The Scars of War, Vienna 1947

Flak Tower, now Haus des Meeres
http://www.haus-des-meeres.at/en/start.html

Reminders of World War II in Vienna

If you walk around the older parts of Vienna, you can see a few artifacts from World War II.  For example, when walking down Gumpendorferstrasse between the Gürtel and the Ring, you cannot miss a huge concrete tower, now a public aquarium (Haus des Meeres), that was built as a control tower to combat WWII air raids. Nearby is a shorter, but still massive, concrete structure that housed anti-aircraft guns. Three of these flak towers were built in Vienna with walls up to eleven feet thick, and they still exist.

For more about the Vienna flak towers, see this Wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flak_tower

Among other artifacts of World War II are small reminders of the destruction it caused. They are small plaques attached to the front of many buildings. They typically say that this building was damaged or destroyed during the war and was rebuilt in some year that followed.  Here is an example:

Sign attached to a building located on Raniergasse

This sign says: This house was damaged in the war years 1939/45 and was rebuilt from the resources of the Federal Ministry of Trade and Reconstruction, under Chancellor Julius Raab, in 1955.

These signs are most frequently seen in neighborhoods around train stations, though they are scattered in a seemingly random pattern throughout the rest of the city. For example, a building next to the Laudongasse building (9th district) where I had a room in 1971-72 had a sign showing it had been rebuilt following the war, but no other nearby buildings had such a plaque.

Without such reminders as these plaques, it would be difficult today to remember that Vienna suffered extensive bomb damage during the war years. The rebuilding started right away, and when I was in Vienna during the 1967-68 academic year, I saw few physical reminders of the destructive war that had ended twenty-two years earlier. (However, Austria in 1967-68 had not yet achieved the affluence that was to come. Many buildings, such as the one I stayed in, had apartments lacking individual toilets and bath/shower facilities. And most were still heated by wood or coal. That has changed.)

World War II Destruction in Vienna

In thinking about what Vienna looked like in 1945, I have read enough and heard enough stories to know that the conditions were grim as Soviet soldiers attacked in early April 1945, and they became grimmer soon after that. Hitler had issued a "stay or die" order, and German soldiers fought fiercely, and to the end, for a lost cause.

Even before the Russians came, the city had suffered intensive bombing, and though the bombs were aimed at strategic targets, they managed to destroy some of the city's most important buildings, including the Staatsoper and half of the Parliament building. They also heavily damaged the ancient and monumental St. Stephens church located in the center of the city. (The damage to St. Stephens can be seen in a book, Der Wiener Stephansdom: Nach dem Brand in April 1945 [St. Stephens: After the Fires in April, 1945], prepared by Anton Macku soon after the end of the war; I took at art history course from this fine gentleman in 1968 through the Institute of European Studies.)

A book published in 1995 has chilling documentation of the Russian battle for Vienna. It includes over 400 pictures taken by Russians that had not previously been published. The book is titled Die Russen in Wien, Die Befreiung Oesterreichs (Russians in Vienna, the Liberation of Austria). It contains pictures of the battle for Vienna and the occupation that followed. It shows the devastation that came with the liberation.

Title:  Russians in Vienna, the Liberation of Austria

Last year when I was in Vienna, my friend Jörg, whom I first met in 1971 when I a rented room in a large flat occupied by him, his wife, and his mother, took me to a street in Döbling, an outer district, and pointed to the apartment building where he was living in 1945 as the Russians fought their way into Vienna. He told me this story:  

He was a young kid living with his grandparents. As some Russian soldiers approached the street where the apartment was located, they were fired upon by German soldiers from the roof of his building. After an exchange of gunfire ended, the Russians ordered everyone out of the building and lined them up in front of it. Jörg was in his grandfather's arms. As his grandfather saw that the Russians were preparing to shoot everyone -- they suspected that some of the residents had shot at them -- he tossed Jörg to one of the Russian soldiers standing nearby. About this time, German soldiers, who had moved to another building, starting shooting again at the Russians. The Russian soldier who had caught Jörg tossed him back to his grandfather, and the Russians turned their weapons toward the shooters, sparing the group in front of the apartment.

Such stories make vivid the situation in Vienna as Russians drove the German military from the city. Many stories of suffering, survival, and recovery can be found in the memoirs of people who lived through the Russian liberation of Vienna and the desperate months that followed. Unfortunately, most such memoirs have not been translated into English.

Pictures of Vienna, 1947

In my curiosity about the post-War situation in Vienna, I bought on eBay some pictures taken in Vienna in 1947. According to information on the envelope, they were mailed by K. Redl, who lived on Döblinger Hauptstrasse (not far from the Döbling apartment where Jörg was staying with his grandparents) to S. J. Darling in Appleton, Wisconsin. A stamp on the front of the envelope shows that they were cleared by Austrian censors. The post office cancellation stamp is dated July 4, 1947. They reached Appleton on July 14th. The postal stamps have been removed from the envelope, probably by a stamp collector.

The letter included 20 photographs. The location where each photo was taken is shown on its back. These pictures show that in 1947 much of the bombing damage in Vienna had not repaired. Much work remained to be done.








The following are a selection of the 1947 photos sent in the letter:

Photo of the Ring near the Schottentor (the edge of the University building is, I think, on the left)

Photo of Währingerstrasse, close to Schottentor

Photo of Kärtnerstrasse; the edge of the Staatsoper building is on the left

Two photos of  Kärtnerstrasse between the Staatsoper and St. Stephens Church

Photo of Stephensplatz: St. Stephens Church (without a roof)

Photo of Neuer Markt; St. Stephen's Spire in the background (1st District)

Photo of the Augustiner Rampe near the Staatsoper. Present site of the Augustiner Museum

Photo of Tegetthoffstrasse, between the Augustiner Rampe and Neuer Markt.
The Spire of the Augustiner Church is in background

Three Photos near the Danube Canal (Kai)

Photo Captioned on Back:  "Döbling View from my House"

These pictures were taken at locations that I have often passed since I started to visit Vienna in 1966. They both remind me of a sad chapter in Vienna's history and make me appreciate even more the present beauty of Vienna