Talk:Lidice massacre

This article is in desperate need of citation

As has been stated under the This is a bad article-heading, this article is making far too many uncited statements that only seem to be there to appeal to the readers' emotions. I especially like the 'semiquoted' parts of supposed orders. Just enough to give the uncritical reader a good idea of how horribly disgusting Nazism was, but there is no citation for it, and it's not really clear if the 'semiquoted' parts are really meant as quotes, or if they're just meant the same way that making quotation marks in the air with your hands is... My english sucks enough to get in the way of my message here. So, to put it simply: THIS ARTICLE DOES NOT CITE ITS SOURCES! 85.224.199.36 13:35, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Typo "Licide" in Camus

[Moved by renaming from clueless article Licide to this talk page:]
Licide is the name of a village that was wiped out completely by the Nazi's during WWII. A reference to it can be found in Albert Camus' The Rebel in which is told that the vilage was the scene of a massacre followed by its complete destruction and removal in the extreme that the landscape would not even show that there ever was a village at that place.

A reference to a article about this massacre can found at www.iut.u-bordeaux3.fr: " Licide : un massacre nazi en 1942"/ R. Carré ; les prisonniers de guerres allemands sous autorité française/ Philippe Boutté, Elisabeth Briend et Olivier Gilles, janv. fév. 1997, n° 91

Thus it is suggested that Licide was a French village and that the massacre took place in 1942.

A quick internet search didn't turn up any additional information. Does anyone have more information ?

See Lidice regarding the Czech village destroyed during World War II.

Category:World War II crimes [End of contents of moved former article]

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A Google English-only search on

Licide -lice -"Joseph Licide" -"si licide" -"sib licide"

gets 66 hits in the following categories:

• mentions of the medication Licide (without mentioning lice)
• mentions of surname Licide (some as "Licide, Joseph")
• "licide" as a technical term that, like "siblicide", does not appear in two unabridged ditionaries, but from context has to do with "brood reduction" (by parent or sibling, i think)
• other chemical hyphenations paralleling "si- licide", like "disi- licide"
• a few refs that have wording appearing above, maybe copied from WP.

A Google (any lang) on

"Licide un massacre nazi "

gets two hits containing "about this massacre can found at ...", as above and presumably derived from WP; the link cited in the former article nevertheless does say, under "Seconde guerre mondiale" (i've reformatted)

• Gavroche : revue d'histoire populaire

Choix d’articles :

• "J'étais médecin des tsiganes à Auschwitz"/ Lancu Vexler, 1994, n° 74, n° 75-76, n° 77
• "1914-18, la "mobilisation" des enfants"/ Jean-Louis Pilliat, mars avril 1996, n° 86
• "(L') Après Nuremberg"/ Jean-Louis Pilliat, sept. oct. 1996, n° 89
• "Ghetto, shoah, Lituanie"/ Sylvain Boulouque, nov. déc. 1996, n° 90
• " Licide : un massacre nazi en 1942"/ R. Carré ; les prisonniers de guerres allemands sous autorité française/ Philippe Boutté, Elisabeth Briend et Olivier Gilles, janv. fév. 1997, n° 91
• "Auschwitz, paradigme de notre temps"/ Jean-Jacques Gandini, sept. oct. 2001, n°119
• "Témoignage sur les fusillés pour l'exemple"/ Albert Bourzac, sept. oct. 2002, n° 125

There is a fr:Lidice, but no fr:Licide; the missing article fr:Licide further has, if i interpret its what-links-here correctly, no red links waiting for it to appear.

Note that 1942 May 27 is the date of Lidice, and that the Nazis were much better behaved with their neighbors to the west than with the Slavs, and the French town becomes a far-fetched mistake that might be interesting to find the detailed explanation for -- or not.
--Jerzy(t) 06:14, 2005 Jan 29 (UTC)

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I didn't know of Licide at the time I wrote the clueless article - I seem to remember hearing about it now, but I didn't know the name. In view of the similarities in the stories, village names and year, I'm convinced it's a simple typo in my copy of Camus's book.

Can this page be safely deleted ?

--Pardus

Sorry if i was harsh about "clueless" (even tho i meant the article, not you!).

Do you mean this page? No, we'll need it for other discussions, by and by. Nor IMO should it be blanked, but let's make this a section with a horizontal rule at the bottom, since this discussion should need no further contributions, and little attention (despite having some value in illustrating how we figure things out, and in reassuring anyone else who gets led into the same mistaken understanding).

Surely you do not mean deleting this talk page's article page.

But perhaps you mean the page that started this discussion. IMO, it would definitely be better to keep the redirect it has become, for anyone who consults WP for more info on the place Camus referred to.

I speculated that the

mistake that might be interesting to find the detailed explanation for -- or not

and IMO the explanation of a typo (or transcription error, by the translator?) is valuable but not interesting enough for mention in the article.

--Jerzy (t) 20:04, 2005 Apr 5 (UTC)

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I'm reading Camus' "The Rebel" right now and in my edition (1991, p.184-85, though I see there was a recently previous one also in 1984, which possibly contained the typo) the town is definitely named "Lidice" just like the Czech town. Also, Camus makes no mention of which nation the town lies belongs to; perhaps you thought it was French because Camus himself is French? And FYI, despite this one apparent fix, the rest of the book is absolutely replete with typos... Alex8541 (talk) 05:57, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

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(comment moved down) It says in Heydrich's bio that 15000 were killed but in this article it says 1300. Which number is it? Bob B.

Direct number of deaths was over 1000. These included intelectuals and leaders until then inprisoned, people from Lidice and those involved in atentat and their relatives. Pavel Vozenilek 20:59, 18 July 2005 (UTC)

The sentence "The great joy many German war criminals felt during their actions is something they would not remember after the war." sounds strange, more like an opinion than something factual. Is it suitable given Wikipedia's editorial guidelines? -- akuchling 12:39, 11 Aug 2005 (UTC)

No, I removed it. Pavel Vozenilek 00:08, 12 August 2005 (UTC)

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It seems that "Lidice (Liditz in German) is a village in Czechoslovakia (now the Czech Republic)" should really refer to "The Czech Republic" primarily, with a reference to "Czechoslovakia" as secondary as "The Czech Republic" is the current and correct name for the country--Igjeff 18:48, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

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"impression" of terror

I removed these sentences which i find quite disturbing:

"Lidice gave the impression to the populations of the Allied countries, that Czechoslovakia was terrorized by Nazi murder and reprisals, while in reality the Reichsprotektorat of Bohemia and Moravia received a relatively benevolent and peaceful treatment by German officials, as Bohemia and Moravia were officially "protected" by Nazi Germany. There happened only marginal persecution of Czechs. Lidice was rather an exception."

If author insists on the background for this massacre then link it to the czech resistance and Reinhard Heydrich article. As for "peaceful treatment" I want remind all that although the czechs were good workers for the "nazi machine of war" they were as any other slavic nation fated to diminish in the bright future of nazi empire. For the "propaganda use" of allied powers i feel there is not much to "propagandize" on such a vicious act of brutal terror.

a movie about Lidice was filmed in Britain soon after the event

The movie mentioned is probably 'The Silent Village' (directed by Humphrey Jennings); I haven't included it, because I'm not completely sure. A comparision is made between Lidice and Cwmgiedd, a village in Wales, and Lidice. It's mentioned in http://cs.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lidice (JoeBlogsDord 23:56, 11 November 2006 (UTC))

Thanks for mentioning this; I popped on here to see if anyone could attribute that film with an actual title rather than a vague description. Hopefully someone can verify this and update the page soon. Evixir (talk) 16:39, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Added citation. Philip Cross (talk) 16:53, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

I do not understand

Eighty-eight Lidice children were transported by bus to Lovosice located in the area of the former textile factory in Gneisenaustreet of Łódź on June 13, 1942.

What Lovosice? Lovosice is a town about 40? km north from Lidice. The sentence does not give any meaning. The fact is that 88 children were transported to Łódź. Łódź has nothing to do with Lovosice since it is a city in today's Poland.

This needs to be corrected or explained as soon as possible. Please, cite it. Thank you. Miraceti 15:29, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

No doubt citation is required and I am sure that someone shall provide it someday. In the meantime, a bit of clarifications as requested by Miraceti may be fine. I do believe that we should not tamper with the contents as the editors who have added the contents must have read the same sometime somewhere. In fact, many dimensions of Nazi crimes are yet to be documented. --Bhadani (talk) 20:29, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

This is a bad article

THE PERSON WHO WROTE THIS VITRIOL IS TROLLING. SEE THEIR [[1]]. Particularly this 1. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.145.5.185 (talk) 18:56, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

This article resembles holocaust literature instead of the encyclopedic article it is supposed to be. This is of course understandable considering the source.

"This monstrous spectactle"

"Under constant shouting and verbal abuse, the Lidice women had reached their destination."

"the slightest offense was punishable"

"Some went mad and others were murdered with few surviving."

"The care was minimal. The children were not fed sufficiently and a few babies cared for by the older girls were constantly crying with hunger. The children slept on plain floors and covered themselves with coats if they had any brought from home."

"Adolf Eichmann ordered in late June the order for the massacre of the rest of the children." (Oh, sure. What wouldn't those evil nazis do? After all, the order "bring the rest of the children up in other ways" is just code language for "kill them", right? Guilty until proven innocent, isn't it?)

"On July 1, 1942, the Lidice children were given the chance to write lettercards to their relatives. The few of them that did reach their addresses cannot be read without emotion. A card asking for news of Dad and Mum and for a shard of bread is amongst the most shattering accusations of Nazism." (*sniff*. But where is the encyclopedic format?)

"On July 2, 1942 all of the remaining 81 Lidice children were handed over to the Łódź Gestapo office, who in turn had them transported to the extermination camp at Chelmo 70 kilometres away. It is almost certain they were gassed to death on the very day of their arrival. Out of the 105 Lidice children, 82 died in Chelmno, 6 died in the German Lebensborn orphanages and 17 returned back home."

Let's recap; there were originally 105 children, and 88 of them were transported to Łódź. Nothing is mentioned of the other 17, except that they "returned back home". So, where did they go in the first place? Anyway, 7 of the 88 were taken to be raised in german families, leaving 81. Then, these 81 were "almost certainly gassed to death on the very day of their arrival", leaving the 7 adopted children and 17 "other" children. Then it is claimed that 82 (not 81) died in Chelmno, 6 (not 7) "died in Lebensborn orphanages" (however that happened) and 17 (the mysterious 17) "returned back home", which didn't exist anymore. Sounds confusing.

"All together, about 340 people from Lidice died because of the German reprisal (192 men, 60 women and possibly 88 children). The barbarous crime committed in Lidice shook the entire civilized world." (Yeah, "possibly 88 children". Where is the evidence?)

Earlier in the article it is stated about the women that "Some went mad and others were murdered with few surviving." If we count in the seven women that were killed with the men working in the mine, that means 53 of the 184 women sent to Ravensbrück died, which also means that 131 - over two thirds - survived. It is never told where these 131 women went, but of course that must mean they were "gassed". It's the only logical scenario, right? Like with the children; if only 17 of them were identified after the war, doesn't that imply that the rest were killed? No, it certainly does not.

So, allegedly "about 340 people died"? That is a tragedy. However, there were much, much, MUCH bigger and more terrible atrocities committed by the Allies, especially by the Soviets but also by others. The widely accepted perspective about WW2 is full of hypocrisy and suppression of unpleasant facts; while the Allied atrocities are downplayed or omitted from all discussion, at the same time there are monuments built, books written and movies made of every single german act of brutality.

I would like to make this article better, but I'm sure my version wouldn't be accepted by some. After all, you need to include the crying babies, touching lettercards, and the term "civilized world" to make the nazis look just that little bit more evil.

Before it was removed, the article also included the passage "The great joy many German war criminals felt during their actions is something they would not remember after the war."

Face it: 90% of the article is based on a single holocaust literature book. I want this article deleted or completely remade.

--Skorpio-88

I agree that the article is of poor quality and unfit for Wikipedia. I looked at this "Talk" page precisely because, on reading the article, I wondered if there had already been a comment on the apparent bias and consequent lack of confidence in its accuracy. As for whether it should be "deleted or completely remade", there are other ways to improve it. For example, those parts which are unsupported by appropriate references could be removed. There may be a place for wailing and gnashing of teeth. This isn't it.Mike Shepherd 13:04, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

the article might have problems.. but many statements that skorpio88 objects to are simply statements of fact. Decora (talk) 16:52, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

I too agree that this article is "propaganda". It is a tool used to support other propaganda. I came to this page looking into what supports the following "current event statement":

https://sputniknews.com/analysis/201806231065702205-merkel-displaced-germans-czech-reaction/

"Babis pointed to the crimes committed by German forces during the war, listing Czech villages that were wiped off the map during the occupation, as well as indiscriminate killings of those suspected of harboring resistance group members."

This is exactly how they build support for giant fabrications like the "Holohoax". The simplest research reveals the nonsense … but most people don't even do simple research. I personally don't want this article removed. But I would hope a so-called responsible scholar would illustrate its use as a propaganda tool. Such a section would be even better if it revealed, as this "talk" article does, that this nonsense is largely … if not completely … made up. It's "fake news revisionism". WithGLEE (talk) 16:04, 24 June 2018 (UTC)

Request: separate article of Lidice massacre

--Captain Obvious and his crime-fighting dog (talk) 06:30, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

Additional images available, but need French translation for copyright

Found some great images on the website for Association Republicaine des Anciens Combattants et Victimes de Guerre de la Marne but I don't speak French and cannot determine the copyright. Can anyone assist? I'm thinking specifically of the photos captioned "La destruction de Lidice" and "Les décombres de Lidice" (the latter of which would replace an image already on the Lidice article that will soon be deleted). Evixir (talk) 18:07, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

New section

I have removed the section on Lidice's sister cities, which stated that Lidice has been twinned with the town of Khojaly, or that a street has been named after Khojaly in Lidice. This has been done on the basis of communication I have held with the Mayor of Lidice, Tomas Skala, who was kind enough to sent me the following letter:

"Dear _______,

I would like to respond to your email for Lidice memorial about future names of Lidice streets. It is not truth that there was made any final decision. First period of new development will be started during next year 2011. So final decision of future names of streets will be made by Lidice council during next year as well.

Yours sincerely
Tomas Skala

Mayor of Lidice

So, until we hear some news reported in third-party sources, we should refrain from re-inserting that section. I have sent a new letter to Mr. Skala regarding further clarification on the matter so hopefully we will hear from him soon.--Marshal Bagramyan (talk) 18:55, 28 October 2010 (UTC)

The letter is not about sister cities so your removal seems very strange. Added Czech source for Khojaly. --Quantum666 (talk) 07:11, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

Hm... That's confusing since I was in communication with Lidice City Administration back in April 2010 and specifically with the department which deals with towns and municipalities, and here is what the person in charge kindly sent me:

"Dear _______,

I have just verified the information about the partnership between Czech municipality of Lidice and municipality of Khojaly from Azerbaijan and I can confirm that the official partnership agreement has been recently signed. As the partnership is quite new, there is still no information about it on their website.

Kind regards,
Olga Kučerová

Union of Towns and Municipalities of the Czech Republic External Relations

So, until there is any other information disproving the confirmation above and pieces by quite a few Azerbaijani and Czech news agencies, please do not remove anything. Thank you! Tuscumbia (talk) 13:42, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

An original newspaper ( for sale on the web ) article about Lidice says that 75% of the women survived. Also the children who were considered Aryan, almost all survived. The other children were untraceable but their deaths were never confirmed. It appears that the story grew with time - it was plenty bad enough without the embellishments.159.105.80.220 (talk) 19:02, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

Of course historical revisionism and neo-Nazis deny the reality of the Lidice massacre and subsequent murders. The people of the Czech Republic do not deny the horrendous war crime that happened in their country. Interesting to note that the deaths were a reality. None of the victims ever returned. That is fact. There was no need to embellish the incident. To claim this is grossly offensive and inaccurate. The dead deserve more respect. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 144.134.185.242 (talk) 02:35, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

There is no reason to change anything at this point. The cited text from reliable sources (WP:RS) is the standard used herein for articles. They state the details of the massacre. Otherwise, there are WP:FRINGE and WP:VERIFY problems with the "original newspaper" above. Kierzek (talk) 16:01, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Copy Edit work done

I have done copy edit work (WP:COPYEDIT) and made edits for concision to the lead (as it should only briefly summarize the most important points covered in an article in a concise way - See:Wikipedia:LEAD); I have corrected spelling of words; properly linked words; added properly cited text and removed the redundancy to the article. Like many articles it can use more work and cites added. Please don't revert to prior versions; it will only needlessly create more work, put back up errors and give a less polished version for general readers. Kierzek (talk) 15:52, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Pronunciation?

How is Lidice pronounced in English and Czech? (lee dice, lih dice, lee dissy, lih dissy, ...?)--Wikimedes (talk) 05:34, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

li-dyi-tse Deiwi (talk) 15:56, 10 June 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for creating the Czech village article

Wikipedia policy guidelines require that the article about the geographical location be named after that location, meanwhile the massacre in Lidice could either be a part of its history section or split into a separate article named Lidice massacre. Poeticbent talk 18:56, 19 June 2016 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for File:Lidice massacred men.jpg

File:Lidice massacred men.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a non-free use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Non-free use rationale guideline is an easy way to ensure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images lacking such an explanation can be deleted one week after being tagged, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

-- Marchjuly (talk) 07:28, 13 October 2017 (UTC)

Phrasing: "All male grownups of the town were shot"

Is this an accurate quotation or translation? "Grownup" is a very childish word, unlike "adult". It really jars in this context. Equinox ◑ 14:27, 18 February 2024 (UTC)

Equinox, I agree and would change it if it wasn't in a quote; I can't find a copy that I can access directly from the NYT or AP, but https://www.rarenewspapers.com/view/661069 does seem to corroborate this being a correct quotation. Perhaps a matter of translation/mediocre English knowledge by the transmitter? LittlePuppers (talk) 21:01, 18 February 2024 (UTC)

@LittlePuppers: I'm inclined to say "if we can't find it, we shouldn't cite it". Equinox ◑ 04:38, 21 February 2024 (UTC)

@Equinox: the link in my previous post does have an image which contains most of the text of that quote (including "grownups"). A full version of the article I'm sure is available from a variety of sources, just not for free online. (That is, you could find it online if you pay, or for free if you have access to a library with extensive older archives of NYT.) See also WP:SOURCEACCESS. LittlePuppers (talk) 06:40, 21 February 2024 (UTC)