his video is part of Project Homecoming, more on that later.
The Austro-Hungarian Empire, as its name suggests, was divided into two parts, the Austrian,
and the Hungarian.
These parts where then further subdivided, on the Austrian side today’s Czechia was
divided in to Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia and on the Hungarian side today’s Slovakia
was, ehh just Hungary.
Hungary was very particular in it’s idea of “who cares it’s all mine”.
Then again that’s the idea followed by any imperial nation not just Hungary.
But I digress.
This direct control of Slovakia by hungary for about a thousand years but more prominent
in the last 200, meant that Slovaks even though having a very small number of intelectual
which ended up leading the nationalistic movement in the 19th and early 20th century, had practically
speaking no middle or higher class.
Most slovaks where farmers, minors and low skilled factory workers.
And even though there where certain aristocrats and intellectuals with slovak roots, they
mostly considered themselves as Hungairians either for practical reasons or actual self
identity.
When we compare that to the Czechs, it’s a very different picture.
Bohemia was a very prominent kingdom within the HRE and even though it then fell under
the Habsburg control it always retain a certain kind of autonomy.
Meaning the Czech people had a thriving middle class, an aristocracy and numerous intellectuals.
This is not to mean they weren’t restrain at all by Austrian rules and in fact almost
any middle or high class Czech had to know German if they wanted to progress their career
in any meaningful way.
But when compared to the Slovaks they where leaps ahead in social progress and personal
freedoms.
With all that said by the end of the 19th century both Czechs and Slovaks were fighting
for some sort of autonomy, whether that be recognized equality within the Empire or complete
succession from it, depends on who you ask.
There where many movements each with a different goal and a different plan to get there.
In Czechia the most prominent political views by the end of the 19th century didn’t really
consider Slovakia.
This is not to say there weren’t any Czech movements for the formation of Czechoslovakia
or at the very least support for the “Slovak Brothers” in one way or another but none
of these movements by the end of the 19th century were prevalent in the Czech mindset,
being vastly overshadowed by the Czech fear of Germanification, which spurred up the Czech
nationalistc movement campaigning for equal rights and self autonomy.
Because if Czechs had the means to administer their own lands they would no longer have
to fear and could even counteract Germanification.
But even though this idea was almost universal amongst all Czech political parties they disagreed
on how to tackle it.
Nonetheless by far the most prominent movement was best described by Karel Kramář a Czech
politician, “The lands of the Bohemian crown, formed an undivided and indivisible whole,
completely independent and autonomous vis-a-vis the other lands of their King“ hence advocating
for remaining within the Empire while gaining the autonomy like Hungary had.
And in fact by the end of the 19th century many Czechs didn’t want to succeed from
the Empire, they just wanted more autonomy.
Swithcing from the Czechs to Slovaks now, the most prominent and infact the only faction
to see some succes in Slovak circles was the nationalistic party.
By the late 19th and early 20th century it had a newspaper based from Martin called Národnie
noviny which was edited by Vajanský.
This party as its name suggests was very much nationalistic with some members bordering
on what we would today call fascism.
Its agenda early on centered around the full succession from the Empire and the creation
of independent Slovakia.
On top of that, the party was known for its Russophilia, anti-westernism, antisemitism
and agrarianism.
After seeing no political success and very strong suppression by the Hungarians the nationalistc
party became less radical going in to the 20th century.
Abandoning the idea of full succession of Slovakia and campaigning for universal suffrage
and equal rights for Slovaks within the Empire.
However anti westernism, anti semitism and Russophilia still remained strong with the
more right leaning members of the party.
Also the idea of a Czechoslovakian state was very much a moot point with in the nationalistic
circles not gaining any traction.
And it is this political state that disgruntled young Slovaks found themselves around the
turn of the century.
With the only prominent political party being very conservative and the Czechs pretty much
minding their own business giving the Slovaks a thumbs up of encouragement across the Morava.
But, this is all just one side of the story and it is time to turn to the other side,
which largely revolves around one man, known today as taticek Masaryk.
Tomas Masaryk was born in a small town of Hodonin right on the border between Czechia
and Slovakia, when he was 6 his family moved to a neighboring town of Cejkovice.
His father was a Slovak farmer and his mother a Germanized Moravian.
Masaryk grew up speaking a zahoracky dialect of Slovak but at an early age also learned
German and Czech from his mother.
He wasn’t particularly fond of manual labor jobs preferring academia above all, for example
as a teenager he taught himself Latin and Ancient Greek just so he could read the original
classical texts.
He was also at the top of his class at a gymnazium in Brno and later Vienna, while there he also
learned French, Russian, Polish and English, and earned a bit of money by translating documents
from those languages to German or Czech.
Interestingly, while he was at gymnazium, when he turned 16 he “joined a number of
young hotheads, who sallied forth to fight for their country” in the Austro Prussian
War also known in Germany as the Unification War.
He got injured during the war and recovered in Bratislava before finishing up his gymnazium,
after which he continued pursuing his passion for academia enrolling at the University of
Vienna from which he got his eventual doctorate in 1876.
During this entire time Masaryk wasn’t involved much in politics and even though he himself
admitted to be a sympathiser for Czech and Slovak autonomy, outside of joining a small
Slovak and Czech student unions in Vienna he never actively did anything.
Instead, he was fully immersed in his studies of philosophy, history, psychology, etc.
But that all changed in 1881/2 when he got a post as a philosophy professor at Charles
University.
It was in Prague that he was very much thrown on to the Czech political stage through the
academic connections he made there, all of whom were already involved in politics.
His early political life and ascendance is quite complicated but the main event that
can be pointed to is the Hilsner Case.
The Hilsner Case was a series of trials against a jewish peddler, for commiting a ritual murder
of a young Czech girl.
The evidence against him was laughable and only situated on the unlikeability of his
character and the fact that he was jewish.
However most of the Czech politics at the time involved anti semitism and much of the
public wanted to see someone face some repercussions.
Masaryk however, even though stating he wasn’t very fond of Hilsner.
Decided to seemingly go against almost all politicians and the public opinion, because
in his eyes this “monstrous non-legality” could not stand in a just nation.
With Masaryk’s help Hilsner was still convicted but instead of being executed was given life
imprisonment.
During this nation wide incident Masaryk was shown to the entire population as a honorous
man and fighter for justice.
His idea of an “unpleasant truth is preferable to a beneficial lie” became one of his core
political beliefs and he went on to find a new Political Czech party called the Realists
in 1900.
This party was meant to replace the current Young Czech Party that Masaryk viewed as pandering
to the Empire just as well as to the Czech people, resulting in nothing being done.
The Realist party was very liberal for it’s time, equating for full equality of women
in the workplace, universal suffrage, freedom of speech, etc.
Also unlike the Czech parties up until now, it actively worked with other Slavic parties
in Austria-Hungary, including Croats, Serbs, Slovaks, etc.
At the same time, Masaryk also helped coordinate a small number of Slovak intellectuals studying
in Czechia, to find a new political movement against the conesrvative Slovak Nationalists.
These people founded the newspaper ‘Hlas’ that focused around social democratic ideas
and became a prominent counter to the Nationalistic party.
As the great war was drawing nigh almost none of the major Czech or Slovak politicians,
including Masaryk, propagated, at least officially, any idea of succession from the Empire.
Instead they all supported the proposed federalist state of Austria-Hungary which was also supported
by Archduke Franz Ferdinand.
It also has to be noted that outside of a small minority, like the group Českoslovanská
jednota, the idea of a Czechslovak state was never proposed on any major political level.
Even Masaryk, though his actions and rhetoric in the early 19th century where very much
so heading towards a unified Czechoslovakia, never actually publicly stated he wanted a
Czechoslovak union until 1907.
Most scholars today believe it was his plan all along to unify the Czechs and Slovaks,
a people who he called ‘co-nationals’, he just wanted to sture up more political
support for such a move before declaring it officially.
And reading his lecture notes I think this becomes very clear.
Nonetheless, whatever the political agenda and views both sides had, when it became clear
that the Great War was inevitable, the Czechs and Slovaks started to view a mutual cooperation
as the best chance towards an independent and strong country.
And just like that, Masaryk who was working towards a unified Czechoslovak state for decades
now, became the center point of the Czechoslovak independence movement during the war.
At the start of the war Masaryk viewed the German and Austrian mobilization and he had
this to say.
“I could not help feeling impressed by the purposeful [German] discipline and the preparedness
to the last button.
Throughout the mobilization I did not see a single drunken German, whereas the contingents
of Austrian recruits on their way home to join [the war,] were, for the most part, helplessly
intoxicated.”
No real point from this quote, I just thought it was funny.
However two quotes do summarize Masaryk’s life for the next 4 years quite well.
Saenger a man who meat Masaryk at the beginning of the war said this.
“The impression which Masaryk produced on me was extraordinary.
He was entirely taken up with one single idea … this man, who was an Austrian against
his will, was engrossed by the question whether the historical moment had come when the Empire
was to be split up into its national ingredients.”
During this time Masaryk also meat with Professor Seton-Watson with whom he created the Memorandum
for Central Europe.
Watson later said this about that.
“The programme which Masaryk placed before me at that secret meeting in a hotel Rotterdam
in October, 1914, was fulfilled almost to the letter in October, 1918.”
So Masaryk had a plan, and he had the will to execute it.
Therefore the next 4 years Masaryk took the initiative, almost single handedly getting
diplomatic support for the creation of Czechoslovakia across the world.
He traveled to Rotterdam 1914
Geneva 1915 Paris 1915-1917
London 1915-1917 Petrograd
Moscow Kiev
Vladivostok Tokyo
Chicago Washington
New York London
Paris And in 1918 Prague
Masaryk was the one to organize the Czechoslovak legion in Russia and later he was the one
to negotiate safe passage of this legion across Russia.
He also had time to be one of the founders of the UCL School of Slavonic and East European
Studies in London and many other things we don’t have time to talk about.
However it wasn’t all smooth sailing for gaining diplomatic support for the creation
of Czechoslovakia.
The most prominent opposition coming from the British, who didn’t want to break up
the Austro-Hungarian Empire, especially not at the start of the War.
America on the other hand proved to be the most enthusiastic allie of Masaryk and his
cause.
When he arrived to Chicago, he was joyfully greeted by 150 thousands people, most of which
where of Czechoslovak Origin.
Eventually thanks to Masaryk unrelentless diplomatic work, a new nation was founded,
a Czechoslovak nation.
Unsurprisingly, Masaryk
was elected as the first president of Czechoslovakia, and a new chapter not just in Masaryk’s
life but in Czechoslovak history began.
A chapter that until 1938, had a lot of its own problems, but that’s a story for another
time.
This video is part of a greater Project Homecoming, where for the holidays a bunch of History
YouTubers are talking about the history of where they live or where they’re from.
Since I am from Slovakia, I talked about the formation of Czechoslovakia.
If you want to see other history youtubers’ videos, click the link to the playlist on
the screen or in the description.
My name is M. Laser and see you next time.