Heliodor P�ka (3. 7. 1897 - 21. 6. 1949 Plze�) - Czechoslovak professional soldier, legionnaire and member of the anti-communist resistance. He became one of the first victims of the infamous processes after the Communist coup in 1948. He was rehabilitated twenty years later.

Heliodor P�ka Born the son of a wheelwright in �t�tina Opava. After finishing secondary school in Opava planned to continue his studies in Prague, but his fate intervened war. In 1915 he joined the Austro-Hungarian army with the rank of warrant officer and was a company commander sent to the Russian front. On the side of the monarchy but the fight did not last long and already in July 1916 in Ukraine was captured by Russian troops. He soon joined the Czechoslovak Legions that ripped through Siberia, Vladivostok and headed to France. There P�ka and his regiment participated in heavy fighting on the Alsatian front. He returned to Czechoslovakia January 9, 1919 as a lieutenant. He took part in a military confrontation with Polish troops in the battle for T��nsko and then was moved to Slovakia, where for a change conflict erupted with the Hungarian units. Young Republic needed capable of commanding cadres and Heliodor P�ka was due combat experience, proven courage and sense of strategy, one of the hot candidates. First, he graduated from the military academy at Saint-Cyr in France and in 1926, even as a staff captain, began studying at the Academy of Military in Paris. In the years 1932-1937 he worked under the Department of Defense as a military attach� in Bucharest.

After the occupation of Czechoslovakia by German troops went to the Balkans, where they helped people fleeing from the Protectorate. He himself has not avoided arrest, but managed to escape to Istanbul. In 1941, he went on behalf of President Benes to the Soviet Union, where he participated in the construction of the Czechoslovak combat troops. In 1943 he was appointed brigadier general after the war, then the rank of major general became Deputy Chief of Staff.

After the coup in February 1948, was accused of treason in a show trial and sentenced to death. He was executed June 21, 1949 in Pilsen Bory prison. In the same prison was held also by his son Milan, who during the war served with the British RAF. After pressure from Ludvik Svoboda, the authorities release him.

Milan P�ka throughout strove for clearing the name of his father. Also, thanks to his involvement in the 1968 trial actually restored. A military court in Prague acknowledged that the condemnation Heliodor peaks was no evidence of a fully rehabilitated him.