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Attractions along the Carpathians
Upper Hungary / Slovakia

Statue of M.R.Stefánik

Generálny pamätník Milan Rastislav Štefánika
Statue of M.R.Stefánik
Generálny pamätník Milan Rastislav Štefánika
Original function:
statue / memorial / relief
Current function:
statue / memorial / relief
Historical Hungarian county:
Komárom
Country:
Slovakia
GPS coordinates:
47.76034, 18.126986
Google map:

History

M.R.Stefánik was born in a Slovak family of 12 children in Kosaras, that was part of Hungary. His father was a Slovak nationalist, a member of the extreme separatist Slovak National Party and

he raised his children in the same spirit. Stefánik attended the grammar schools of Pozsony (at that time it was a Hungarian and German town) and Sopron (Hungary), and he passed his final exams in the Evangelic Grammar School of Szarvas (Hungary).

He learned at the University of Prague, where his philosophy teacher was Masaryk, who influenced him with his idea of the Czech and Slovak unification. In Prague he started to write untruthful articles in newspapers about the oppression of the Slovaks by the Hungarians. After the breaking of the First World War in 1914, he betrayed his homeland, joined the French Foreign Legion and became a fighter pilot. In 1916 the Czechoslovak National Council was formed in Paris, and Masaryk became its president. They organized the Czechoslovak Legion from Czech and Slovak deserters. Its main purpose was to occupy Bohemia and northern Hungary after the defeat of the Central Powers. In November 1, 1918 the Czechoslovak Legion started the invasion of northern Hungary under the command of Italian officers. In January, 1919 Pozsony was also occupied. They invaded large areas with Hungarian majority as well, and the Slovaks formed only less then 50 percent of the population of the occupied territory. In May, 1919 Stefánik was travelling by plane from Udine to Pozsony but his plane crashed during landing. All the passengers died. There were several theories.

The Czech Masaryk and Beneš wanted to a suppress the Slovaks in the Czechoslovak state that was to be created from the very beginning, thus they had a serious disagreement with Stefánik.

According to the reports Stefánik was travelling on an Italian plane, which was taken as a Hungarian plane because of its flag of green-white-red colors, and was shot down by the Czechoslovak soldiers. But according to the Slovak nationalist politician Andrej Hlinka, the plane landed, but Stefánik was shot at the command of Beneš as soon as he got out of the plane.

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