Dr. Georg Lexer

Georg Lexer was born as the son of the Carinthian gendarmerie post commander, Georg Lexer. After attending elementary school in Greifenburg, he transferred to the "Marianum" apprentice home for priests in Klagenfurt. Due to a "disciplinary problem", he was expelled from the boarding school, but not from the grammar school. Soon afterwards, he joins the Marianische Studentenkongregation. The Lexer family experienced the occupation of Austria at first hand due to the tragic fate of his father.

His father Georg was involved in bloody battles as a gendarme during the National Socialist coup attempt near Klagenfurt in July 1934. There are also casualties among the National Socialists and troops loyal to the government.

In February 1938, he falls ill with severe pneumonia. Discharged into home care, the gendarmerie post commander Georg Lexer was arrested on the night of March 11-12, although feverish and bedridden, by his own subordinate gendarmes, who were already wearing swastika armbands when he was arrested, and taken to the Klagenfurt provincial court prison. In proceedings before the National Socialist People's Court, he is accused of having committed the murder of a National Socialist during the battles in July 1934. The proceedings before the People's Court were dropped on the grounds that "in a war, shooting is inevitable" (statement by the presiding judge). Georg Lexer was not released, however, but taken over by the Gestapo and sent to the Buchenwald concentration camp in September 1938, where he was murdered on August 3, 1941.

Georg Lexer and his brother, who was a year younger than him, were harassed by many, and they now had to work alongside school, as the family no longer had any financial means after their father's arrest. So, in his penultimate year at school in 1939, Georg Lexer signed up as a tram conductor.

Around Easter 1941, he met Eduard Pumpernig, a lance corporal in the Luftwaffe and opponent of the Nazi regime. Through him, he and his brother Wunibald came into contact with the Antifascist Freedom Movement of Austria (AFÖ). There are many cooperative meetings and drawings of Wehrmacht facilities are also created. Together with Eduard Pumpernig, he painted slogans such as "Down with Hitler!", "Austria awake!" or "Prussia out!" on house walls in Klagenfurt and removed swastika flags from houses on the night of July 11, 1941 to July 12, 1941. During a trip to the Gailtal valley to explore escape routes to Italy, Edurard Pumpernig and Georg Lexer broke up. Georg informs his mother and brother, but the former does not believe him enough.

In order to be able to study, Georg and Wunibald volunteer for military service in 1941. Georg Lexer was drafted into the navy and was able to begin his medical studies at the Naval Medical Academy in Strasbourg.

After the Anti-Fascist Freedom Movement of Austria (AFÖ) was exposed, Georg Lexer was interrogated by the Gestapo in Klagenfurt and Vienna and finally charged with preparation for high treason by the People's Court in Strasbourg in 1944. He was expelled from the academy as politically unreliable.

In the chaos of the war in 1945, he managed to evade arrest, make his way to Carinthia and hide until the end of the war.

After the war, he resumed his studies, obtained his doctorate in Innsbruck in 1947 and became a specialist and hospital director in Carinthia. For many years, he was the regional chairman of the ÖVP Kameradschaft der politisch Verfolgten und Bekenner für Österreich in Carinthia.