Památník Československých Bojovníků Bitvy U Sokolova

The monument stands at the intersection in front of the city office building. A bronze statue of a soldier in a winter gear with a submachine gun in his hand is placed on a stone pedestal. It was inaugurated on 11 November 1951 and is the work of sculptor Vendelín Zdrůbecký (1923 - 1986). It was built in memory of the first combat performance of the 1st Czechoslovak Independent Battalion at the Battle of Sokolov on March 8, 1943 in the then USSR. In the pedestal is a symbolically placed finger from the battlefield.

What does the Memorial of the Battle of Sokolov in Ukraine near Kharkov have in common with Sokolov in what was then German West Bohemia? Nothing! Nevertheless, you will find it in the city center at the roundabout at the Municipal Office. The memorial of the Battle of Sokolov in Ukraine is built in Sokolov, West Bohemia, at the crossroads in front of the town hall. Bronze soldier On a stone pedestal is a standing bronze statue of a soldier in a winter gear with a submachine gun in his hand. It is the work of sculptor Vendelín Zdrůbecký from the Army Art Studio, which was ceremoniously unveiled on November 11, 1951. The German Falkenau was the Czech Falknov The monument was erected in memory of the first combat performance of the 1st Czechoslovak Independent Battalion at the Battle of Sokolov on March 8, 1943 in the then Soviet Union. The finger from the battlefield is symbolically placed in the pedestal. Ukrainian Sokolovo is actually called Sokolove. The name of the local town Falknov (Falkenau) was changed in 1948 to Sokolov. General Ludvík Svoboda, later Czechoslovak president and former commander of Czechoslovak military units within the Red Army, personally took part in the renaming ceremony. The name of the town Falkenau was originally based on falconry, ie hunting with birds of prey. The historic fountain with a falconer in the Old Square refers to this. This name is not related to the Ukrainian village of Sokolovo. The Soviet communists liquidated the Czechoslovaks I have never had anything against the monuments to the freedom of our republic. I respect all those who have laid down their lives for us on every front. At school we also learned about the battle of Sokolov. It was an almost mythical event in modern history under socialism. I believed that everything happened as described in the textbooks. Later, I searched for the meaning of the whole operation. It was, of course, the heroic sacrifice of our soldiers, but perhaps not entirely voluntary. General Ludvík Svoboda pulled his people out of gulags (Soviet labor camps very similar to German concentration camps), criminal companies (where people went straight to death), prisons, and famine-ridden areas. Despite the resistance of the Soviet command, he turned them into a Czechoslovak combat unit within the Communist Red Army. The botched strategy of the Red Army After the necessary training, it was deployed in the area of ​​the village of Sokolovo. Her hopeless position was not very different from the deployment of a criminal company. Czechoslovak men with small arms stood against the well-armed Nazis with the support of armored units.

A sculptural group towering next to the roundabout in memory of Czechoslovak soldiers from the Battle of Sokolov