English Translation

In accordance with my previous report, I have decided to impose forced
administration on the confiscated properties of ten principal exponents
of the Czech nobility, namely Kinský, Belcredi, Sternberg,
Schwarzenberg, Lobkowicz, Czernin, Kolowrat, Strachwitz, etc. The
above-mentioned gentlemen belong to those intellectual agitators who,
in the Reich and in the Ostmark, exploit their German names and noble
connections for subversive activities, particularly espionage. The
reason I have decided upon this measure is the "Declaration of loyalty
to the Czech state" which these aristocrats sent on behalf of the Czech
nobility to Beneš on 17 September 1938.
I remain with German greetings, Heil Hitler
Yours, Reinhard Heydrich
SS-Obergruppenführer
Prague, 18 May 1942
PROVENANCE AND CITATION
Source of this transcription: Czech-language transcription supplied by Jan Drocár
to Alexander Hannibal Czernin Fishlock by email, 28 February 2026.
Jan Drocár: Employee of the Chamber of Deputies of the Parliament of the Czech
Republic; secretary of the National Committee for Preparations of the 700th
Anniversary of the Birth of Charles IV (2016); editor-in-chief, Historická šlechta
(www.historickaslechta.cz, published in Czech).
Published scholarly citation: Zdeněk Hazdra, 'Česká šlechta v časech nacistické
okupace (malé zamyšlení),' in Válečný prožitek české společnosti v konfrontaci s
nacistickou okupací (1939–1945), ÚSTR, Prague, pp. 33–50, at p. 47 and fn. 27.
Hazdra cites a copy from the personal family archive of Theobald Czernin
(Dymokury).
Original German document: Not yet located. The letter was written by Heydrich in
German. This Czech text is a translation from the German original. The archival
location of the German original has not yet been confirmed. Priority search
targets: Národní archiv Prague (inv. 2736, inv. 1583); Bundesarchiv Berlin (NS 6
— Party Chancellery fonds); personal family archive of Theobald Czernin at
Dymokury.