Elisabeth Waldheim

Elisabeth Waldheim

Elisabeth Waldheim , née Ritschel (born April 13, 1922 in Vienna ; † February 28, 2017 there ), was the wife of the Austrian diplomat and politician Kurt Waldheim from 1944 and first lady of the Republic of Austria from 1986 to 1992 .

Life

Elisabeth Ritschel was born as the eldest daughter of Wilhelm and Hildegard Ritschel, née Jahutka. She had two younger sisters, the twins Margaritha and Erika Ritschel. Like many girls of her generation, she was baptized after her in memory of the Austrian Empress Elisabeth . Her parents came from a family of professional officers , her father, who actually wanted to become an engineer , had been an officer in the First World War . After the defeat of Austria-Hungary and the end of the Danube Monarchy , he worked in the private sector until his death in 1962 , her mother was a housewife . Elisabeth Ritschel's parents' house was Catholic , bourgeois and German national ; Her father had become a member of the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP) after the so-called Anschluss of Austria , because he hoped for an improvement in his economic situation.

The Ritschel family lived in Josefstadt , Vienna's 8th district, near Burggasse. Elisabeth Ritschel initially attended the boarding school of the Notre Dame de Sion convent school in Vienna, in contrast to her sisters, who were allowed to attend a public primary school right from the start of their school career. Later she switched to the middle school in Hietzing . At the age of 17 she became a member of the Bund Deutscher Mädel (BDM), at 18 a member of the NSDAP. Elisabeth Ritschel, later Waldheim, stated that at the age of 18 she had been transferred from the BDM to the NSDAP, which would have been inadmissible according to the party's statutes . In December 1943, according to her own statements from 1986, on the occasion of her upcoming engagement, at the request of her future husband , she resigned from the NSDAP, but the NSDAP did not become aware of this: this is indicated by the lack of a resignation note in the NSDAP membership file; of there also missing from circuit 's report indicated that their membership fees have been paid until the end.

About her relationship with the Nazi state shortly after her marriage is known: “In January 1945, she passed on touching slogans from the front to her fellow student Hilde: 'She said that Kurt was back in Vienna, we have to hold on. The final victory will come. '"

With the date of March 12, 1940 and the final grades of the 7th grade of the women's high school in Vienna 13th, Wenzgasse , Elisabeth Ritschel received, without having taken the actual Matura , a “leaving certificate”, which showed her “as a pupil of the eighth grade” but it never actually was. Furthermore, the certificate bears the following note: “The pupil is awarded the maturity certificate based on the decree of September 8, 1939 - E III a 1947, W EV (b) .” This decree was subject to the restriction that “the pupil can provide a certificate of dutiful work in important military service for the entire period up to the end of the school year ”. The information about which important military service she could certify was later refused by her.

In the summer of 1940, she became the Reich Labor Service for harvesting after Roisdorf in Bonn committed. From autumn 1940 E. Ritschel studied law at the University of Vienna . In late 1942 she met while studying Kurt Waldheim, who also law studied.

In 1943, Elisabeth Ritschel finished her studies after six semesters with the “legal trainee examination” and since then has been awarded the academic title of Magister . During her studies she completed practical training at the District Court of Dornbirn and at the Commercial Court of Vienna. Before and after her marriage, E. Ritschel worked briefly for two years. From the summer of 1943 she completed her assessor training , in which she was assigned to the Liesing District Court and the Vienna Higher Regional Court . The engagement took place at Christmas 1943, while Kurt Waldheim was on vacation at home . On August 19, 1944, they married in the Karlskirche in Vienna . On this occasion she rejoined the church , who had previously left the Catholic Church in the course of the National Socialist information policy . The Waldheim couple had to break off their planned honeymoon by train to Mariazell shortly after the start of the journey because of the Allied air raids on Austria. They spent their wedding night in an overcrowded air raid shelter outside Vienna.

Elisabeth Waldheim experienced the end of the war on a farm in Ramsau near Schladming in Upper Styria , where her first daughter Liselotte was born on May 7, 1945. In August 1945 she returned to Baden near Vienna , where her husband's family lived. She did not resume her own professional activity as a lawyer after the Second World War.

As a result, Elisabeth Waldheim accompanied her husband on his diplomatic and political stays abroad. In her “main job” she was henceforth a diplomatic wife. During Waldheim's time as UN Secretary-General , she devoted herself to charity tasks in New York and did extensive fundraising , especially for UNICEF , the United Nations Children's Fund . Among other things, she started a media-effective collection campaign for UNICEF at the John F. Kennedy International Airport , in which the stewardesses collected the change of the passengers left over from foreign currencies . On the occasion of a gala evening at the UN , she organized a Beach Boys concert to raise money for UNICEF.

In July 1986 Elisabeth Waldheim became the First Lady of Austria . She continued to take on charity tasks, organized the annual UN Christmas bazaars, supported the Catholic religious order Caritas Socialis in Vienna and other charity organizations. In 1985 and 1986 Elisabeth Waldheim was Ball President of the Philharmonic Ball of the Vienna Philharmonic .

In 1994 she was awarded the Orden Pro Ecclesia et Pontifice . The award was made by the papal nuncio Archbishop Donato Squicciarini as part of the celebrations for the golden wedding of Kurt and Elisabeth Waldheim, which took place in the house of the Waldheims on Lake Attersee in Nussdorf .

In July 2010, Waldheim was one of the former First Lady of Austria to the swearing-in of the then Federal President Heinz Fischer to the guests of honor.

Elisabeth Waldheim died at the age of 95 on February 28, 2017. Former Federal President Heinz Fischer praised her as a “brave woman”, “who has stood by her husband's side for more than six decades, even in difficult times”. You have fulfilled your tasks in an exemplary manner.

She had three children with Kurt Waldheim. Her daughter Christa is married to the ÖVP politician Othmar Karas .

Awards

• 1994: Pro Ecclesia et Pontifice

literature

• Senta Ziegler: Austria's first ladies. From Luise Renner to Margot Klestil-Löffler. Ueberreuter, Vienna 1999, ISBN 3-8000-3719-X , p. 82ff.

Web links

Commons : Elisabeth Waldheim  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} Elisabeth Waldheim died . Österreichischer Rundfunk , February 28, 2017, accessed on March 1, 2017.
2. ↑ ^{a b c d} Kurt Waldheim: In the glass palace of world politics . Econ publishing house. Düsseldorf Vienna. 1985. pp. 29-45. ISBN 3-430-19453-9
3. ↑ ^{a b} Waldheim to Fight Bias; Wife Was Nazi . AP article in the Los Angeles Times , June 11, 1986, accessed March 1, 2017.
4. ↑ Mrs. Waldheim was a member of the NSDAP. (No longer available online.) Hamburger Abendblatt , June 12, 1986, archived from the original on August 9, 2013 ; accessed on March 1, 2017 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
5. ↑ Facsimile from the membership file of the NSDAP, where it is listed under No. 9027854 and (as in the examination file of the University of Vienna) as resident at Vienna 9th, Spitalgasse 1a, in: FORVM XXXIV. Jahr, January / February 1987, issue 395/396, p. 12 f .; Facsimile from the judicial trainee examination file: ibid, p. 14.
6. ↑ profile No. 27 of June 30, 1986, p. 23; The name of profil changed, the article remained undisputed and unappealed.
7. ↑ Facsimile of the "Abgangszeugnis Ritschel Elisabeth", which she herself had made available, of the decree and of a normal "Abitur- und Reifezeugnis" from the same year at the same school in: FORVM lc, p. 18 f.
8. ↑ ^{a b} UN secretary-general's wife has little time to herself . AP article in The Montreal Gazette , December 1, 1972, accessed March 1, 2017.
9. ^ That was the first legal examination before the judicial examination office at the Higher Regional Court of Vienna. The “examination certificate” with the grade “good”, issued on July 20, 1943, as a facsimile in: FORVM lc p. 15.
10. ↑ §17 BGBl. 140 of March 21, 1978.
11. ^ Edith Reinisch: Nazi perpetrators in the media 1986-2005. S. 5. ( Online in Google Books .)
12. ^ Regina Pöll: Ambassador wives fight for social security . In: Die Presse , January 7, 2009, accessed on March 1, 2017.
13. ↑ Senta Ziegler: Austria's First Ladies , p. 82 .
14. ↑ Caritas Socialis Christmas Bazaar: Photos. (No longer available online.) Toppress Austria, 2006, archived from the original on September 16, 2009 ; accessed on March 1, 2017 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
15. ↑ The History of the Philharmonic Ball. Website of the Vienna Philharmonic, January 14, 2013, archived from the original on January 14, 2013 ; accessed on March 1, 2017 . 
16. ↑ Vatican Honors Waldheim's Wife . In: The Washington Post , August 22, 1994.
    Waldheim's Wife Gets a Papal Award . In: New York Times , August 22, 1994, accessed March 1, 2017.
17. ↑ Heinz Fischer started his second term in office. (No longer available online.) Niederösterreichische Nachrichten , July 8, 2010, formerly in the original ; accessed on March 1, 2017 .  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.   Katharina Schmidt: A first attempt at clearer words . In: Wiener Zeitung , July 9, 2010, accessed on March 1, 2017.