50th anniversary of Leamington's Czechoslovak Memorial Fountain commemorated

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Re: In the Park

Postby dutchman » Sat Nov 05, 2016 3:29 pm

Fundraising plea for Leamington Spa's Anthropoid memorial

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Campaigners are hoping to raise £25,000 to help restore a fountain put up in memory of men who died during a World War II mission.

The fountain commemorates those who took part in Operation Anthropoid, a successful mission to assassinate Nazi police chief Reinhard Heydrich.

The Czech and Slovak soldiers who took part were based in Leamington Spa, Warwickshire, where the fountain is.

Their story was recently made into a film.

The fountain, with the names of the seven soldiers who took park carved around it, is in Leamington Spa's Jephson Gardens.

Fundraiser Carrie Saint said it had been commissioned and funded by former Czech and Slovak soldiers, but now was in urgent need of restoration.

During the war a refugee camp for Czech and Slovak solders had been set up in nearby Moreton Paddox, which is where the soldiers who took part in the mission had been based before the raid. The Free Czechoslovak Army had also been based in the town.

An exhibition telling the story of the parachutists is being held at the Leamington Pump rooms and a film, Operation Anthropoid starring Cillian Murphy and Jamie Dornan as soldiers Jozef Gabcik and Jan Kubis, was released in September.

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50th anniversary of Leamington's Czechoslovak Memorial Fountain commemorated

Postby dutchman » Tue Oct 30, 2018 7:28 pm

The 50th anniversary of the Czechoslovak Memorial Fountain in Jephson Gardens was commemorated at the weekend

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The Free Czechoslovak Army made their home in Leamington during the war following the invasion of Czechoslovakia by the Nazis.

The fountain was designed by John French and erected in 1968 in remembrance of all Czechoslovak soldiers, airmen and patriots who lost their lives in the Second World War.

More than 4,000 Free Czechoslovak Army soldiers were based in Leamington in the years after 1941. While staying in town, a small number were selected to be trained as paratroopers by the British special forces, and after rigorous training, were regularly parachuted back into Czechoslovakia to carry out sabotage missions and support resistance movements.

The fountain underwent a £25,000 restoration earlier this year thanks to funding from The Friends of the Czechoslovak Memorial Fountain, The Czech Ministry of Defence, Warwick District Council, Leamington Town Council, Czechoslovak House in London, Czech charity Reading Help, as well as a substantial donation from one of the last living veterans in the Leamington area.

It was also awarded grade II listed status by English Heritage this year, recognising it as a monument of historic importance.

A special remembrance service was held on Saturday to mark the fountain’s golden jubilee, attended by the deputy Czech ambassador Jan Brunner and the head of the consular section of the Slovak Embassy Ivan Zachar.

Together they laid red roses in remembrance of the Czechoslovak soldiers, airmen and patriots who lost their lives in the war. Red roses from Lidice, one of the Czechoslovak villages raised to the ground as a reprisal by Nazi Germany, have been planted next to the fountain.

District neighbourhood spokeswoman Coun Moira-Ann Grainger said: “The Czechoslovak Memorial Fountain has been a presence in Jephson Gardens for 50 years, and I am pleased that the recent restoration work means that it will continue to stand as a fitting memorial of the bravery and courage of the Czechoslovak soldiers that lost their lives during World War II.”

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