Kobylisy Shooting Range
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Kobylisy Shooting Range (Czech: Kobyliská střelnice) is a former military shooting range located at Kobylisy, a northern suburb of Prague, Czech Republic.
The shooting range was established in 1889-1891 (far away from the city at that time) for training of Austro-Hungarian and later Czechoslovak army. During Nazi occupation it was used for mass executions as part of retaliatory measures against Czech people after assasination of Reinhard Heydrich in 1942. About 550 Czech patriots of every social rank lost their lives here, most of them between May 30 and July 3, 1942 when executions took place almost every day. The bodies of the executed were subsequently incinerated in Strašnice crematorium.
List of people shot at Kobylisy includes:
- Jan Auerhan, director of State Bureau of Statistics
- Gen. Alois Eliáš, prime minister
- Lt. Col. Josef Mašín soldier, member of the Three Kings resistance group
- Matěj Pavlík-Gorazd, bishop of Czechoslovak Orthodox Church, later canonised as saint Gorazd
- Františka Plamínková, senator, feminist
- Evžen Rošický, journalist, athlete
- Vladislav Vančura, physician, writer and film director
- 26 citizens of Lidice (members of Horák and Stříbrný families arrested already before extermination of the village and men who were away at work during that night)
The site was adapted to a memorial after WWII and its recent shape dates back to 1970s when large paneláks of a new housing estate surrounded it. Kobylisy Shooting Range has a status of national cultural monument since 1978. Today it is freely accessible and within ten minutes' walk from Kobylisy or Ládví metro stations.
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