Deryk Barker:

>It is well-established that Reinhard Heinrich, Hitler's deputy in revenge
>for whose assassination (in 1941 IIRC) the town of Lidice in Yugoslavia
>was obliterated, was an accomplished violinist who could be moved to
>tears by great music.

Any qualms I may have about correcting Deryk are tempered by the knowledge
that one day he will repay the favour!

Reinhard Heydrich was Hitler's "Protector of Bohemia and Moravia".  Czech
partisans living in England parachuted in and assassinated him when he was
driving to work in May 1942.  This was the subject of an English television
documentary made on location.  The revenge: "Lidice - Czech mining village
(population near 700).  In reprisal for the assassination of Reinhard
Heydrich, the Nazis "liquidated" the village in 1942.  They shot the men,
deported the women and children to concentration camps, razed the village
to the ground, and struck its name from the maps.  After the second World
War, a new village was built near the site of the old Lidice, which is now
a national park and memorial." (from the IB Holocaust Project's web site).

By then, Martinu was living in the US and was devastated by this news.
His short orchestral work, Memorial to Lidice, was his response.  Its
final bars mockingly quote the opening of Beethoven's 5th.  As a musical
representation of sheer anguish, it's one of the most powerful I know.

Richard Pennycuick
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