Hilsner case

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Contemporary cartoon that an analogy between Hilsner and Dreyfus affair manufactures

The Hilsner case , also known as the Hilsneriade, was a series of anti-Semitic legal proceedings in Austria-Hungary against Leopold Hilsner from Bohemia . In the affair, which aroused great media interest at the time, Tomáš Masaryk , the future Czechoslovak President, publicly opposed the allegations of ritual murder .

Course of events

Crime scene in the forest with an image of a saint

Anežka Hrůzová, a 19-year-old Catholic girl who lived in Malá Věžnice , was murdered on March 29, 1899 in the outskirts of the city of Polná . Her body was found in a forest three days later. Her throat had been cut. However, few traces of blood were found nearby. Pretty soon, the Jewish shoemaker Leopold Hilsner (also Hülsner , 1876–1928) was suspected of having committed a ritual murder .

Due to the public prejudice in the case of uninterrupted processing of the people and also because he could not produce a clear alibi, Hilsner was found guilty by the court and sentenced to death on September 16, 1899. During the trial, the representative of the accessory prosecution, Karel Baxa , member of the state parliament, repeatedly brought up the motive of ritual murder and thus ensured that the legend of the ritual murder was spread in the media and increased anti-Semitic resentment in Moravia.

On April 25, 1900 by the Prague Court of Cassation judgment annulled and ordered another trial. On November 14, 1900, the 17th day of the trial at the Písek jury , Hilsner was acquitted of direct complicity in the murder of Anežka Hrůzová, but sentenced to death by hanging as an accomplice in the murder of Marie Klimova (two years earlier). The judgment was upheld by the Supreme Court in Vienna.

Symbolic grave of Anežka Hrůzová near Polná

The philosophy professor and sociologist Tomáš Masaryk also attempted rehabilitation , whose work The Necessity of the Revision of the Polna Trials , published in Vienna, was confiscated in the Czech part of Bohemia . In the prevailing anti-Semitic climate, Masaryk lost his teaching post at Prague University . At his pressure, as well as that from Paris and Berlin, on June 11, 1901, Emperor Franz Joseph I converted the death sentence to heavy imprisonment for life. Hilsner served a large part of his imprisonment in Stein in Lower Austria .

On July 2, 1917, on the occasion of the name day of his son Otto , Emperor Karl I issued a political amnesty , which gave rise to interpellations in favor of Hilsner. On March 19, 1918, a delegation from the Austrian-Israelite Union led by Julius Ofner (1845–1924) turned to Justice Minister Hugo von Schauer (1862–1920) and asked for Hilsner's pardon. On March 24, 1918, Leopold Hilsner was able to leave Stein prison. However, in accordance with a public prosecutor's order from 1916, he was transferred to the Krems district authority and taken into police arrest , where a committee decision was to be made about his suitability for military service. Hilsner, visibly weakened by years of malnutrition, was brought to Vienna, where he had to wait for the muster .

In 1918 Hilsner became the protagonist of the silent short film The Drama of an Innocent Convicted / The Hilsner Case . The work was immediately censored by the authorities and after its (delayed) publication in 1920 it was only shown in the Jewish district of Vienna . In 1922 Hilsner, a professional traveling salesman, changed his family name to Heller .

Hilsner lived from 1918 in Vienna, Prague and at his family's hometown, Velké Meziříčí . On January 8 , 1928, he died in the Rothschild Hospital in Vienna . He is buried in the Vienna Central Cemetery , Jewish section, Gate 4, Group 10a, Row 8, Grave No. 4.

One of his supporters was the Floridsdorf district rabbi Joseph Samuel Bloch , who made rehabilitation attempts during Hilsner's lifetime and provided financial support to both him and his family.

Memorial plaque for Hilsner in Vienna

While commemorative events were held in Czechoslovakia 100 years later, the topic was hardly mentioned in Austria. The grave at the central cemetery could only be renovated again through a private initiative. In 2002 a memorial plaque was installed in Vienna- Leopoldstadt . On November 14, 2008 Hilsner was symbolically rehabilitated by the then Austrian Justice Minister Maria Berger ( SPÖ ) in a solemn ceremony at Vienna's central cemetery.

See also

literature

  • Frank Hadler: Hilsner affair. In: Dan Diner (Ed.): Encyclopedia of Jewish History and Culture (EJGK). Volume 3: He-Lu. Metzler, Stuttgart / Weimar 2012, ISBN 978-3-476-02503-6 , pp. 43-46.
  • T (omáš) G (arrigue) Masaryk: The meaning of the Polna crime for ritual superstition . HS Herrmann, Berlin 1900. - Full text online .
  • Max Grunwald : On the psychology and history of the blood ritual mania. The trial of Simon von Trient and Leopold Hilsner. Lecture . Calvary, Berlin 1906. - Full text online .
  • Arthur Nussbaum : The Polna ritual murder trial. A criminal psychological investigation based on records. With a foreword by Franz von Liszt . Hayn, Berlin 1906. - Full text online .
  • Maximilian Paul-Schiff: The Hilsner process. File extract . Rosner, Vienna 1908, OBV .
  • Zdenko Auředníček: Materials on the trial against Leopold Hilsner. Presented to the kk General Prokuratur . Self-published, Vienna 1910, OBV .
  • Peter Zimmermann : The night behind the woods. Novel . Deuticke, Vienna 2000, ISBN 3-216-30525-2 .
  • Georg R. Schroubek : The "ritual murder" of Polná. Traditional and modern delusional beliefs. In: Rainer Erb , Michael Schmidt (ed.): Anti-Semitism and Jewish history: studies in honor of Herbert A. Strauss . Berlin: Wissenschaftlicher Autorverlag 1987, pp. 149–171
  • Hilsner Case. In: Encyclopaedia Judaica , 1972, Volume 8, Col. 496 f.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ A new folk song. In:  Deutsches Volksblatt / Deutsches Volksblatt. Radical medium-sized organ / telegraph. Radical Mittelstandsorgan / Deutsches Volksblatt. Daily newspaper for Christian German politics , morning edition, No. 4091/1900 (XII. Year), May 24, 1900, p. 5, bottom left. (Online at ANNO ). Template: ANNO / Maintenance / dvb.
  2. ↑ About the process in Písek ( Memento of the original from April 22, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . In: Dr. Bloch's Oesterreichische Wochenschrift , November 2, 1900, No. 44/1900 (17th year), ZDB -ID 2177107-8 , p. 777 f. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.compactmemory.de
  3. ↑ On the day. The unculture process. In:  Arbeiter-Zeitung , Morgenblatt, No. 256/1899 (XI. Volume), September 17, 1899, p. 1. (Online at ANNO ). Template: ANNO / Maintenance / aze.
  4. ^ Albert Lichtblau : The debates on the ritual murder accusations in the Austrian House of Representatives at the end of the 19th century. In: Rainer Erb (ed.): The legend of ritual murder. On the history of the blood charge against Jews , Berlin 1993, pp. 267–292, here pp. 270 f.
  5. ↑ Courtroom . Hilsner trial. In:  Arbeiter-Zeitung , Morgenblatt, No. 115/1900 (XII. Year), April 28, 1900, p. 7, center right. (Online at ANNO ). Template: ANNO / Maintenance / aze.
  6. ↑ On the occasion of the Písek court ruling, the following price announcement will be renewed: 5000 guilders Austrian currency (currency) reward ( memento of the original from April 22, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . In: Dr. Bloch's Oesterreichische Wochenschrift , November 16, 1900, No. 46/1900 (17th year), ZDB-ID 2177107-8, pp. 817 and 823 f. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.compactmemory.de
  7. ^ Hilsner trial. (...) Seventeenth day of negotiations. In:  Prager Abendblatt , No. 261/1900, November 15, 1900, p. 3 middle. (Online at ANNO ). Template: ANNO / Maintenance / pab.
  8. ^ Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk: The need to revise the Polna trial . Publishing house "Die Zeit", Vienna 1899, OBV .
  9. ↑ The need to revise the Polna Trial ( Memento of the original from April 22, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . In: Dr. Bloch's Oesterreichische Wochenschrift , November 17, 1899, No. 46/1899 (XVI year), ZDB-ID 2177107-8, p. 870, center right. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.compactmemory.de
  10. ↑ Austria. Amnesty for political crimes. In:  Political Chronicle of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy , year 1917, issue 7, p. 370 f. (Online at ANNO ). Template: ANNO / Maintenance / pch.
  11. ↑ An act of grace by His Majesty the Emperor. On the liberation of Leopold Hilsner ( Memento of the original from April 22, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) 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. . In: Dr. Bloch's Oesterreichische Wochenschrift , July 6, 1917, No. 26/1917 (XXXIV. Year), ZDB-ID 2177107-8, p. 441 f. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.compactmemory.de
  12. ↑ Hilsner's pardon  ( 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. . In: The Truth , April 5, 1918, No. 7/1918, ZDB -ID 2176231-4 , p. 4 f.@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.compactmemory.de  
  13. ↑ Correspondence. Hilsner's pardon ( Memento of the original from April 22, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) 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. . In: Dr. Bloch's Oesterreichische Wochenschrift , April 12, 1918, No. 14/1918 (XXXV. Year), ZDB-ID 2177107-8, p. 218 f.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.compactmemory.de
  14. ↑ The Drama of an Innocent Man in the Internet Movie Database .
  15. ↑ Petr Vašíček: Polná Ritual Murder 1899 . (English). In: Albert S. Lindemann (Ed.), Richard S. Levy (Ed.): Antisemitism. A history . Volume 1: A-K . Oxford University Press, Oxford 2005, ISBN 1-85109-439-3 , p. 558, online .
  16. ↑ a b Friday: Memorial event for Leopold Hilsner at the central cemetery. Speeches by Justice Minister Maria Berger and IKG President Ariel Muzicant . In: ots.at , November 10, 2008, accessed on April 6, 2014.