History's Secret Heroes: Series 3: Operation Anthropoid

History's Heroes

BBC

Documentary, History, Society & Culture

4.8 • 704 Ratings

🗓️ 1 April 2025

⏱️ 29 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

In Prague, two men set out to assassinate one of Hitler’s most high-ranking officers.

Helena Bonham Carter shines a light on extraordinary stories from World War Two. Join her for incredible tales of deception, acts of resistance and courage.

A BBC Studios Audio production for BBC Radio 4 and BBC Sounds.

Producer: James Shield Assistant Producer: Rachel Oakes Executive Producer: Paul Smith Written by Alex von Tunzelmann Commissioning editor for Radio 4: Rhian Roberts

Transcript

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0:00.0	He tells her that she will be sent to France as a secret agent, and if she's caught, she's going to be shot.
0:09.3	I'm Helen Obalam Carter, and this is history's secret heroes, where I shine a light on extraordinary stories from World War II.
0:17.6	What they wanted was someone to get themselves arrested and sent to Auschwitz.
0:22.0	Tales of deception, an incredible acts of resistance and courage.
0:26.3	She was a born soldier.
0:27.4	She's a freedom fighter in its widest sense.
0:29.9	The brand new series of History's secret heroes.
0:32.8	Listen first on BBC Sounds.
0:36.2	BBC Sounds, music, radio, podcasts.
0:40.2	A snowy morning in Berlin.
0:43.4	January, 1942.
0:45.9	In a villa on the shores of Lake Vancey,
0:49.6	senior members of the Nazi party gathered.
0:53.5	The meeting was convened by Reinhardt Heidrich.
0:57.2	He's a sort of shadowy figure.
0:59.5	He cultivates that image as well of being a man who is sort of the perfect Nazi.
1:05.0	Heidrich had an interest in racist politics from a young age
1:08.6	and married a woman who was a committed Nazi.
1:12.1	A family friend introduced him to Heinrich Himmler, the head of the SS.
1:17.9	In 1931, Himmler brought Heidrich into the SS and put him in charge of its intelligence
1:24.7	arm, the SD. He was chillingly effective.
1:29.7	And by the time that the Second World War broke out in 1939,
	...

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