Edith Gadawits

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Edith Gadawits , later married Edith Schober (born on August 18, 1924 in Vienna ; died on March 6, 2013 there ) was an Austrian resistance fighter against National Socialism . She was sentenced to death by the Nazi judiciary together with Felix Imre at the age of only 19 and was on death row for seven months . Then the sentence was changed to twelve years in prison.

Life

Gadawits was a member of the Communist Youth Association of Austria (KJVÖ) and the resistance group The Soldiers' Council, which operated anti-fascist agitation among members of the German Wehrmacht . Like many in these groups, she was very close to nature, loved hiking and mountaineering. During a climbing trip on the Peilstein, she met Felix Imre from Pottenstein , who then joined the soldiers ' council. The young communists of the resistance group were observed by the Gestapo and arrested one after the other from July 1941, finally sentenced to death in numerous cases by the People's Court and executed with the guillotine . It later emerged that the Gestapo had smuggled a spy into the group, Grete Kahane . Gadawits was arrested on February 28, 1943, and Imre at an unknown date.

On September 24, 1943 Gadawits - together with Gertrude Hausner, Felix Imre and Anna Senhofer - stood before the 5th Senate of the People's Court in Krems. At this point in time two members of the soldiers' council had already been executed - the 23-year-old seamstress Rosa Hofmann in Berlin and the likewise 23-year-old locksmith Rudolf Masl in Vienna. Gadawits and Imre were sentenced to death by guillotine , Hausner and Senhofer each to twelve years in prison . While Gadawits' appeal for clemency was still being processed, the Nazi regime transferred Felix Imre to the Vienna Regional Court , where he was beheaded on November 2, 1943. Seven months after she was sentenced to death, Gadawits learned of the conversion of the sentence to twelve years in prison.

After the fall of the Nazi regime , Gadawits married the Spanish fighter Rupert Schober (1912–1994). In 1962 she published an article under the name Edith Schober about her time on death row and the women who were waiting with her for her execution, about their psychological stress and about those who were not fortunate enough to be pardoned.

In the post-Nazi era, Gadawits worked as a witness in schools and at numerous events: “True to her conviction that it is worth changing the world, she told young people about the illegal, anti-fascist struggle at events.”

literature

  • Edith Schober: I was on death row for seven months.
    • First published in: "Tagebuch", November 1962, p. 7
    • Also in full length in: Willi Weinert: “You can put me out, but not the fire”: a guide through the grove of honor of Group 40 at the Vienna Central Cemetery for the executed resistance fighters . Verlag Alfred-Klahr-Ges., 3rd edition 2011, 153 [1]
  • Tilly Spiegel : Women and Girls in the Austrian Resistance , Europa-Verlag 1967, 57

proof

  1. ↑ Charlotte Rombach: Resistance and Liberation 1934–1945: Zeitzeugen Report , neobooks 2013, ISBN 9783847661825
  2. ^ University of Vienna : Austrian Women in Resistance , article about Gertrude Hausner, written by Christine Kanzler, accessed on May 17, 2015
  3. ^ Concentration camp association : Sentenced to death - pardoned after seven months: Edith Schober (August 18, 1924 - March 6, 2013) , accessed on May 14, 2015
  4. ^ Alfred-Klahr-Gesellschaft : Mitteilungen , J. 2011, N.4, 27f
personal data
SURNAME Gadawits, Edith
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Schober, Edith
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian resistance fighter against National Socialism
DATE OF BIRTH August 18, 1924
PLACE OF BIRTH Vienna
DATE OF DEATH March 6, 2013
Place of death Vienna