Austria after the Anschluss

March 13, 1938, with the Anschluss, Austria, renamed Ostmark, is placed under the authority of the Gauleiter Josef Bürckel, with the title of Commissioner for the attachment of Austria to the Reich. 190,000 Jews then reside in Austria where the persecution of them, particularly in Vienna, becomes more important than in Germany: public humiliations, better organized expropriations, and a faster forced emigration. Even before the entry of the Wehrmacht into the country and despite the authorities’ efforts to moderate it, violence broke out: the streets were the scene of violence and bullying, apartments and businesses belonging to Jews were looted. The violence ends on April 29, when Bürckel threatening to punish the guilty.
A few days after the Anschluss, Himmler visit the quarries of Mauthausen, 24 km from Linz and 145 km from Vienna. The first 300 inmates, Austrian and German common-law prisoners from Dachau, arrived in Mauthausen on 8 August 1938.

The acceleration of persecution

After the Anschluss in March 1938, anti-Jewish measures were enacted at a redoubled pace. The first important step in this process is the law of 28 March abolishing the legal status of Jewish communities granted in the 19th century. At the same time, aryanization measures are intensifying. The law of 26 March 1938 obliges all Jews in the Reich to declare their entire fortune to the authorities, under penalty of criminal prosecution. Under the terms of article 7 of this decree, Goering, responsible for the Quadrennial Plan, may dispose of the goods declared "in accordance with the needs of the German economy". From April to November 1938, the services of the Reich collected two out of seven billion marks of "Jewish property".
Shopkeepers and craftsmen were ordered to cease all commercial activity before 1 January 1939. Finally, the exemptions for Jewish lawyers and veterans are removed. In July 1938, Jewish doctors had to apply for licences and limit their practice to a strictly Jewish clientele. The idea of marking progresses with the obligation to bear the first names Sara and Israël on passports (18 August 1938). In early October 1938, the letter "J" was affixed to the identity documents at the instigation of Switzerland. A series of roundups takes place in Berlin during the summer as police checks become more frequent. 1,500 Jews are interned in concentration camps. Destruction of property, evictions from certain villages and the desecration of places of worship also take place. The synagogues in Munich (9 June), Nuremberg (10 August) and Dortmund (September) were blown up.

The fate of Austrian Jews

On 20 August 1938, the Central Jewish Emigration Office was set up under the responsibility of Stahlecker, in fact controlled by Eichmann himself. He first undertook to expel the Jews beyond the borders, particularly in Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and Switzerland. According to German sources, about 5,000 Austrian Jews were expelled between March and November 1938. In October 1938, Himmler ordered all the Jews from the Austrian provinces to be gathered together in Vienna. During the summer of 1938, Austrian Jews tried to take refuge illegally in neighboring countries and as far as the United Kingdom. The Gestapo sent several groups of Jews to Finland, Lithuania and the Netherlands from where they were turned back. Protests from foreign countries are multiplying, and illegal entry or deportation to the West is becoming more difficult. Less than 6 months after the Anschluss, 45,000 Austrian Jews emigrated. In May 1939, more than 100,000 Jews left in turn, nearly 50% of Austrian Jews.

Crowd greeting Adolf Hitler during the Anschluss. Austria, March 1938.
Cr says photographic: M morial de la Shoah/CDJC.

As a humiliation, Vienna o, Jews were forced to clean the floor of a street. Vienna, Austria, March 1938.
Cr says photographic: M morial de la Shoah/CDJC.

Dachau concentration camp: some ports are building a new SS camp for the munitions factory. Germany, June 28, 1938.
Cr says photographic: M morial de la Shoah/CDJC.