DI Franz Derndorfer

After graduating from secondary school in Linz, Franz Derndorfer began studying architecture at the Vienna University of Technology in the fall. In 1935, he joins the student association Norica.

On 1 September 1939, he is drafted into the German Wehrmacht (Panzer Regiment No. 74) and fights on the Eastern Front. He was able to complete his studies in April 1940 with a degree in engineering.

Probably in the fall of 1942, Franz Derndorfer was appointed to the German army at the suggestion of Georg Krasser, who had been on the Eastern Front with Derndorfer, by the adjutant to the commander of the Artillery Replacement and Training Division 109 in Brno, First Lieutenant Hans Janauschek, and was assigned to the Ila staff of Division 109 as a clerk for officers.

Franz Derndorfer, together with Georg Krasser and under the leadership of Lieutenant Hans Janauschek, is actively involved in setting up a resistance group in the Artillery Replacement and Training Division 109 in Brno.

In this role, he experiences the resistance work and the further fate of Division 109, which is relocated to Amstetten in December 1944.