Jakob Fussenegger

Jakob Fussenegger graduated from secondary school in Dornbirn in 1929 and then entered the seminary in Brixen. On June 29, 1933, he was ordained a priest in Innsbruck Cathedral. After pastoral work in Schwarzenberg, he was appointed parish assistant in Hohenems from 1936 to 1941. Here he took particular care of the parish youth.

The Gestapo took a Sunday sermon as an opportunity to take him into protective custody for 10 days on July 29, 1940 for "disturbing the people". He was threatened with immediate transfer to a concentration camp if he repeated the offense. He was also banned from school and in 1940 was banned from writing by the Reichsschrifttumskammer. On August 1, 1941, he was drafted into the Wehrmacht and transferred to Poznan to join the air intelligence unit. Over the next few years, he was posted to Russia, Hungary and finally Czechoslovakia. On May 5, 1945, he was taken prisoner of war by the British, from which he returned to Hohenems on August 6, 1945, where he worked as chaplain and regional youth chaplain until 1950.