Gustav Košulič

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Gustav Košulič (born July 2, 1911 in Brno , † July 12, 1943 in Berlin-Plötzensee ) was a Czechoslovak radio amateur and resistance fighter against National Socialism .

Life

Gustav Košulič was born in 1911 to Václav Košulič and his wife Eva. The trained electrical engineer occupied himself in his free time with amateur radio, which was still in its infancy at the time . Only a comparatively few amateur radio licenses had been issued worldwide in the 1930s. Košulič worked under the assigned amateur radio callsign OK1GU. He did his military service at the military broadcaster on the Brno Spielberg . From 1937 he worked as an inspector for the Kontrolní služba radioelektrická (KSR for short), which monitored the still young radio system in Czechoslovakia. In the spring of 1938 he met Marie Uhrová. Both married in 1940 and had a daughter together with Jana Košuličová in the summer of 1941.

After the establishment of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia , the Soviet secret service deployed a group of Czechoslovak pilots as agents behind enemy lines. One of the aims was to spy out German troop movements and armaments projects in the area of ​​the Protectorate. Together they succeeded in creating an espionage network covering almost the entire area of ​​the Protectorate. Their information was transmitted by means of encrypted messages, among other things, for which two of them were specially trained as radio operators who both mastered Morse code and were able to build appropriate radio equipment. Material samples, drawings, documents and the like were carried out of the country via the network. Due to the expanding network, further transmitters were necessary and Gustav Košulič was finally recruited as a radio operator in 1940 by Vladislav Bobák , one of the main players at the time. Supported by other radio amateurs such as Jan Habrda (OK2AH) and always under the risk of being targeted and discovered by the Germans, Košulič constantly changed the location of his radio station after a brief instruction in the system.

At the beginning of 1941, betrayed by Jaroslav Bednář, who worked for the Gestapo , and discovered by the Germans, Košulič, like many others in the network, was arrested and finally sentenced to death in November 1942. On July 12, 1943, Gustav Košulič was executed in the central execution site in Berlin-Plötzensee .

literature

In 1979 the GDR military publishing house published the paperback book Das Kommando der Braven by František Kavan, which tells of the struggle and work of the espionage network; Gustav Košulič is also mentioned in it. In the original language it was published under the title Komando statečných . And also the Czech non-fiction author , radio presenter and radio amateur Dr. Josef Daneš († 1999) reported in his 1985 book Za tajemstvím éteru on the work of the network with the participation of Gustav Košulič and its later break-up by the Gestapo.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Vítězslav Hanák, OK1HR: “ČEŠTÍ A MORAVŠTÍ RADIOAMATÉŘI - VYSÍLAČI PROTI NACISMU 1939–1945” in AMA, the journal of the Czech radio club, December 1995, pp. 3 to 10
  2. ↑ František Kavan: The command of the brave . Military publishing house of the GDR, 1979 (Czech: Komando statečných . Prague. Translated by Ruth Kassube).
  3. ^ Josef Daneš: Za tajemstvím éteru. (Nakladatelství dopravy a spojů - Praha, 1985) pp. 146–157 ( Memento of the original of June 8, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / ok2kmo.nagano.cz
  4. ↑ Dr. Josef Danes dies - Radio Prag in Funkamateur , 1/00, p. 32
personal data
SURNAME Košulič, Gustav
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Czechoslovak radio amateur and resistance fighter against National Socialism
DATE OF BIRTH July 2, 1911
PLACE OF BIRTH Brno
DATE OF DEATH July 12, 1943
Place of death Berlin-Plötzensee