Erwin Aichinger

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Erwin Aichinger (born September 17, 1894 in Bleiberg , Carinthia , † March 6, 1985 in Bad Kleinkirchheim ) was an Austrian forest scientist who emerged primarily as a plant sociologist.

Training and beginnings in Carinthia

Aichinger's father Josef was a pharmacist, his mother Vinzenzia Reisinger was a nobleman.

After finishing high school in Villach, Aichinger attended the higher forestry school in Bruck an der Mur . In 1915 he enlisted in the high mountain troops and was promoted to first lieutenant. He was seriously injured in the last Isonzo battle in 1917. Then he was able to finish the training.

After the war he took part in the Carinthian defensive battle in 1919.

In 1921 Aichinger passed the state examination for forest managers. He first worked as a forestry adjunct in Griffen , Steyr and at the Bleiberger Bergwerksunion , and in 1922 he became forester at the Liechtenstein Forestry Office in Rosenbach . Friedrich von und zu Liechtenstein promoted his studies, which he conducted in Vienna, Prague, Montpellier, Zurich and Algiers. During this time he met Josias Braun-Blanquet , the founder of modern plant sociology, who was to have a strong influence on him. In 1927 Aichinger founded a “work center for alpine vegetation and soil culture” in Rosenbach, where he organized courses for foresters and farmers as well as educational hikes in the sociology of plants. With the Swiss Rudolf Siegrist he worked the gray alder forests on the Drau . In 1931 the office was attached to the International Geobotanical Institute in Montpellier .

In 1933 Aichinger published the monograph Vegetationskunde der Karawanken , his dissertation at the University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences in Vienna. His post-doctoral thesis in 1934 dealt with the Faakersee and its siltation, but was not accepted in Vienna. He gave up his position in Rosenbach and devoted himself exclusively to his plant-sociological work.

Aichinger came into contact with National Socialism at an early stage , among other things through his friend Hugo Herzog , Gauleiter of Carinthia, who had founded a local branch of the NSDAP in Rosenbach in 1922 . In 1924 Aichinger joined the movement still operating as DNSAP in Austria and from then on paid regular membership fees. After the annexation of Austria , he became a member of the NSDAP on October 11, 1940 with membership number 6.262.414, his membership was backdated to June 15, 1938. When he joined in 1924, no membership numbers had yet been assigned. During the wing battles of the 1920s, Aichinger switched to Theo Habicht and the regional inspector for Carinthia, Hans vom Kothen . During the political terror he worked in the group of Otto Spangaro and Odilo Globocnik as a propaganda and arms courier. He rose in the SD and became authorized representative of the NSDAP Carinthia. After the party was banned in June 1933, he was the link between the Gauleiters in Austria, the regional leadership in Munich and the party leadership in Berlin. After Hubert Klausner's rise to Gauleiter, Aichinger became his adjutant. His political commitment was probably the reason why Aichinger lost his listing as an expert for forestry and that he did not receive a venia legendi .

Professorship and wartime

In 1936 Aichinger became a professor at the University of Freiburg at the chair for forest protection, forest use and plant sociology. In 1938 his admission to the SS was proposed. In the course of his scientific and political review, Franz Kutschera judged : "He is not only in scientific, but also in character and political respect." On July 1, 1939, Aichinger was admitted to the personal staff of the Reichsführer SS . He rose to become SS-Obersturmbannführer .

After the connection, Aichinger received the order from the forest master Anton Reinthaller to reorganize the forestry department at the Vienna University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences. In 1939 he became full professor of plant sociology here . In the summer he continued to run his institute in Carinthia, which had since moved to Villach and was taken over by the Province of Carinthia in 1942 and affiliated with the university.

In September 1939, Aichinger joined the 139 Mountain Infantry Regiment, and operations at the front are documented until 1944. In between he always had vacation time for his scientific work. Aichinger's goal during this time was to put plant sociology at the service of self-sufficiency in the context of the war economy.

In the course of the war, however, Aichinger's attitude towards National Socialism changed. He had already spoken out against the dismissal of Jewish professors. He also worked to save the Carinthian forests from complete deforestation, which he largely succeeded in doing. In 1941 he protested in writing to Heinrich Himmler , with whom he had known personally since 1926, against the resettlement of the Carinthian Slovenes , he spoke of "arbitrary rule", "derailments", "sabotage of the German people" and "cultural disgrace". In September 1942 Aichinger rejected the Nazi racial theories in a lecture in Villach ; for him there were no higher or lower races. Nevertheless, he was awarded the Golden Party Badge in 1943 .

After the Hitler assassination of July 20, 1944 , he stood up for Erwin Planck , albeit in vain . Aichinger, however, did not find any connection with the resistance movement. In November 1944 Aichinger left the SS ancestral legacy .

post war period

After the war, in 1945/46 the People's Court Graz, Senate Klagenfurt, raised inquiries against Aichinger. He pleaded not guilty and defended himself, among other things, by stating that he "was never illegal, [...] in no way received the golden party badge or the rank of SS Sturmbannführer for political reasons" and that he "had no function whatsoever “In the NSDAP. Governor Hans Piesch was one of his exonerating witnesses . Aichinger was released in 1947 and the proceedings were discontinued.

After the Second World War , the institute was relocated to Arriach , and in 1952 to St. Georgen Castle at Sandhof near Klagenfurt . In 1951 Aichinger founded the Applied Plant Sociology series . In 1959 he founded the East Alpine-Dinaric Society for Vegetation Science with Maks Wraber from Ljubljana and Sandro Pignatti from Trieste . In 1965 Roland Stern took over the management of the institute. Aichinger lived in Bad Kleinkirchheim from 1981, where he died in 1985.

Works (selection)

  • Vegetation science of the Karawanken , Jena 1933.
  • Principles of forest vegetation science , 1949.
  • Plants as a forest location indicator , 1967.

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k Alfred Elste: Kärntens brown Elite , 1997.
  2. ↑ a b c d Helmut Hartl: Erwin Aichinger , 1998.
  3. ^ Kutschera to Schöne, Klagenfurt, December 13, 1938, BDC personal file. Quoted from Alfred Elste: Kärntens brown Elite , 1997, p. 29.
  4. ^ Landesgericht Klagenfurt, District Court Villach: Interrogation of the accused , dated July 17, 1947. Quoted from Alfred Elste: Kärntens brown Elite , 1997, p. 33f.

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Aichinger, Erwin
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian forest scientist and plant sociologist
DATE OF BIRTH 17th September 1894
PLACE OF BIRTH Bad Bleiberg , Carinthia
DATE OF DEATH March 6, 1985
Place of death Bad Kleinkirchheim , Carinthia