Gustav Schwarzenegger

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Gustav Schwarzenegger

Gustav Schwarzenegger in an ID photo from the Austrian State Archives
Born August 17, 1907(1907-08-17)
Austria-Hungary
Died December 1, 1972 (aged 65)
Flag of Austria Steiermark, Austria

Gustav Schwarzenegger (August 17, 1907 – December 1, 1972) was an Austrian police chief (Gendarmeriekommandant), postal inspector, a senior non-commissioned military police officer, who later became notable as the father of Hollywood star and Governor of California Arnold Schwarzenegger.

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[edit] Biography

Gustav Schwarzenegger, the son of Karl Schwarzenegger, married war widow Aurelia Jadrny (July 2, 1922 – August 2, 1998) on October 5, 1945, in Mursteg, Steiermark, Austria. He died in Weiz, Steiermark, Austria at the age of 65, where he had been transferred as a policeman. He is buried in Weiz Cemetery, Weiz, Steiermark, Austria. Aurelia Jadrny Schwarzenegger died of a heart attack at the age of 76 while visiting Weiz Cemetery in 1998 and she is buried next to her husband.

His son, Arnold Schwarzenegger, stated in the film Pumping Iron that he did not attend his father's funeral, but later retracted this, explaining that it was a story he had appropriated from a boxer to make it appear as though he could prevent his personal life from interfering with his athletic training.[1] News reports about Gustav's Nazi links first surfaced in 1990, at which time Arnold asked the Simon Wiesenthal Center, an organization he had long supported, to research his father's past. The Center found Gustav's army records and Nazi party membership, but did not uncover any connection to the notorious paramilitary organization, the Schutzstaffel (SS).[2] Media interest resurfaced when Arnold ran for Governor in the 2003 recall election. According to the New York Times in an October, 2003 article," a film producer who chronicled Arnold Schwarzenegger's rise to fame as a champion bodybuilder in the 1970s circulated a book proposal six years ago that quoted the young Mr. Schwarzenegger expressing admiration for Adolf Hitler." The book proposal by the producer, George Butler, included what were presented as verbatim excerpts from interviews with Mr. Schwarzenegger in the filming of the documentary Pumping Iron. In a part of the interview not used in the film, Mr. Schwarzenegger was asked to name his heroes -- who do you admire most. Mr. Schwarzanegger denied ever making such statements. [3]

[edit] Nazi Party and SA membership

According to documents obtained in 2003 from the Austrian State Archives by the Los Angeles Times, which was after the expiration of a 30-year seal of his records under Austrian privacy law, Gustav Schwarzenegger voluntarily applied to join the Nazi Party, in 1938, when it was still illegal in Austria. He also voluntarily applied to become a member of the Sturmabteilung (SA), the NSDAP's paramilitary wing, on May 1, 1939 about 6 months after the bloody national pogrom against the Jews and at the time that Jews in Graz (Schwarzenegger's hometown) were being actively rounded up and sent to concentration camps. The Brown Shirts was a organisation that was primarily responsible for the persecution of the Jews and clearing them from Graz, a process called Aryanization. Gustav Schwarzenegger as a member of the Brown Shirts probably participated in making his hometown "Judenfrei", clear of the Jews. [2] Austria became part of the German Reich through the Anschluss on March 12, 1938.

[edit] Military career

Schwarzenegger was a Hauptfeldwebel (about the equivalent of a Company Sergeant Major)[4] with Battalion 521[5] of the Feldgendarmerie, which were military police units attached to regular army units for traffic control, to enforce military law, and battlefield security, only being used to control civilian populations in the combat zone of the German army. Supporting the Einsatzgruppen that carried out mass murder of political elites, Jews and others in this area was a routing function of the Wehrmacht and especially the military police. The Feldgendarmerie were also notorious for summarily executing suspected partisans and retaliating against villages suspected or partisan activity. Late in the war, such units were also used to impose draconian measures against both "defeatist" German civilians and military personnel alike. Schwarzenegger appears to have received much medical attention and may have contracted malaria during his term of service; he was discharged in 1943.[2]

Ursula Schwarz, a historian at Vienna's Documentation Center for Austrian Resistance, has said that Schwarzenegger's career was fairly typical for his generation [6], and no evidence has emerged that has directly linked him with participation in war crimes or abuses against civilians. He resumed his police career in 1947.

[edit] Notes and references

  1. ^ Nick Gillespie (July 31, 2003). Hasta la Vista, Arnold: How Schwarzenegger could have liberated U.S. politics. Retrieved on 2006-11-13.
  2. ^ a b c Tracy Wilkinson and Matt Lait. "Austrian Archives Reveal Nazi Military Role of Actor's Father", Los Angeles Times, August 14, 2003. Retrieved on 2006-11-14. 
  3. ^ ADAM NAGOURNEY AND DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK (October 3, 2003). THE CALIFORNIA RECALL: A CANDIDATE'S WORDS; Schwarzenegger Admired Hitler, Book Proposal Says. [(New York Times)].
  4. ^ Neither Robert E. Witter's Chain Dogs: The German Army Military Police of World War II,Pictorial Histories Pub. Co., Missoula, MT, ISBN 0-929521-86-2 nor the US Army's G-2 report on the German Police, April 1945 list Hauptfeldwebel as a rank. Hauptfeldwebel is a company-level administrative appointment denoting the senior non-commissioned officer of the unit, and can be held by either of the two highest Feldwebel ranks. Perhaps the confusion is that the -civil [ordnungspolizei]- police rank equivalent to a US Army sergeant major is "hauptwachtmeister", while the -military- police rank equivalent is "stabsfeldwebel", I is what is believe Schwarzenegger's actual rank was.
  5. ^ Feldgendarmerie abteilung 521 was formed in Vienna, and served in Poland, France, and with 4th Panzer Army in the Ukraine and Western Russia, 1941-44.
  6. ^ Spotlight Thrown on Nazi Past of Schwarzenegger's Father
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