Karl Gitzoller

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Karl Gitzoller (born January 1, 1905 in Strobl ; † August 26, 2002 in Neuhaus an der Triesting ) was an Austrian resistance fighter against National Socialism and co-founder of the partisan group Willy-Fred in the Salzkammergut .

youth

Gitzoller was born in Strobl on Lake Wolfgang in 1905. After attending the then eight-year elementary school, he began an apprenticeship as a machinist in 1921, which he completed in 1923. He then worked in various Salzburg companies, later in Tyrol in road construction and in a brick factory as a fitter. In 1931 he married and had two daughters.

Political commitment

Until then, Gitzoller was not interested in politics. This changed after the Austrian Civil War in February 1934. Through his acquaintance with Sepp Plieseis , he came into contact with local groups of the then illegal communists . Gitzoller began to get involved in politics as part of training courses that the later Spanish fighter Franz Jaritsch held. After the connection of Austria in March 1938 to the German Reich , he was finally called up for military service in 1939. He did not join the Wehrmacht , however , but was drafted into the Steyr works and had to work in armaments production. This was in line with the regime's action at the time with people who were considered politically too unreliable for the military, but against whom there was too little evidence to imprison them.

In Steyr , too , Gitzoller quickly came into contact with the local resistance groups among the workers, in particular with Albert Schwarz . Among other things, he carried out collections for the Red Aid , but this led to his arrest in October 1942. With five other comrades he was transferred by train from Steyr to the district court of Wels . However, he managed to escape on the way from the Wels train station to the courthouse. He then hid in Attnang for eight days and then tried to get to the Salzkammergut.

Resistance group Willy-Fred

Karl Gitzoller finally came to Bad Ischl on a bicycle , where he contacted Resi Pesendorfer , whose help he hoped for. The accommodation of an escaped prisoner meant a great risk, but finally the empty "Villa Waldhütte" was found as a hiding place, in which Pesendorfer was currently employed as a cleaning lady. After the winter he hid in the mountains and spent the night in empty alpine huts and in a cave. He was able to feed himself as a poacher , a tradition of resistance against the authorities that has long been cultivated in the Salzkammergut. In addition, he could rely on support from the valley, where a few women in particular had built up a real secret network to take care of the men in hiding.

In October 1943 he was involved with Resi Pesendorfer and Agnes Primocic in the liberation of Sepp Plieseis from the Vigaun subcamp near Hallein . He was waiting for him near the camp and provided him with civilian clothes. Then both fled into the mountains and reached the Attersee via the Osterhorn group . On the way to Ischl, however, Gitzoller was shot near the prisoner of war camp in Mitterweißbach at the end of November and suffered an injury to his lower leg. But he was still able to flee and go into hiding with the family of his comrade Raimund Zimpernik in Aigen-Voglhub. Later he hid in his hometown Strobl and in Sankt Wolfgang am Wolfgangsee, as well as on the Schöffau-Alm below the Rettenkogel.

After the end of winter 1943/44 Gitzoller went to the mountains together with Sepp Plieseis and Alois Straubinger and they set up the partisan shelter "Igel" in the Totes Gebirge , which then became the base of the Willy-Fred resistance group. An increasing number of refugees and soldiers gathered around this small group in the course of 1944, who no longer wanted to go back to the war after a leave from the front in their native Salzkammergut and instead took the risk of living as deserters in hiding . The group grew rapidly, and soon up to 30 armed partisans lived on the hedgehog, and an even larger number were scattered on alpine pastures and hid with trusted contacts. At the end of 1944, the group consisted of up to 500 people in the Upper Salzkammergut. At first they just called themselves "Willy" as a camouflage. However, this name was soon better known than desired, and so "Fred" was chosen as the new code name. In historical research, the partisan group is therefore usually called "Willy-Fred".

End of war

The main goal of the Willy-Fred group in 1944 and early 1945 was to successfully hide the people who went into hiding and to wait for the foreseeable victory of the Allies in order to then be prepared for the construction of a new, free Austria with as many like-minded people as possible. The main concern, however, turned out to be the sufficient supply of food to those in hiding. The winter of 1944/45 was the most difficult time. In addition, in January 1945, Karl Feldhammer was shot by the Gestapo in Bad Aussee , through whom part of the supply had previously passed. His widow Marianne Feldhammer quickly took over his role , who was the only woman who knew the way to the hedgehog and brought food to the partisan refuge several times.

Only in the last weeks of the war did the group become active externally, whereby the events, especially in the Ausseerland, rolled over chaotically and therefore historically cannot be reconstructed with the utmost accuracy. The group around Sepp Plieseis was allegedly involved in the rescue of the art treasures stored in the Altaussee salt mine, as well as in the arrest of some prominent Nazi officials who had fled to the Salzkammergut. It was also members of the partisans who piloted the hesitant Americans from Wolfgangsee to Ischl, Gosau and Aussee. The main merit of the group, however, was to have offered numerous people a hiding place that, unlike other communist resistance groups in Upper Austria, was not discovered until the end, despite intensive searches by the National Socialists.

post war period

After the end of the war, Gitzoller returned to his job as a machine fitter and left the Salzkammergut in the direction of Lower Austria . He works first in Weißenbach, then in Hirtenberg and later in the Pottensteiner cloth factory. Because of his unemployment in the 1930s and the several years of underground life during the Second World War , which were not counted towards his pension, he had to remain employed into old age. Only decades after the war did his merit as an active resistance fighter against National Socialism and for a free Austria find official recognition and he received compensation from the republic in his last years.

He spent the last few years with his wife in Neuhaus an der Triesting , a small town on the edge of the Vienna Woods, where he also died in 2002 at the age of 97.

Parts of his biography during the time of the Igel were filmed in 1990 in the television film "At the end of a long winter" produced by ORF together with ARD , the screenplay of which is by Walter Wippersberg and is based on the recordings of Albrecht Gaiswinkler . In 2006 the writer Franzobel from Vöcklabruck edited the history of the resistance group Willy-Fred in his play "Hirschen", in which Karl Gitzoller does not appear as a named figure.

swell

  • Sepp Plieseis : From the Ebro to the Dachstein. The struggle for life of an Austrian worker , Linz, Verlag Neue Zeit, 1946, 400 pages, new editions under the title “Partisan der Berge”, Globus-Verlag, Vienna, 1987, ISBN 3-85364-186-5
  • Peter Kammerstätter: Material collection on the resistance and partisan movement Willy-Fred in the upper Salzkammergut - Ausseerland 1943–1945 , Linz, self-published, 1978
  • Christian Topf: On the trail of the partisans. Historical walks in the Salzkammergut , Grünbach near Freistadt, Edition Geschichte der Heimat, 1996, 232 pages, new edition 2006, ISBN 3-900943-32-X

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Gitzoller, Karl
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian resistance fighter
DATE OF BIRTH January 1, 1905
PLACE OF BIRTH Strobl
DATE OF DEATH August 26, 2002
Place of death Neuhaus (municipality of Weissenbach an der Triesting)