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Thank you for visiting our website. Please sign our Guestbook and leave your comment.
Děkujeme Vám za návštěvu našich webových stránek. Podepište se, prosím, v naší knize návštěvníků a připojte Váš komentář.
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If you found this website useful please consider making a donation to help cover the costs of continuing research and maintaining and further development of this educational resource.
Your donation makes a huge difference in our efforts to Remember the Czechoslovak men and women who served in the RAF during WW2.
Thank you for your support of this project.
Pokud jste našli tuto webovou stránku užitečnou, zvážíme, zda byste měli přispět na pokrytí nákladů na další výzkum a udržování a další rozvoj tohoto vzdělávacího zdroje.
Váš dar pro nás představuje obrovskou posilu v našem snažení zdokumentovat a zachovat památku na všechny československé muže a ženy, kteří sloužili v královském letectvu RAF během 2. světové války.
Děkujeme Vám za Vaši podporu tohoto projektu.
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Free Czechoslovak Air Force 
Nice to see my article reused. We carried out the work on AR501 at a time when we were advised not to try and make contact with those back in Czechoslovakia for fear of making those whose life had been made hard due to their service in the RAF any harder by the communist regime. This is why it carried NN*D. After the Prague spring we can now speak and a lot more information has come to light so the aircraft has until its rebuild carried the more correct NN*A. What marks it will carry after rebuild I do not know.
I am proud that we as a group produced the first really authentic paint scheme in the modern era and one with Czech connections since this is what it was. There was an expectation on us to paint it as yet another fake BoB aircraft with brown and green upper surface colours and the inevitable red spinner. Fortunately the management at Shuttleworth showed a lack of interest in what we were doing so we all agreed that absolute authenticity as far as we could achieve was our aim including painting the aircraft like at Westlands where the boundaries between ocean grey and dark green were not sharp as would have been the case on a Castle Bromwich aircraft where they used a form of mat to get the pattern correct.
Great days: I still have my tie with a Czech cockade and a superimposed S for shuttleworth on it.
Always grateful to the help of Czech pilots and aircrew. Sadly the after war treatment given by the communist leadership must also not be forgotten or forgiven.
KEEP THEIR MEMORY ALIVE
Enjoyed browsing through your site which is very informative and I am very interested in Czech history and the role of the country during WW2.
My ancestors starting with my father are from Frystak , and I look forward to reading any further postings in particular from Frystak , Zlin and Holesov areas as well as others.
Thanks for creating and maintaining the site.
Best Regards , Augustin
[Moderators note: Currently these two articles relate to that area]:
https://fcafa.wordpress.com/2013/03/01/the-bata-raf-airmen/
https://fcafa.wordpress.com/2012/03/01/oldrich-dolezal/
congratulations on website
This is all very great stuff. Thanks for setting it up and providing such invaluable information.
Thank You for a great site. To have such a brave ancestors makes me very proud to be Czech.
Superb site, great research/resource tool
This is a wonderful website. I am so pleased to have found it I am actually looking for information on my father in law Josef Chytry. I am hoping he is still alive as I would like him to meet his granddaughters and great grandchildren. Thanking you in anticipation of your help. Please tell me where to look next.
I see no mention of m Step Grandfather Fof Josef Vencelas Stivar
[moderators note: see https://fcafa.wordpress.com/2010/05/19/s-2/ ]
My Daughter and son in law has a kit box from S/ldr E. Foit who died in 1976 if any of his family are interested in this contact me please.
Loved reading the comments. My natural father was a member of of 311 Bomber Squadron.
He was one of the first lads to get here via the French airforce, and a ship from Gibralter in 1940.
He always said he was a navigator, but reading the service records it shows him to have been a wireless mechanic…….. What was his role, what did he do ?????
He was reluctant to talk about the war years, and photos are no more.
He died 13 April 2005. In Ostrava. His original home town was Prerov. Moravia.
Many thanks.
I would like to ask you, if Stanislav Trucalek is name of your father. He was wireless mechanic of 311. Sqr..
Dobrý deň, zháňam informácie ( fotky, posobenie v RAF, bojové lety atď. ) o našom rodákovi Jozefovi Remenárovi. Ďakujem za akékoľvek informácie.
[Moderators translation:
Hello, I am looking for information (photos, activities RAF sorties etc.) about our native Joseph Remenár. Thank you for any information.]
What to say – just thank you, great job!
More pics of Karel Petr Sláma, F/Lt, 313 Sq available in case of your interest.
Michal Sláma
I am grateful to have found this website by accident. The history of our pilots in Britain is among the brightest spots of our past, if not the brightest, and I eagerly follow any resource addressing it. I personally feel this history to be our strongest tie towards the civilized, brave, fair and forward looking west, as opposed to the brutal, nihilistic and degrading east. The latest developments in Crimea show that we might be not too far from a situation when our own political survival might be at stake again. And we will need to see that there have been many people among us before who made the right choices despite all the odds. Making right choices is hugely unpopular now among the majority of our population. Perhaps the communist lunacy of our past took its toll to a terrible extent.
I thank the administrators of this web and of course I thank the more so to the czechoslovak pilots of the Battle of Britain, who in fact keep saving me even today, whenever I have doubts whether the current state of our nation should make me feel ashamed to be Czech.
hear,hear. Well said.
Hello:
this comment is unrelated to this topic. I am the Canadian who built for his friend as exact a replica (1/48 scale) of his father P/O Zdenek Munzar’s Liberator PP D EV955 as I could. If there is an interest in photographs of work in progress and/or the completed aircraft, please let me know.
Gilles Pepin
Našel jsem zde nacionále svého otce, díky za Vaší práci, jsem ochoten poskytnout písemnosti, které vlastním. Díky Honza TRubáček
[Moderators translation:
I found here the information about my father, I am prepared/willing to supply the documents in my possession.]
Thank you for creating this site. It has given me a great insight into what my Grandfather Otakar Cerny struggled through during the war. I would never have known so much about his journey as part of the 311 Bomber Squadron, and the resultant pow camp escapes that he and Josef Bryks took part in. Reading these accounts makes me very proud of my Grandfather’s and his countrymen’s bravery in their defiance against the enemy. Thank you for making this information available, without such sources their plight is all too easily forgotten.
Thank you very much for the excellent website. I discovered it while looking for the details of Cpt. Eduard Prchal’s story. You have the best presentation of it I was able to found. I’ll return to your website to learn more on the bravery of Czechoslovak RAF pilots in the WW2.
Thank you for this website. My Grandfather, F/lt Jindrich Vnoucek (deceased January 1997) was a Navigator in 311 Czechoslovak squadron and also a fellow comrade with whom he escaped from Czechoslovakia with in 1938 and 1948 F/lt Josef Richter was also in 311 Squadron. Any information anyone has about these two guys I would love to hear.
Thank you
What an excellent website! It is very good to see the memory of these brave and intrepid persons preserved for posterity. Congratulations!
Absolutely FIRST CLASS site. Both Liz and myself have proud and wonderful memories of all the RAF-Czechoskovakian chaps at the West Hampstead club, as well of those of 111(F) Squadron who were unable to leave at the time of the 1948 putsch, but who we regularly corresponded with until meeting them back in UK in 1990 for the 50th Battle of Britain Anniversary – and again in Prague in 1991 with all global others at the superb September reconciliation ceremonies. Totally unforgettable memories !
Toto jsou výborné stránky! Blahopřeji a děkuji. Jen tak dál!
[Moderators translation:
These are excellent pages. My congratulations and thanks. The more the better! ]
Thank you very much for your very admirable biography of PILOT JOSEF BRYKS. It follows well the Czech television video documentary from 2007. His life is a continuing inspiration to all of us in the 21st century. He truly was a fellow countryman born of character. May he rest in peace with honor forever in the hearts of his many new and old admirers !
Extremely interesting to me personally as my last name is Dolezal and my father worked for the Bata organisation starting in Zlin, India and the USA, and I am a corporate pilot today. I know a lot of the Bata history but not so much of the aviation part. Very fascinating biography of Oldrich Dolezal. I know many stories of the like of Czechs escaping their homeland and some never able to return. I look forward to my first visit to the Czech republic soon having only a few yaers ago met some of my Czech relatives from Zlin and Frystak.
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Thank you for a beautiful site. My late Grandfather, Miroslav Kopecky was a Czech pilot, Squadron 310 and reading all these stories is fascinating. Best wishes.
Corinne, we are building a page for your grandfather on the Battle of Britain London Monument website http://www.bbm.org.uk, perhaps you could get in touch and fill the gaps we have.
Regards…………Edward McManus
Hallo,
My grandfather brother Anton Vanko is buried together with another two Czechoslovak pilots in parts of Britain pilots. Do you know reason, why he was buried just there and not in Czechoslovak part of the cemetery?
I have visited Brookwood several times, I would like to thank to the cemetery management and staff, the environment is excellent there. At the same time thank very much to you for management of this web site!
Best regards
Karol Vanko
Dobrý deň,
brat môjho starého otca Anton Vanko je pochovaný spolu s ďalšími dvoma Čechoslovákmi v časti anglických pilotov. Neviete prosím dôvod, prečo je pochovaný práve tam a nie v československej časti?
Cintorín Brookwood som navštívil už niekoľko krát, môžem vyjadriť svoje úprimné poďakovanie správcovi cintorína za to, ako sa o toto pamätné miesto stará. Taktiež vyjadrujem svoju vďaku aj Vám za správu tejto web stránky!
S pozdravom
Karol Vanko, Trenčín, Slovensko
Hi. I’ve really enjoyed browsing this site; it’s a credit to the brave men to whom it is dedicated, and to the loyal and devoted family members who have created it, researched it and preserved the memory.
Vaclav Bergman, a pilot in 310 squadron during the Battle of Britain and then in 1944 commander of 313 squadron, was my uncle, and a great example of the fortitude, fighting spirit and humanity of these men.
Found information for my research on Pembrey Airport on the first day. A detailed report of the action leading up to the capture of the FW190A-3 at Pembrey.
Very informative web site
Parádní web, díky!
[Moderators translation: Awesome site, thanks!]
my wife has just found out that her father, vaclav jan spitz, was an air gunner in 311 squadron he has never seen him since she was about 5 years old she has no photos or any other information about him and would love to hear from anyone who has dave.
My grandad Jan Smejkal served in the Free Czechoslovak Air Force during World War 2, after escaping the Nazis. He enlisted in the Czech Air Force on the 1st October 1936. When the German invaded, he was put into a forced labour camp. He managed to escape from Germany under a train back to Prague. He then managed to escape to Poland. In 1938 he again fled from Poland through Danzig and skirting Germany in a Swedish boat to Calais. He then joined the French Foreign Legion. When France was occupied in 1940, he then managed to escape in a British destoyer from Bordeaux to Gibraltar. He then made it to Liverpool and joined the Free Czech Air Force until he was demobilised in 1946. In 1948, he returned to the Czech Republic with my grandmother, my dad and my aunt and uncle. They stayed there for a few months but it was too dangerous for them as he was treated as a traitor by the new Communist regime and faced serving a prison sentence. As a result, they had no choice but to return to the UK. He died in 1989 never having returned to his homeland. I recently went to visit Cisarov, the village where my grandad came from and visited my great grandmother’s grave. I would love to find out more about my grandad’s family!
In 1948, he could not return to the Czech Republic because it is declared on 1 Jan 1993 !!!!!!! He returned to Czechoslovakia for sure.
As well as keep carefully semantic diference between adjectives “Czechoslovak” and “Czech” in general (this is the same case like diference between British and English /and/or Scottish, Welsh, Irish, etc/): e.g. there was no Czech Air Force by 1 Oct 1936 but only the Czechoslovak Air Force, etc..
Thanks for all the information about Czech RAF airmen. Otto Smik, pilot, was during the occupation
of the germans for some time hide in a house in Ginneken (Breda, Holland), Oct. 1944, after shot down.. Our liberation by the Polish Forces on 29th of Oct., he went back to his Squadron in England. One month later he died by an attack on a bridge near Deventer in Holland. on nov. 28th 1944. = Frank de Leeuw.
I’m long overdue, but at last I have just come across your excellent Czech Air Force web site and I am delighted to see you have my description of the Czech boys at RAF Sutton Bridge. I wrote that back in 1996 in my first book ‘Combat Ready!’. A lot of water has passed under the bridge (literally!) since researching that first book and it brings back fond memories. It is now out of print but maybe one day I might get around to updating it and see if it could be re-published. I am very happy to see the story put to good use, though. Good Luck.
Hello again,
Just wanted to say that I am really getting to appreciate this site and the work under-taken to provide the information here. Congratulations to the team.
Cheers
MT
I never appreciated how brave my dad was as a young man, to join the war effort (311 Squadron) until he passed on and I read his writings, which he undertook with a spring of enthusiasm in his last couple of years – it seemed to bring back memories for him as he wrote. He hardly ever spoke about the war. It was only at my insistence that he write down his memoirs that he started. (His name, Jan F Gazdarica)
Thank you very much for your website.
My Uncle, Flt/Lt. Vratislav Liska, served with No 312 Czech Fighter Squadron, but returned to Cz after the war and was killed when his ‘plane crashed during training, possibly due to sand in the fuel line.
We have a framed official composite photo of this squadron with all men identified on their individual pictures.
If interested, I could attempt to photo it for you – a loupe is needed to read the names.
Dear Lyn,
your uncle npor. Vratislav LIŠKA (a deputy commander of a flight, No.25 Air Regiment of the Czechoslovak Air Force) fatally crashed near Kuří Village (about 16 km south-east of Prague Downtown) on 11 Oct 1948 piloting a De Havilland Mosquito FB Mk.VI (s/n HR 255, code unknown) Fighter Bomber.
According to Czech archival sources (crash investigation protocols), there was no training mission but an unauthorised test flight and the reason of crash was, unfortunately, flying indiscipline of your uncle (air combat maneuvers /tonneau/ at very low altitude: when his plane began to lose altitude and speed, apparently your uncle opened the throttle too sharply and pulled his pilot stick back (in order to increase speed and altitude). Due to very sharp opening the throttle, the left engine lost its power (it became flooded with fuel) and the right one (running at full power on the contrary) overturned the plane to its uncontrolled fall from about 30 m of hight level to the ground. After falldown, the plane burst into flames and burnt completely (two-member-crew /the other crew member was ppor. MUDr. František VOTRUBA as an observer/ had no chance to escape).
Your uncle is burried at the military cementry in Olomouc (see
http://www.vojenskyhrbitov-cernovir.estranky.cz/fotoalbum/identifikace-hrobu/nektere-zachovane-hroby/vratislav-liska.html) and his picture from war time can be seen at
http://www.vojenskyhrbitov-cernovir.estranky.cz/fotoalbum/kpt.-vratislav-liska/kpt.-liska-vratislav-.html
Thank you for the info. & links.
Great site.
Thank you for your very informative website regarding this extrordinary airman. We at Tangmere Military Aviation Museum have a section dedicated to Karel “The Night Reaper”, but this helps to fill in some of the gaps.
Thank you for mentioning the Tangmere Museum. This is the airfield from where my father, Karel Kuttelwascher, flew. Because of the “kills” he achieved he was awarded the DFC and Bar in 1942 and was the highest scoring night intruder pilot and the highest scoring Czechoslovak pilot of WW11. My twin sister, Mari, and I are extremely proud of him.
Děkuji za skvělé stránky věnované nejen pilotům,ale i z leteckému personálu.Všem těm kteří šli jakýmkoliv způsobem bojovat za správnou věc.Navigátor RAF 311. bombardovací perutě Karel Rybníček z Kozlova byl bratranec mé babičky,5. října 1945 na letišti Blackbuche havaroval po startu jejich Liberator,celá posádka zahynula.
[Moderators translation: Thank you for brilliant pages dedicated not only to the pilots, but also to the airmen (flight personnel). To all, who went to fight – in whichever manner – for the right cause. Karel Rybnicek, navigator of RAF 311 Sqn from Kozlov was my grandma’ s cousin. Their Liberator had an accident after the take off at Blackbushe airfield on 5th Oct 1945 and the whole crew perished.]
Well done! An extremely useful and attractive site that does honor to those who served their country – and the world – in the desperate and (often) lonely fight against fascism. Layout models the best in traditionally clean Czech typography, and the photographs and information well worth the having. Although long a student of RAF, Battle of Britain and friend of Czechoslovakia (and Czech Republic – Charles University, 1972 – 1992), I came to this good work thanks to UK scholar and enthusiast, Roger Darlington, whose book on his father-in-law, the remarkable Flt Lt K M Kuttelwascher, I hope to see in the Czech edition before too long. Agree with the suggestion for a donation “button.”
Dr George Abbott White (Boston, USA)
Thank you for creating this informative website. I know there are several of us looking for information on our relatives that served in WWII. It would be great is some blog could be set up that might help us find additional information from others who find this site. My father was Frantisek Josef Pohlodek that served as a Flight Office in Squadron 311. He passed away when I was 10 years old and I am having difficulty locating any information or pictures of him that I’m sure other may have in their photo albumns. Thank you, Jirinka Pohlodek
Zdravím a děkuji za obrovskou práci kterou jste si dali na památku statečných chlapů které nikdo
nenutil a kteří svou přísahu vlasti beze zbytku splnili. Pilot RAF 311 Rudolf Pancíř z Petříkova u Jílovic byl bratranec mého otce a zůstal v Biskaji.
[Moderators translation: Greetings and thank you for great work you’ve done in remembrance of the valiant blokes, who were not forced (to do it) yet who fulfilled their oath to the last dot. RAF pilot Rudolf Pancíř from Petříkov near Jílovice was my father’ s cousin and remained in the Bay of Biscay.]
Thankyou for taking the time and trouble to put together all this information. My grandfather Milan Stehno was a wireless operator with 311 Sqn. I am immensely proud of him and never fail to be moved by the ammount of young Czech men who volunteered to fight, never knowing wether they’d see their homeland again.
Hi Kate,
A family member of mine named Karel Novotny flew many missions with your grandfather between 1941-1942 as an air gunner. I am hoping that you may have some information or pictures that may help me find out a little bit more about my great uncle – and the other way round.
Many Thanks
Darja
This is an excellent website dedicated to the memory of the Czechoslovak Air Force flying as well as ground support personnel who served at the RAF Czechoslovak units as well as to individuals serving at other Allies units during the WW II.
I wish you all the best for your work.
Miro(slav)
Thanks for all your effort on this web site.
christian
It’s a shame you don’t have a donate button! I’d without a doubt donate to this fantastic site.
Great website ang good luck with your work.
Thank you for this excellent website. My Father was a Czech pilot, Squadron 310 (Miroslav Bederich Kopecky)
Good site, a lot of useful and little known information here.
Very informative site about the little known Czech RAF airmen.
Thank you for this website. It is very informative about our foreign airmen in ww2