This is an IHeart podcast.

Welcome to Aaron Menke's Cabinet of Curiosity's, A production of IHeart Radio and grim and mild.

Our world is full of the unexplainable.

And if history is an open book, all of these amazing tales are right there on display, just waiting for us to explore.

Welcome to the Cabinet of Curiosity's.

Homer's Odyssey is one of the foundational literary works of Western civilization for a reason.

It speaks to the journey that we all take in life, braving various difficulties as we struggle to find, home, whatever that might mean for each of us.

For some people, home is a metaphor. For others, it's a very literal place.

During World War I in Russia, one band of soldiers tried desperately to return to their homeland.

But to get there, they had to fight several armies and travel in the completely wrong direction.

The Czech and Slovak people are two distinct subgroups of Slavs who suffered under the oppression

of the Austro-Hungarian Empire for decades. Austria had closer ethnic ties to Germany, and so

at the onset of World War I in 1914, they sided with Germany and the central powers.

This gave the Czechs and Slovak's the opportunity to declare their own state, Czechoslovakia,

and fight with the Allied powers.

Now, this Czechoslovakian Legion fought on many fronts, but the bulk of their force was stationed

in Russia. The Legion consisted of over

40,000 soldiers, as well as wives, children, and civilian aides. They helped Tsar Nicholas's

armies fight the Germans until the fateful year of 1917, when the Russian Civil War broke

out, and the Czechoslovakianion suddenly found themselves in an awkward position.

Russia withdrew for World War I as internal struggles between the Red Bolsheviks and the

white Tsarists tore the country apart. The Czechoslovak Legion didn't want to choose a side.

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