"Hamburg des Ostens?" Der Ausbau des Wiener Hafens in der NS-Zeit 1938–1945

Project Leader: Prof. DDr. Oliver Rathkolb
Project Staff: Mag.a Dr.in Ina Markova, Mag. Dr. Stefan Wedrac
Funding: Hafen Wien
Duration: 1.3.2021 – 30.9.2022

 

 

In 1974, the Vienna City Planning Office published an activity report covering the period from 1935 to 1965. The fact that there were three system breaks during this period – from the Dollfuß-Schuschnigg dictatorship to Nazi terror to the re-establishment of the Republic – is not mentioned. The following sober entry can be found about the port itself:

"At the end of the war, the port facilities at Albern, Freudenau, Lobau and Kuchelau were owned by the city. While the Freudenau port, better known as the "Winterhafen", and the Kuchelau port were already built around the turn of the century, the construction of the Albern and Lobau port facilities took place during the Second World War. As part of the concept developed at the time, a "Vienna-Southeast Major Port", which essentially provided for three self-contained port facilities, the Port of Freudenau was to be expanded to include a general cargo port, while retaining its previous function as a protective and winter , a group of basins for grain and bulk cargo handling in Albern, and facilities for the storage and transhipment of mineral oils in the area of the Donau-Oder Canal.

In fact, a harbour basin in Albern, four sections of the Danube-Oder Canal and a harbour basin in the Lobau, as well as five grain silos equipped with transhipment facilities with a total storage capacity of 8 5,000 tonnes of storage capacity, as well as roads and railway facilities, sewerage and water supply, in the Lobau parts of the port railway facilities and embankments for an access road and in the port of Freudenau mainly track facilities.

The project "Hamburg of the East? The Expansion of the Port of Vienna during the Nazi Era 1938–1945" will deal with the planning, disputes over authority and the fates of the forced labourers used for the construction. The following major topics will be examined:

Prologue:

The significance of the Danube as an economic artery for Austria will be discussed in a general introduction. The focus will be on the early 20th century. After that, the various Viennese ports over the centuries will be discussed before the situation immediately before the "Anschluss" is examined.

Chapter 1: Vienna – Hamburg of the East? The decision-making process behind the port expansion

Taking into account the material, the following questions regarding the decision-making process for the expansion of the port of Vienna can be answered: Who were the actors involved, what interests did they have in the expansion of the port? What was the relationship between Vienna and Berlin? Who bore the costs of the port expansion? What were the economic and ideological objectives of the port expansion?

Chapter 2: Securing oil for the war of aggression – the Wifo secret

On the basis of the file material, it is possible – despite efforts to maintain secrecy – to clarify which companies resorted to forced labour for their construction projects. The records of the companies examined in the Federal Archives in Berlin also make it possible to reconstruct which authorities – state employment offices, the Reich Waterways Directorate, municipal representatives, the Reich Ministry of Transport, companies – were the driving forces behind the exploitation of forced labourers and the significance of the Wifo plant in Vienna for securing crude oil for the German Reich's war of aggression.

Chapter 3: Down in the Lobau – civilian and forced labour

The establishment of a forced labour camp for Hungarian Jews in the summer of 1944 does not mark the beginning of the exploitation of foreign labour in the Lobau. Non-Germans had been housed in "work camps" there since the autumn of 1940 at the latest. These were prisoners of war forced to work, but also civilian workers. The camp in the Lobau was a complex with many branches. It is certain that political prisoners considered "Aryan" were also imprisoned in the Lobau, at least in the final phase of the Nazi dictatorship. After the occupation of Hungary by the German army, this camp system was extended to include a section for Jewish forced labourers, with the Wifo company running a larger camp and the companies Schmitt & Junk and Sager & Woerner running smaller ones. However, numerous other companies also "made use" of the workers imprisoned there. In addition, the history of forced labour for the Deutsche Reichsbahn must be dealt with in this context: As part of the port expansion, railway stations and tracks were built for or to the port. These were also built by forced labourers.

Chapter 4: Resistance – a "nice place" in the midst of terror

Despite the massive Nazi apparatus of repression, people in the (forced) labour camp in Lobau also resisted. Resistance is a deliberately broad term – based on the definition of the Documentation Centre of Austrian Resistance. Specifically, resistance in the context of the expansion of the Port of Vienna in 1938–1945 includes: sabotage of war-critical operations; political (communist) propaganda against the Nazi dictatorship; escape from the Lobau camp; and help for those imprisoned there, such as that provided by Helene Dasovsky in her restaurant "Schönes Platzerl" in the Lobau.

Epilogue: "German", Soviet, Austrian – the history of the port after 1945

Just as the Port of Vienna has a history before the Nazi era, there is also a history after 1945 that will have to be written as part of this study. The discussion – or even the concealment – of the Nazi financial injection in the Second Republic must also be part of this study, as must the share of forced labourers in the wealth created. What was actually left of the port facilities completed during the Nazi era in 1945 after the Allied air war? The period of Soviet occupation – which is more difficult to research – should be examined, as should the gradual transformation and change of the port after the conclusion of the State Treaty in 1955.