Dr. Richard Steidle

Born in South Tyrol, Richard Steidle first attended grammar school in Feldkirch and then moved to Innsbruck, where he joined the Nibelungia Innsbruck secondary school fraternity.

After graduating from high school in 1900, he studied law in Innsbruck and joined the Austria Innsbruck student fraternity in 1900. He completed his studies in 1908 with a doctorate in law and then moved to Schlanders and Vienna as a trainee lawyer. In 1913 he opened his own law firm in Innsbruck. As he was unfit for military service, he became a military court litigator at the beginning of the First World War.

After the war, Richard Steidle became involved in Tyrolean state politics: in 1919, he was elected to the Tyrolean state parliament as a member of the Christian Social Party (CSP), where he remained until 1934. He was also a member of the Tyrolean provincial government several times and of the Federal Council from 1922 to 1931. In 1920, he founded the Tyrolean Heimatschutz and held various positions within this organization.

On 11 June 1933, he was shot and seriously injured in front of his house in Innsbruck during an assassination attempt by the 20-year-old National Socialist Werner Frhr. von Alvensleben from Berlin and three other Austrian Nazis; as a result, he was left with a paralyzed arm. Richard Steidle is appointed Security Director for Tyrol on October 17, 1933. One of his tasks in this function is to combat National Socialists. On July 15, 1934, he was appointed Austrian Consul General in Trieste. He remained in this position until 1938.

After the Anschluss, he was called back to Vienna to be sworn in and immediately arrested in the parliament building. In November, he is transferred to the Buchenwald concentration camp, where his son Othmar is also held. The intention was to liquidate Richard Steidle here. In order not to have any witnesses, his son was transferred to the Dachau concentration camp on August 23, 1940.