Milan Rastislav Štefánik

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Milan Rastislav Štefánik

Milan Rastislav Štefánik (born July 21, 1880 in Košariská , † May 4, 1919 in Ivanka pri Dunaji ) was a Slovak politician , astronomer , diplomat , officer , French military pilot , general , founder of the Czechoslovak legions in World War I and is considered to be next to Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk and Edvard Beneš as one of the three founding fathers of the First Czechoslovak Republic . From 1918 to 1919 he was the first Czechoslovak war minister.

Life

Štefánik was born as one of 13 siblings in a Lutheran-Slovak pastor family in what was then the Kingdom of Hungary . He attended the Protestant Lyceum in Pressburg and Ödenburg . He studied astronomy at the Charles University in Prague and met the Czech politician Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk as a student . As a result, he found entry into Czech-Slovak politics and joined the liberal Slovak student movement Detvan , which opposed Hungarian rule and the Russophile positions of the Slovak National Party .

After receiving his doctorate in 1904, he went to the important Paris observatory in 1906 and took part in research trips for astronomical observations, especially solar eclipses , to Brazil , New Zealand , Tonga , Tahiti and the Galapagos Islands .

Štefánik was a member of the Freemasons Association .

First World War

Štefánik (in uniform) on one of his missions in Washington, DC

In 1912 Štefánik became a French citizen, after the beginning of the First World War he served as a fighter pilot in the French army, especially in Serbia . From 1915 onwards he devoted himself entirely to politics and, together with Czech politicians in exile, propagated the dissolution of Austria-Hungary and the establishment of Czechoslovakia . In February 1916 he was a co-founder of the Czechoslovak National Committee . He successfully traveled through the most important states of the Entente and the USA in order to win them over to the Czechoslovak cause.

The National Committee instructed him to set up his own army, consisting of the Czech and Slovak prisoners of war of the Entente. The project received financial support primarily from the French state and from Slovaks who emigrated to the USA. One of his most successful diplomatic successes was the decree on the creation of the Czechoslovak army in France, which the French government issued in December 1917. In 1918 he was appointed General of the Czechoslovak Legions and Minister of Defense of the Provisional Government. He helped build the legions in Russia , France and Italy . In May 1918 he tried in vain to use the main forces of the legions in Siberia to build a new eastern front .

death

Tomb on Mount Bradlo

Štefánik died shortly after the establishment of the ČSR on May 4, 1919 when his three-engine biplane type Caproni Ca.33 (number 11495) crashed in Vajnory near Bratislava. The causes of the process have never been fully clarified. A common explanation was that a Czechoslovak anti -aircraft gun mistakenly shot down the plane being piloted by Štefánik. The green, white and red Italian national emblem of the aircraft was probably confused with the similar-looking Hungarian national emblem. Czechoslovakia was effectively at war with Hungary because of the conflict over Slovakia. In Slovakia, the view that the popular Štefánik had been the victim of an attack was also partly widespread in order to be able to deny Slovakia a truly equal position in Czechoslovakia - which it actually did not receive in the following years.

Honors

In 1907 he received the Jules Janssen Prize . From 1909 he was a member of the Royal Astronomical Society . In 1914 he was appointed officer of the Legion of Honor for his scientific work .

Appreciations

Statue of Štefánik on Milan Rastislav Štefánik Square in Bratislava

Since 1921, Štefánik has been buried in a large tomb on Bradlo Mountain , the local mountain of Brezová pod Bradlom in the Myjavská pahorkatina Mountains . Many streets were named after him. There are statues of him in Prague, Bratislava and Paulhan (France), a monument in Košice (Slovakia). Also, the Bratislava airport is named after him. Czechoslovakia put a 10 kroner coin in circulation in 1991 and 1993 with his portrait, and he was also featured on the former Slovak 5000 kroner note . He is also the namesake of the asteroid (3571) Milanštefánik , a Prague observatory and a railway tunnel on the Nové Mesto nad Váhom – Veselí nad Moravou railway line . The air force wing in Malacky also bears his name. In 2019, Slovakia honored the 100th anniversary of his death with a 2 euro commemorative coin .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Schönfeld: Slovakia , p. 272.
  2. ↑ a b Renata SakoHoess: Slovakia . DuMont Reiseverlag, 2004, ISBN 3-770-16057-6 , p. 27.
  3. ^ Tajné společenství v Čechách - zednáři (Secret Societies in Bohemia Freemasons) ( Czech ) Homepage of the ČT24 transmitter . Retrieved November 18, 2012.
  4. ^ Stanislav J. Kirschbaum: A history of Slovakia. The struggle for survival . St. Martin's Press, New York 1996, ISBN 0-312-16125-5 , pp. 149f.
  5. ^ Iván T. Berend : Central and Eastern Europe before World War II . University of California Press, Berkeley 1998, ISBN 0-520-20617-7 , pp. 164f.
  6. ^ Josef Kalvoda: The genesis of Czechoslovakia. Columbia University Press, New York 1986, ISBN 0880331062 , p. 458; and Joseph A. Mikuš: Slovakia. A political history: 1918-1950. Marquette University Press, Milwaukee 1963, p. 15.
  7. ↑ Herbert Michaelis (Ed.): Causes and consequences. From the German collapse in 1918 and 1945 to the state reorganization of Germany in the present. A collection of certificates and documents on contemporary history. Volume 12: The Third Reich. The Sudeten German problem. The Munich Agreement and the Attitude of the Great Powers. Wendler, Berlin 1979, p. 395.
  8. ↑ Zlata Praha: založení první hvězdárny ...; Volume 23 (1910-1911); No. 28, p. 280.

literature

Web links

Commons : Milan Rastislav Štefánik  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files
personal data
SURNAME Štefánik, Milan Rastislav
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Stefanek, Milan
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Slovak politician, astronomer, diplomat, general and Minister of War of Czechoslovakia
DATE OF BIRTH July 21, 1880
PLACE OF BIRTH Košariská
DATE OF DEATH May 4, 1919
Place of death Ivanka pri Dunaji