The trial of hated Dr. Josef Pfitzner, Czechoslovakia's No. 3 war criminal,* took three days. The greying, pasty-faced Czech historian, of German descent, who had served the Nazis as Lord Mayor of Prague, shrilly defended his collaboration, swore that he had been loyal to the Republic. The People's Court in Prague heard him patiently, weighed his words against his deeds: persecution of Jews, jailing of students, Germanizing of Czechs, toadying to Hitler. Then it sentenced him to death for high treason.
Three hours later the prisoner shuffled from the courthouse to a scarlet-draped gallows in a crowded public square. Three black-uniformed executioners—university students whom he had sent to concentration camp—stood waiting.
A murmur rippled through the tense crowd as the traitor reached the scaffold. The sentence was read again. The executioners lifted him by a leather strap under his armpits into the crowd's full view. They slipped the noose around his neck. Suddenly, in guttural German, Pfitzner half-shouted, half-croaked:
"I die for Germany!"
An angry executioner slapped the traitor's face, sprang the trap.
*No. 1: Governor Karl Hermann Frank. No. 2: Police General Kurt Daluege, successor to assassinated Reinhard (Hangman) Heydrich. Both are awaiting trial.