Hanzelka family photograph

Venant Hanzelka was born in 1906 in Frydek, Austria-Hungary (Fryldek-Milstek, Czech Republic). He had an older brother Alfons, born in 1896, also in Frydek. After the defeat of the Austro-Hungarian Empire in World War I (1914-1918), Bohemia, Moravia, and part of Silesia were unified into the nation of Czechoslovakia. Venant became an architect, settled in Brno, Czechoslovakia (Czech Republic), and married Stepanka. Alfons moved to Strelice, just outside of Brno, and worked for Czechoslovak State Railways as a chief clerk. Venant, Stepanka, and Alfons were active members in their local Sokols, gymnastic societies that promoted communal spirit, physical fitness, and nationalism on a local level. Alfons served as an officer in Sokol Strelice after its construction in 1932, and eventually became the county chief for Sokol Brno. Venant and Stepanka had their only child, Hana, on October 7, 1938, in Brno.

In September 1938, a conference was held in Munich where Great Britain, France and Italy agreed to Germany’s annexation of the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia in exchange for a promise of peace from Hitler. Czechoslovakia was not invited to the conference but was pressured to agree the plan. On March 15, 1939, Germany invaded and claimed the Bohemia and Moravia regions of Czechoslovakia, where Brno was located. Slovakia became independent and Hungary annexed the remaining Transcarpathian region. Czechoslovakia ceased to exist. Alfons, Venant, and Stepanka became active members of an underground group, Hal, opposed to the German occupiers. It was part of the democratic Defense of the Nation movement and was coordinated by the Czech Army. Alfons, because of his prominence as a Sokol official, was arrested on September 1, 1939, the same day Germany invaded Poland. He was held for several weeks in Spilberk Castle in Brno and then released. Venant continued to work as an architect and many of his designs were published in book form. In early 1940, the Defense of the Nation joined with several other democratic resistance groups. Until 1941, this new group, the Central Committee of the Home Resistance, received instructions from the Czech government-in-exile in London. On May 27, 1942, there was an assassination attempt on Reich Protector Reinhard Heydrich. He died of his injuries on June 4. The German reprisal was brutal, more than 3000 Czech citizens were arrested with over half killed, and the entire village of Lidice was decimated.

In 1942, Alfons was arrested by the Gestapo and imprisoned in Brno before being transported to Auschwitz concentration camp. His arrest caused Stepanka and Hana to go into hiding at an old mill in the woods near the town of Svojanov in the Pardubice region. Venant did not hide with them, but would meet them in the forest sometimes. Stepanka and Hana remained in hiding until Germany surrendered on May 7, 1945 and were reunited with Venant. The family returned to Brno, and learned that Alfons was killed on November 9, 1942, in Auschwitz. Venant resumed his career in architecture and published his final book of designs in 1955.