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Gustav Schwarzenegger

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Gustav Schwarzenegger
Born(1907-08-17)17 August 1907
Graz, Duchy of Styria, Archduchy of Austria, Cisleithania, Austria-Hungary
Died13 December 1972(1972-12-13) (aged 65)
Weiz, Styria, Austria
Buried
Weiz Cemetery, Weiz, Styria, Austria
Allegiance First Austrian Republic
Federal State of Austria
 Germany
Austrian Republic
Branch Austrian Land Forces
 German Army
Service years1930–1937 (Austria)
1939–1944 (Germany)
RankStabsfeldwebel
UnitFeldgendarmerie-Abteilung 521 (mot.), 4th Panzer Army
Conflicts
AwardsIron Cross 1st Class
Iron Cross 2nd Class
Eastern Medal
Wound Badge Black/3rd Class
Spouse
Aurelia Jadrny
​
(m. 1945)​
Children
Other workPoliceman

Gustav Schwarzenegger (17 August 1907 – 13 December 1972) was an Austrian police chief (Gendarmeriekommandant), postal inspector, member of the Sturmabteilung (SA), and military police officer. He was the father of former governor of California and actor Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Biography

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Schwarzenegger was born on 17 August 1907 in Graz, the son of Karl Schwarzenegger (1872–1927) and wife Cecelia (née Hinterleitner, 1878–1968).[1] His paternal grandfather, Wenzel (Václav) Mach, was Czech, and came from the small village of Chocov near Mladá Vožice, in the Kingdom of Bohemia in the Lands of the Bohemian Crown of the Austrian Empire.[2] Vaclav had a child out of wedlock with Kunigunde Schwarzenegger, and the child was originally named Carl Mach, but later adopted his mother's surname, Schwarzenegger.[3][4]

Nazi Party and SA membership

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According to documents obtained in 2003 from the Austrian State Archives by the Los Angeles Times,[a] Schwarzenegger applied to join the Sturmabteilung (SA), the Nazi Party's paramilitary wing, on 1 March 1939. Austria became part of Nazi Germany after being annexed on 12 March 1938.[5] A separate record obtained by the Wiesenthal Center indicates he sought membership before the annexation, but was accepted only in January 1941.

Schwarzenegger also applied to become a member of the SA on 1 May 1939, a year after the annexation of Austria, at a time when SA membership was declining. The SA had 900,000 members in 1940, down from 4.2 million in 1934. This six-year decline in SA membership was an extended result of the three-day-long purge known as the Night of the Long Knives, a political purge carried out by Adolf Hitler against the SA, seen at that time as too radical and too powerful by senior military and industrial leaders within the Nazi party.

Military career

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Schwarzenegger had served in the Austrian Army from 1930 to 1937, achieving the rank of section commander and, in 1937, he became a police officer. After enlisting in the Wehrmacht in November 1939, Schwarzenegger, according to his Soldbuch, had gained the rank of Stabsfeldwebel[6] (sergeant major) of the Feldgendarmerie, which acted as military police units. He served in Poland, France, Belgium, Ukraine, Lithuania and the Soviet Union. His unit was Feldgendarmerie-Abteilung 521 (mot.), part of Panzer Group 4.

Wounded in action in the Siege of Leningrad, in Leningrad, Russia,[7][8][9] on 22 August 1942, Schwarzenegger was awarded the Iron Cross 1st and 2nd Classes for bravery, the Eastern Medal, and the Wound Badge Black/3rd Class; he also received significant medical attention for his injuries. Initially treated at a military hospital in Łódź, the capital of the General Government, according to the records, Schwarzenegger also suffered recurring bouts of malaria, which led to his discharge in February 1944.[7] Considered unfit for active duty, he returned to Graz, Alpine and Danube Reichsgaue (Austria), where he was assigned to work as a postal inspector.[5]

A health registry document describes him as a "calm and reliable person, not particularly outstanding" and assesses his intellect as "average." Ursula Schwarz, a historian at Vienna's Documentation Centre of Austrian Resistance, has argued that Schwarzenegger's career was fairly typical for his generation,[10] and that no evidence has emerged directly linking him with participation in war crimes or abuses against civilians.[5] He resumed his police career in 1947.

Later life and death

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Gustav and Aurelia Schwarzenegger on their wedding day, October 20, 1945

Schwarzenegger married war widow Aurelia "Reli" Jadrny (29 July 1922 – 2 August 1998) on 20 October 1945, in Mürzsteg, Styria, then in Allied-occupied Austria. They later had two sons, Meinhard and Arnold. Meinhard died on 20 May 1971 in a solo car accident while driving drunk on a mountain road at age 24; Meinhard was survived by his son, Patrick Knapp Schwarzenegger.[11][12]

Schwarzenegger died of a stroke on 13 December 1972, at the age of 65, in Weiz, Styria, Austria, where he had been transferred as a policeman. While visiting Weiz Cemetery in August 1998, where her husband was buried, Aurelia Jadrny Schwarzenegger died of a heart attack at the age of 76; she is buried next to him. Their son, Arnold, stated in the film Pumping Iron that he did not attend his father's funeral, but the film's director, George Butler, later said that it was a story Arnold had appropriated from a boxer, to make it appear as though he could prevent his personal life from interfering with his athletic training.[13]

News reports about Schwarzenegger's Nazi links first surfaced in 1990, at which time Arnold Schwarzenegger asked the Simon Wiesenthal Center, an organization he had long supported, to research his father's past. The Center found his father's army records and Nazi party membership, but did not uncover any connection to war crimes or the paramilitary organization, the Schutzstaffel (SS).[5] Media interest resurfaced when Arnold ran for Governor of California in the state's 2003 recall election.

In his 2012 memoir, Arnold puts forth an account in which Gustav disapproved of him and viewed his weight training as "garbage".[14]

In a 2021 video made in response to the January 6 United States Capitol attack, his son Arnold publicly recalled, how Gustav was frequently drunk and abusive to his family when Arnold was young. He attributed this behavior to guilt and shame over what Gustav and other Nazis and collaborators had perpetrated or enabled during the war.[15] His son brought up the war's impact on Gustav again in a 2022 video about the Russian invasion of Ukraine, in which he urged the Russian soldiers to discontinue their invasion in order not to "be broken like [his] father".[16]

Notes

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  1. ^ This was following the expiration of a 30-year seal on Schwarzenegger's records under Austrian privacy laws.

References

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  1. ^ Krasniewicz, Louise; Blitz, Michael (1 January 2006). Arnold Schwarzenegger: A Biography. Greenwood Publishing Group. ISBN 9780313338106.
  2. ^ "Birth record of Ernst Mach". Retrieved 29 January 2021.
  3. ^ "Slovenka vypátrala skutočný pôvod akčného hrdinu: Žiadny Schwarzenegger, ale Arnold Mach!". Nový čas. 18 August 2020. Archived from the original on 23 December 2020. Retrieved 23 December 2020.
  4. ^ "Conan the Bohemian: Arnold Schwarzenegger's Czech roots confirmed". The Prague Reporter. Archived from the original on 12 January 2021. Retrieved 23 December 2020.
  5. ^ a b c d Wilkinson, Tracy; Lait, Matt (14 August 2003). "Austrian Archives Reveal Nazi Military Role of Actor's Father". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 20 March 2015.
  6. ^ Schwarzeneggers Vater war SA-Mitglied
  7. ^ a b Stelzl-Marx, Barbara; Bauer, Kurt; Hesztera, Gerald; Lewis, Mark; Neugebauer, Wolfgang; Lieske, Dagmar; Halbmayr, Brigitte; Pittroff, Benedikt; Hördler, Stefan; Loistl, Simone; Baumgartner, Gerhard; Garscha, Winfried R; Harten, Hans-Christian; Pohl, Dieter; Klemp, Stefan; Popielas, Daniel; Schreiner-Bozic, Marcus; Perzi, Niklas; Wallenstorfer, Richard; Kuretsidis-Haider, Claudia; Knoll, Harald; Beyrer, Michael; Muigg, Mario; Wenninger, Florian; Zerovnik, Martina; Stoffers, Nadjeschda; Hellensteiner, Peter; Mach, Stefan; Warlitsch, Doris (2024). Exekutive der Gewalt: Die österreichische Polizei und der Nationalsozialismus. Germany: Böhlau Wien. pp. 539–540. ISBN 9783205218487. Archived from the original on 19 November 2025. Im Oktober 1938 nahm Gustav Schwarzenegger vermutlich an der Besetzung des Sudetenlandes und ab 1. September 1939 am Feldzug gegen Polen im rückwärtigen Operationsgebiet teil. Danach verblieb er in Polen, kam im Juni 1940 nach Frankreich, von wo er im Mai 1941 vorübergehend in die Heimat zurückkehrte. Ab Juni 1941 wurde er beim Überfall auf die Sowjetunion eingesetzt. Er gehörte als Stabsfeldwebel der motorisierten r. Kompanie der Feldgendarmerie-Abteilung 521 an. Im August 1942 erlitt er vor Leningrad eine schwere Verwundung, erkrankte später an Malaria und wurde nach längeren Aufenthalten in Lazaretten im Februar 1944 als »nicht mehr voll feldverwendungsfähig« entlassen. Ab Mai 1944 bis Kriegsende war er im Rang eines Hauptwachtmeisters der Gendarmerie als Preisüberwachungsbeamter beim Landrat in Mürzzuschlag eingeteilt. (TRANSLATION: In October 1938, Gustav Schwarzenegger presumably participated in the occupation of the Sudetenland and, from September 1, 1939, in the campaign against Poland in the rear area of operations. He then remained in Poland, arrived in France in June 1940, and from there temporarily returned to Germany in May 1941. From June 1941, he was deployed in the invasion of the Soviet Union. As a staff sergeant, he belonged to the motorized company of the 521st Field Gendarmerie (Military Police) Battalion. In August 1942, he suffered a severe wound near Leningrad, later contracted malaria, and after extended stays in military hospitals, was discharged in February 1944 as 'no longer fully fit for field duty.' From May 1944 until the end of the war, he was assigned to the district administration in Mürzzuschlag with the rank of Hauptwachtmeister (lit. 'head watch master;' master sergeant, senior sergeant or sergeant major) in the Ordnungspolizei (original text states 'Gendarmerie' but translator assumes 'Ordnungspolizei' was meant, as he was discharged and returned to OrPo service by this time, and 'Hauptwachtmeister' was an OrPo rank) as a price control officer.)
  8. ^ "Schwarzenegger remembers his Nazi father in plea to Russia to end Ukraine invasion". CBS News. CBS Broadcasting Inc. 18 March 2022. Archived from the original on 16 March 2025. [...Schwarzenegger's] father, Gustav Schwarzenegger, who was a Nazi soldier during World War II and was part of the invasion of Leningrad, during which he was wounded by shrapnel, according to his son. 'When my father arrived in Leningrad, he was all pumped up on the lies of his government, and when he left Leningrad, he was broken, physically and mentally,' Schwarzenegger said. 'He lived the rest of his life in pain. Pain from a broken back, pain from the shrapnel that always reminded him of these terrible years. And pain from the guilt that he felt.'
  9. ^ "I love the Russian people. That is why I have to tell you the truth. Please watch and share". Twitter. 18 March 2022.
  10. ^ "Spotlight Thrown on Nazi Past of Schwarzenegger's Father". AFP. 25 August 2003. Archived from the original on 22 November 2006.
  11. ^ "The Unkillable Arnold Schwarzenegger". Rolling Stone. 7 May 2015. Archived from the original on 10 March 2022. Retrieved 5 June 2018.
  12. ^ Total Recall, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Simon & Schuster, 2012, p. 134
  13. ^ Gillespie, Nick (31 July 2003). "Hasta la Vista, Arnold: How Schwarzenegger could have liberated U.S. politics". Reason. Retrieved 13 November 2006.
  14. ^ Schwarzenegger, Arnold (2012). Total Recall: My Unbelievably True Life Story. New York: Simon & Schuster. p. 134. ISBN 9781451662436.
  15. ^ @Schwarzenegger (10 January 2021). "My message to my fellow Americans and friends around the world following this week's attack on the Capitol" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
  16. ^ Urban, Sasha (17 March 2022). "Arnold Schwarzenegger Recalls Nazi Father in Anti-War Message to Russia". Variety. Retrieved 19 March 2022.
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