústí nad Labem, Czechoslovakia, into a Czech-German family of Wilhelm Edelmann and his wife Josefa née Kladivová...
Reinhold Elstner
Reinhold Elstner
Reinhold Elstner was a German Wehrmacht veteran and Diplom Chemist who poured gasoline over himself and committed suicide at about 8 pm on April 25, 1995, on the steps of Munich's historical Feldherrnhalle, in protest against what he called "the ongoing official slander and...
E. S. Engelsberg
E. S. Engelsberg
E. S. Engelsberg E. S. Engelsberg E. S. Engelsberg (23 January 1825, Engelsberg (now Andělská Hora (ve Slezsku), in the Bruntál District), Austrian Silesia - 27 May 1879, Deutsch Jaßnik (Jeseník nad Odrou) was a Bohemian (Silesia-born) Austrian composer....
Karl Ernstberger
Karl Ernstberger
Karl Ernstberger was a Czech German architect active in western Bohemia, predominantly in Karlovy Vary....
Herbert Feigl
Herbert Feigl
Herbert Feigl was an Austrian philosopher and a member of the Vienna Circle.-Biography:The son of a weaver, Feigl was born in Reichenberg , Bohemia, and matriculated at the University of Vienna in 1922...
Hanni Fink
Hanni Fink
Hanni Fink was a German luger from Czechoslovakia who competed during the 1930s. She won four medals in the women's singles event at the European luge championships with two golds under her maiden name and two bronzes under her married name .-References:*...
Karl Hermann Frank
Karl Hermann Frank
Karl Hermann Frank was a prominent Sudeten German Nazi official in Czechoslovakia prior to and during World War II and an SS-Obergruppenführer...
Anni Frind
Anni Frind
Anni Frind was one of the most highly recorded lyric sopranos in Germany during the 1920s and 30s.Anni Frind was born in Nixdorf, a small village in Bohemia...
Martin Glaessner
Martin Glaessner
Martin Fritz Glaessner AM was a geologist and palaeontologist. Born and educated in Austro-Hungarian Empire, he spent the majority of his life in working for oil companies in Russia, and studying the geology of the South Pacific in Australia...
Karl Gilg
Karl Gilg
Karl Gilg was a German chess International Master from Czechoslovakia.Gilg played for Czechoslovakia in several Chess Olympiads....
Peter Glotz
Peter Glotz
Peter Glotz was a German social democratic politician and social scientist.Glotz was born in Eger, Sudetenland , to a German father and a Czech mother. His father, an insurance-clerk and member of the Nazi party, worked for an "aryanized" Jewish factory in Prague...
Traudl Grassi
Traudl Grassi
Traudl Grassi was a German luger from Czechoslovakia who competed in the late 1930s. She won a silver medal in the women's singles event at the 1939 FIL European Luge Championships in Reichenberg, Czechoslovakia .-References:...
Waltraut Grassi
Waltraut Grassi
Waltraut Grassl was a German luger from Czechoslovakia who competed in the late 1930s. She won a silver medal in the women's singles event at the 1938 FIL European Luge Championships in Salzburg, Austria and one year later in Liberec.-References:*...
Peter Grünberg
Peter Grünberg
Peter Andreas Grünberg is a German physicist, and Nobel Prize in Physics laureate for his discovery with Albert Fert of giant magnetoresistance which brought about a breakthrough in gigabyte hard disk drives.-Biography:...

Erhard Grundmann
Erhard Grundmann
Erhard Grundmann was a German luger from Czechoslovakia. He competed between the late 1930s and the mid 1950s for Czechoslovakia and later for West Germany. He won two bronze medals in the men's doubles event at the European luge championships .-References:*...
Mizzi Günther
Mizzi Günther
Mizzi Günther was a Bohemian-Viennese operetta soprano.Günther was born in Varnsdorf, Bohemia . Her debut was in 1897 in Hermannstadt, now Sibiu, in Romania. She achieved stardom in Vienna in 1901 as O Mimosa San in The Geisha...
Sigfried Held
Erich Heller
Erich Heller
Erich Heller was a British essayist, known particularly for his critical studies in German-language philosophy and literature of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.- Biography :...
Konrad Henlein
Konrad Henlein
Konrad Ernst Eduard Henlein was a leading pro-Nazi ethnic German politician in Czechoslovakia and leader of Sudeten German separatists...
Günther Herbig
Günther Herbig
Günther Herbig is a German conductor.Born in Ústí nad Labem, Czechoslovakia, Herbig studied conducting at the Franz Liszt Academy in Weimar in 1951 with Hermann Abendroth. He later was a student of Hermann Scherchen, Arvid Jansons, and Herbert von Karajan...
Herta Huber
Herta Huber
Herta Huber is a German writer and poet. She is well known for writing in the Egerland dialect, originating from what is now part of Bohemia in the Czech Republic...
Theodor Innitzer
Rudolf Jung
Rudolf Jung
Rudolf Jung was an instrumental force and agitator of German-Czech National Socialism and, later on, became a member of the German Nazi Party....
Rudolf Kauschka
Rudolf Kauschka
Rudolf Kauschka was a German sportsman, tourist, and mountaineer from Czechoslovakia.-Biography:...
Egon Klepsch
Egon Klepsch
Egon Alfred Klepsch was a German politician .In the years 1963–1969 Dr. Klepsch was Federal leader of the Junge Union. In 1965 he worked briefly as an election campaign manager for Ludwig Erhard. In the same year he was elected to the German Bundestag, to which he belonged until 1980.Since...
Kurt Knispel
Kurt Knispel
Kurt Knispel was a Sudeten German Heer panzer loader, gunner and later commander, and was the highest scoring tank ace of World War II with a total of 168 confirmed tank kills; the actual number, although unconfirmed, may be as high as 195...
Friedrich Kraus
Friedrich Kraus
Friedrich Kraus was a Jewish Austrian internist. He is remembered for his achievements in the field of electrocardiography and his work in colloid chemistry.- Academic career :...
Albert Krauss
Albert Krauss
Albert Krauss was a luger who competed from the 1930s to the 1950s for three different countries. He won three bronze medals in the men's doubles for Czechoslovakia at the European luge championships...
Hans Krebs
Hans Krebs (National Socialist)
Hans Krebs was a Moravian Nazi Party member and SS-Brigadeführer from Czechoslovakia.-Career:Hans Krebs was born in the ancient town Jihlava in Moravia when it was part of the Habsburg Empire and was involved in the German nationalistic movements from his youth...
Gustav Karl Laube
Gustav Karl Laube
Gustav Karl Laube was a Bohemian German geologist and paleontologist.In 1871 Laube became professor mineralogy and geology of the technical university in Prague, in 1876 professor of geology and paleontology at the German Charles-Ferdinand University in Prague.He was active in geological research...
Julius Lippert
Julius Lippert (historian)
Julius Lippert was an Austrian cultural historian and politician in Bohemia.Lippert was born in Braunau and died in Prague.- Literary works :* Allgemeine Geschichte des Priestertums, 2 Vols., 1883–1884...
Karl Löbelt
Karl Löbelt
Karl Löbelt was a ethnic German luger who competed in the early 1910s. He won a gold medal in the men's doubles event at the inaugural European championships of 1914 in Reichenberg, Bohemia .-References:*...
Robert Martinek
Robert Martinek
Robert Martinek was an artillery officer in the Austro-Hungarian Army during World War I, the Austrian Bundesheer and, during World War II, in the Wehrmacht Heer, who came to be regarded as one of the most skilled artillerymen of his generation.-Military service:Martinek was born on 2 February...
Rudolf Maschke
Rudolf Maschke
Rudolf Maschke was a luger who competed for Czechoslovakia before World War II and for West Germany after World War II. He won five medals at the European luge championships with one gold , two silvers , and two bronzes .-References:*...
Robert Mayr-Harting
Robert Mayr-Harting
Robert von Mayr-Harting was an Austrian-born Sudeten German politician....
Gregor Mendel
Gregor Mendel
Gregor Johann Mendel was an Austrian scientist and Augustinian friar who gained posthumous fame as the founder of the new science of genetics. Mendel demonstrated that the inheritance of certain traits in pea plants follows particular patterns, now referred to as the laws of Mendelian inheritance...
Evelyn Opela
Evelyn Opela
Evelyn Opela is a German television actress.Since 1986 she is married with German television film producer Helmut Ringelmann...
Ehrenfried Patzel
Ehrenfried Patzel
Ehrenfried Patzel was an Ethnic German football player from Czechoslovakia.Patzel played for Teplitzer FK from 1932 to 1939, then he went to Germany to play for 1...
Josef Pfitzner
Josef Pfitzner
Josef Pfitzner was a politician of Nazi Germany and a writer.- Bio :Josef Pfitzner was born in Petrovice , Austrian Silesia. He was a German historian and politician and was Professor at the German University of Prague. Early on, he was attracted to Nazism and belonged to the branch of Austrian...
Ferdinand Porsche
Ferdinand Porsche
Ferdinand Porsche was an Austrian automotive engineer and honorary Doctor of Engineering. He is best known for creating the first hybrid vehicle , the Volkswagen Beetle, and the Mercedes-Benz SS/SSK, as well as the first of many Porsche automobiles...

Gertrude Porsche-Schinkeová
Gertrude Porsche-Schinkeová
Gertrude Porsche-Schinkeová was a Czechoslovak luger of German ethnicity who competed during the mid 1930s. She won two bronze medals in the women's singles event at the European luge championships .-References:*...
Alfred Posselt
Alfred Posselt
Alfred Posselt was a Czechoslovak luger of German ethnicity who competed from the late 1920s to the mid 1930s. He won two bronze medals at the European luge championships .-References:*...
Erwin Posselt
Erwin Posselt
Erwin Posselt was a ethnic German luger who competed in the early 1910s. He won a gold medal in the men's doubles event at the inaugural European championships of 1914 in Reichenberg, Bohemia .-References:*...
Fritz Posselt
Fritz Posselt
Fritz Posselt was a Czechoslovakian luger who competed in the late 1920s. He won a bronze medal in the men's doubles event at the 1928 European championships in Schreiberhau, Germany .-References:*...
Fritz Preissler
Fritz Preissler
Fritz Preissler was a Czechoslovak luger who competed in the 1920s and 1930s. He won four medals at European luge championships with three golds in the men's singles event and a silver in the men's doubles event .-References:*...
Otfried Preußler
Otfried Preußler
Otfried Preußler is a German children's books author. His best-known works are The Robber Hotzenplotz and The Satanic Mill ....
Kurt Raab
Kurt Raab
Kurt Raab was a West German stage and film actor, as well as a screenwriter and playwright. Raab is best remembered for his work with cult German film director, Rainer Werner Fassbinder with whom he collaborated on 31 film projects.-Biography:Raab was born in Bergreichenstein, Sudetenland, what is...
Walter Reder
Walter Reder
SS-Sturmbannführer Walter Reder was a German Waffen-SS officer who served with the 3.SS-Panzer-Division Totenkopf and the 16.SS-Panzergrenadier-Division Reichsführer-SS. He was a Knight's Cross and German Cross in Gold winner...
Emma Riedl
Emma Riedl
Emma Riedl was the editor of the Konsumgenossenschaftliches Familienblatt , a newsletter published by the German consumer cooperatives of Bohemia between 1921 and 1938....
Heinz Rutha
Heinz Rutha
Heinz Rutha was a Sudeten German architect of furniture and politician for the Sudeten German Party...
Emil Sax
Emil Sax
Emil Sax was an Austrian economist from Javorník, Austrian Silesia.He taught at the Charles University and died in Volosko, Kingdom of Yugoslavia.- Literary works :...
Johann Schicht
Johann Schicht
Johann Schicht was a German Czech entrepreneur, owner of a large soap-making plant.-Biography:...
Oskar Schindler
Oskar Schindler
Oskar Schindler was an ethnic German industrialist born in Moravia. He is credited with saving over 1,100 Jews during the Holocaust by employing them in his enamelware and ammunitions factories, which were located in what is now Poland and the Czech Republic respectively.He is the subject of the...
Augustin Schramm
Augustin Schramm
Major Augustin Schramm was a ethnic German Czechoslovak communist professional and NKVD agent. He was a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia in 1930s...
Horst Siegl
Horst Siegl
Horst Siegl is a Czech former football striker. He played for Czechoslovakia and later Czech Republic, for both he played total 23 matches and scored 7 goals...
Norbert Singer
Norbert Singer
Norbert Singer is a German automotive engineer. He has played a key role in every one of Porsche’s 16 overall race victories at the 24 Hours of Le Mans.Singer was born in Eger , part of Nazi Germany's Sudetenland in 1939....
Emanuel Wirth
Emanuel Wirth
Emanuel Wirth was a German violinist.Wirth was born in Žlutice in northwestern Bohemia. As Joseph Joachim's assistant at the Hochschule für Musik , he taught violin and viola. August Wilhelmj said he was the best violin teacher of his generation...
Fritz Wittmann
Fritz Wittmann
Dr. Fritz Wittmann is a German politician and lawyer.Wittmann was born in Plan bei Marienbad in Czechoslovakia's Egerland. He was a member of the German Parliament and president of the Federation of Expellees from 1994-1998...

External links

Facing history — The evolution of Czech-German relations in the Czech provinces, 1848–1948: historical publication sponsored by Czech government; series of PDF
Portable Document Format
Portable Document Format is an open standard for document exchange. This file format, created by Adobe Systems in 1993, is used for representing documents in a manner independent of application software, hardware, and operating systems....

files
Emotions prevail in relations between Germans, Czechs, Poles– poll, Czech Happenings, 21 December 2005

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.

History

Politics

Policies affecting Sudeten Germans

Rise of the Nazi party

Final crisis in 1938

Under Nazi rule

Expulsion and transfer

Notable Sudeten Germans

See also

Further reading

External links