I’m staying at a small hotel in Austria, where a poster on the wall has caught my attention (pictured in the comments). I’m not native speaking German, so my understanding might be poor. However, it’s an “Urkunde” or certificate to Jakob and Frans Schneeberger (the later the founder of the hotel) for - what I understand - their commitments in the war.
So I wondered, why and who gave out these certificates? Surely couldn’t have happened after May ‘45 - or what?
Also - am I staying at a nazi-hotel?
Sorry if I’m merely misinterpreting.
I’ll leave others to answer in more detail about the potential origin of the certificate (which is not an official government certificate - more likely either a local or even family production, or a post-war “Old Comrades Association”). But here’s a précis of the two men’s (possibly brothers) war records:
Jakob was a senior private soldier in the Mountain Light Infantry Regiment 137. He joined the Army in July 1941, and in the Summer and Autumn of that year was involved in Operation Platinum Fox in the far north of Norway/Finland trying to take Murmansk, and the subsequent . He was injured by shrapnel at the “Devils Mountain” on 1st of May 1943. He returned to Austria in April 1944 as a disabled war veteran, and was given an Iron Cross Second Class with the Infantry Assault Badge, the Eastern Medal and the Heavily Disabled War Veteran’s badge.
Franz was an NCO in the Mountain Infantry, joined up in October 1939, “took part in the March into the Sudetenland” (which is inconsistent with his supposed join up date, as the occupation of the Sudetenland took place in early October 1938), the Polish (in September 1939 - also before his supposed join up date) and French Campaigns, as well as the attack on the Soviet Union. He was killed in Smolensk in August of 1941. This means he was probably in 1st Mountain Division, as the other German Mountain Divisions were fighting in northern Norway at the time. He too was awarded an Iron Cross Second Class, also with the Infantry Assault Badge.
As to your question on whether you’re staying in a Nazi Hotel, it depends. The tone is certainly propagandising (the banner at the bottom reads “to the Heroic Story of our Homeland”), and it would be considered a faux pas to display something like this in a German or Austrian home today. I guess you mean Jakob is the founder of the hotel - if he’s is still alive (and even if he lied about his age and enlisted in a wave of anti-Bolshevik fervour at the age of 17, he’d be 98 by now), you could maybe understand the heavily wounded war veteran who lost his brother wanting to remember him. Assuming Jakob is relatively long dead, it’s either forgotten in a corner or politically pretty dubious at very best.
