Klement Gottwald

Klement Gottwald
Klement Gottwald in June 1948
Chairman of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia
In office
23 February 1929 – 14 March 1953
General Secretary 1929–1945
Preceded byBohumil Jílek
(General Secretary)
Succeeded byAntonín Novotný
(First Secretary)
President of Czechoslovakia
In office
14 June 1948 – 14 March 1953
Prime MinisterAntonín Zápotocký
Preceded byEdvard Beneš
Succeeded byAntonín Zápotocký
Prime Minister of Czechoslovakia
In office
2 July 1946 – 15 June 1948
PresidentEdvard Beneš
Preceded byZdenek Fierlinger
Succeeded byAntonín Zápotocký
Personal details
Born(1896-11-23)23 November 1896
Vyškov District, Moravia, Austria-Hungary
Died14 March 1953(1953-03-14) (aged 56)
Prague, Czechoslovakia
Political partyKSČ
Spouse
Marta Holubová
(m. 1928)
ChildrenMarta (1920–1998)
ProfessionCabinetmaker
Newspaper editor
Signature

Klement Gottwald (Czech pronunciation: [ˈklɛmɛnt ˈɡotvalt]; 23 November 1896 – 14 March 1953) was a Czech communist politician, who was the leader of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia from 1929 until his death in 1953 – titled as general secretary until 1945 and as chairman from 1945 to 1953. He was the first leader of Communist Czechoslovakia from 1948 to 1953.[1]

Following the collapse of democratic Czechoslovakia after the Munich Agreement, the right-wing leadership of the Czechoslovak Second Republic banned the Communist Party, forcing Gottwald to emigrate to the Soviet Union in November 1938. In 1943, Gottwald agreed with representatives of the Czechoslovak-government-in-exile located in London, along with President Edvard Beneš, to unify domestic and foreign anti-fascist resistance and form the National Front. He was the 14th prime minister of Czechoslovakia from July 1946 until June 1948, the first Communist to hold the post. In June 1948, he was elected as Czechoslovakia's first Communist president, four months after the 1948 coup d'état in which his party seized power with the backing of the Soviet Union. He held the post until his death.

  1. ^ Skilling, H. Gordon. "Gottwald and the Bolshevization of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (1929-1939)." American Slavic and East European Review 20.4 (1961): 641-655.