Location: Hebalm
In April 1945, on the orders of district leader Dr. Hugo Suette, a total of 18 politically “suspicious” people who were known to be resistant to the Nazis, including Dr. Ludwig Mooslechner from Schwanberg, were shot by members of the SS, RAD and Gestapo and buried in a bomb pit on the Hebalpe. The bodies were exhumed in June 1945 and buried in a grave in the Deutschlandsberg municipal cemetery; the grave bears the inscription “Resistance fighters 1934-1945” and is a memorial.
A serious incident occurred in Schwanberg on March 15, 1945. Gendarme Karl Klug of the Trahütten post had been ordered to bring a blacksmith from Kruckenberg to Deutschlandsberg. As the blacksmith stated that he was unable to walk, a farmer from Mainsdorf had to transport him with his cart. On the way, they came across a woman and a man. The farmer recognized the man, as he had stolen from him a few weeks earlier, whereupon Klug arrested the two without resistance. When Klug wanted to carry out a perlustration a little later and asked the man to raise his hands, the man pulled a revolver out of his coat pocket and fired a pistol shot from a distance of one meter. Klug was killed instantly, the man and the woman fled. An SS company was stationed in Schwanberg at the time, which took part in the gendarmerie patrol for the perpetrator together with the Volkssturm the next day. At the Amtmannnkeusche they came across two men and two women who allowed themselves to be arrested without resistance. The man arrested, Gerhard Doorn, a Dutchman, confessed to having shot the gendarme Klug. His companion obviously panicked and accused ten other Schwanberg residents of supporting people in hiding and being hostile to the Nazi regime. Anton Stieber, who as a Volkssturm member was part of the patrol, was accused by the escort of hiding his son Josef, who had deserted from the Wehrmacht. At that time, however, Josef Stieber was no longer at his parents’ home but was instead active as a partisan in the Koralm region. The Stieber family members who remained in Schwanberg were subsequently arrested. When Josef Stieber learned of these arrests, he went to Frohnleiten, where he intended to meet a former Schwanberg RAD girl he was friends with. However, he was spotted by a patrol, shot, and died on March 31, 1945. Due to the testimony of Doorn’s escort, numerous other Schwanberg residents were arrested, including Dr. Ludwig Mooslechner, a physician who had provided food and medical supplies to deserters and partisans, and Hans Turkitsch, an assistant barber. The detainees were not organized in a formal resistance group; what united them was likely their Catholic-motivated opposition to National Socialism and their common place of residence, namely Schwanberg.
The arrested individuals were taken to the prison of the District Court in Deutschlandsberg, where a few prisoners were released after a few days. On April 10, 1945, nineteen prisoners were transported from the District Court in Deutschlandsberg to Hebalm at the request of District Leader Dr. Hugo Suette, under the pretense of being transferred to Wolfsberg. During the transport, one French prisoner managed to escape. The remaining eighteen prisoners were executed with shots to the back of the head by members of the SS, Gestapo officers, and RAD men in a bomb crater, where their bodies were then buried. After the collapse of the Nazi regime, the bodies were exhumed and reburied on June 10, 1945, in the Deutschlandsberg cemetery. The grave site in Deutschlandsberg, which serves as a memorial, bears the inscription “Resistance Fighters 1934–1945,” with eight names listed below.
Literature: Christian Fleck, Koralmpartisanen. Über abweichende Karrieren politisch motivierter Widerstandskämpfer (= Materialien zur Historischen Sozialwissenschaft; 4). Wien/Köln 1986, 129–131. Heimo Halbrainer, „In der Gewißheit, daß Ihr den Kampf weiterführen werdet“. Briefe steirischer Widerstandskämpfer aus Todeszelle und KZ. Graz 2000, 166–167. Herbert Blatnik, Zeitzeugen erinnern sich an die Jahre 1938–1945 in der Südweststeiermark. 2Eibiswald 2000, 242–246.
Text: Markus Rieger-Roschitz / Ludwig Boltzmann Institute for Research on War Consequences
