Remembering the Czechoslovak Legionnaires: my great-granduncle’s story
In this special episode of Czechast, we revisit a report originally produced for Radio Prague International that tells the story of the Czechoslovak Legionnaires — soldiers who fought across Europe and deep into Siberia to secure their country’s independence. Among them was host Vít Pohanka’s great-granduncle, who fell in battle near the Ural Mountains. His fate is part of a larger story of courage, sacrifice, and nation-building that should never be forgotten.
In the main square of the town of Žďár, there is a small memorial plaque bearing the names of eleven local men who died far from home. Among them is Eduard Pohanka — my great-granduncle. For decades, my family knew only that he had been killed in action somewhere near the Ural Mountains in November 1918, after the end of World War I.
To learn more about his fate, I turned to historian Tomáš Jakl of the Czech Ministry of Defence’s Military History Institute. He explained that long before the war, as many as 100,000 Czechs and Slovaks had lived in Russia — farmers, craftsmen, teachers, and professionals. “There were even Czech music teachers and artists,” Jakl noted. “Tsar Nicholas II admired the Czech Sokol movement and introduced its physical training methods into Russian schools.”
When war broke out in 1914, many of these expatriates formed a volunteer battalion called Česká družina — the Czech Companions — to fight alongside the Russians against Austria and Germany. Initially used for propaganda and translation, they were soon sent to the front as scouts and intelligence officers.
From Zborov to the revolution
As the conflict continued, thousands of Czech soldiers who had served in the Austro-Hungarian army were captured by the Russians or deserted to join them. Many found themselves in the growing Czechoslovak units. My great-granduncle Eduard was among them — a trained machinist who became invaluable to the Russian railways and factories.
The tsarist regime’s collapse in 1917 brought turmoil. The new provisional government under Alexander Kerensky at first distrusted the Czechoslovak units, considering them remnants of the old order. But after the Battle of Zborov that July — where Czech troops captured three enemy lines while the rest of the Russian army retreated — attitudes changed. The Czechoslovak Legions expanded rapidly, becoming a disciplined force of tens of thousands.
Then came the Bolshevik Revolution. Agreements to remain neutral and travel east to Vladivostok soon broke down. “At the end of May 1918,” says Jakl, “Trotsky ordered that any Czechoslovak caught with a gun on the Trans-Siberian Railroad be shot on sight.” Local Soviet forces began attacking the legionnaires’ trains; they fought back, capturing city after city along the vast rail line. The Bolsheviks were taken completely by surprise.
The road home — and a legacy that endures
It was during these chaotic months that Eduard Pohanka fell in battle near the village of Kordon in the Ural Mountains on November 8, 1918. Documents from the Military History Institute confirm the place and date of his death. He was one of more than 4,000 legionnaires who never returned home.
The legions held the Trans-Siberian Railroad for nearly two years, controlling much of Siberia and securing the evacuation of some 70,000 Czechs and Slovaks through Vladivostok. By the spring of 1920, most had reached Europe — some via America, others through Asia and the Suez Canal to Trieste, then by train to their new country: Czechoslovakia.
Eduard Pohanka did not live to see the nation whose freedom he helped win. But like thousands of others, he left behind a proud legacy — one that lives on in the plaques, cemeteries, and family stories scattered across Czech towns and villages.
This Czechast special brings back the original Radio Prague International report that tells his story — and that of the legionnaires whose courage and sacrifice helped shape the history of modern Czechia.
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Czechast is a regular RPI podcast about Czech and Moravian culture, history, and economy.
