VIP transport to Dachau

In the early hours of April 1, 1938—just a few weeks after Austria's annexation by Nazi Germany—one of the darkest chapters in Austrian history began: the first organized transport of prisoners from Vienna to the Dachau concentration camp.

Among the deportees were prominent figures from Austrian public life: politicians, intellectuals, artists, scientists, and officials who were considered opponents of the Nazi regime. They were arrested, stripped of their dignity, and transported to Bavaria in cattle cars—a harbinger of the systematic terror that was to follow.

This transport marked not only the beginning of the persecution of political opponents in Austria, but also the brutal eradication of democratic structures and the destruction of lives. Many of the deportees did not survive their imprisonment in the concentration camps, while others suffered lifelong trauma.