Stefan Singer
Personalia
Born:
Died:
Profession:
Persecution:
Imprisonment Jan. 17, 1940 – June 29, 1940,
Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp June 29, 1940 – Feb. 1, 1942,
Dachau Concentration Camp Feb. 1, 1942 – Jan. 3, 1944
KZ Number:
Curriculum Vitae
Stefan Singer was born in Kappel an der Drau as the fourth child of farmer Johann Singer and his wife Maria, née Schemiau. After graduating from high school, he entered the seminary in Klagenfurt and was ordained a priest on July 19, 1896. He then served for one year as prefect at the Marianum Boys’ Seminary in Klagenfurt and subsequently as an assistant pastor (curate) in the parish of Eisenkappel. In the fall of 1899, he moved to Augsdorf as an interim pastor, where he soon became the parish priest and also took over the parish of Schiefling. In 1922, he finally became the parish priest of his home parish, Kappel an der Drau. In addition, he authored works on the ecclesiastical history of the Lower Carinthia region.
As pastor of Kappel an der Drau, he also witnessed the occupation of Austria by Nazi Germany on March 12, 1938. On January 16, 1940, when he accidentally opened a letter addressed to the Kappel elementary school, he resealed it and affixed a Dollfuß stamp to it. As a result, the Gestapo summoned him the very next day. Following the interrogation, he was immediately arrested on January 17, 1940. On February 7, 1940, he was transferred from the Ferlach District Court to the Klagenfurt State Prison. The arrest warrant was not read to Stefan Singer until February 27, 1940. In it, he was accused not only of mailing a Dollfuß stamp but also of refusing to fly a flag from the church tower as a sign of victory over Poland and of writing German names in Slovenian. For these reasons, he was deemed an enemy of the state.
Although he was informed 14 days later that he had been acquitted by the Regional Court, he was not released. In early June 1940, he was served with another arrest warrant by the Gestapo. In it, he was classified as an enemy of the people and the state. The following day, he was taken to the Klagenfurt train station and arrived in Munich by train on June 14, 1940.
There, however, he was not sent to the Dachau concentration camp but was transferred to the Oranienburg concentration camp, where he arrived on June 29, 1940. There he met, among others, the priest Josef Pollak. Soon after his arrival, he was placed in solitary confinement, from which he was not released until January 1942. On January 20, 1942, Stefan Singer was deported via Halle, Leipzig, and Hof to the Dachau concentration camp, where he arrived on February 1, 1942. He was released from the Dachau concentration camp on January 3, 1944. However, he was not allowed to return to Kappel an der Drau but was sent to the Sisters of the Cross in Fölling near Maria Trost. There he spent the last year of his life, marked by the abuse he had suffered in the concentration camps. Physically weakened and broken, he died there on February 24, 1945.
His body was brought back to his hometown of Kappel an der Drau after the war and was buried on November 21, 1945.
Places
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Place of activity:
Citations
- Mikrut, Jan (2000): Blutzeugen des Glaubens. Martyrologium des 20. Jahrhunderts. Band 3 (Wien), p. 189–197.
