On November 9, 2021 – the 83rd anniversary of the 1938 “Kristallnacht” pogrom – the Shoah Wall of Names Memorial in Vienna, Austria, was officially inaugurated. The memorial commemorates the fate of more than 64,440 Jewish children, women and men from Austria who were murdered during the Shoah. The memorial site is located in Ostarrichi Park, a central space adjacent to the Campus of the University of Vienna and the Austrian National Bank.
Federal Chancellor Alexander Schallenberg at the Shoah Wall of Names Memorial bearing the names of 64,000 Austrian Jews who were killed in the Holocaust during its opening in Vienna, Austria, on November 9, 2021.
The inauguration ceremony was attended by Federal Chancellor Alexander Schallenberg, President of the National Council Wolfgang Sobotka, Israel’s Diaspora Minister Nachman Shai, Israel Ambassador Mordechai Rodgold, President of the Federal Association of Jewish Religious Communities in Austria Oskar Deutsch, Secretary-General of the National Fund of the Republic of Austria for Victims of National Socialism Hannah Lessing, Jewish community leaders and other dignitaries. In addition, descendants of survivors of the families of the murdered Austrian Jews, as well as by the initiator of the project, Austrian-born Holocaust survivor Kurt Yakov Tutter attended the ceremony. Regrettably, Federal President Alexander Van der Bellen, was not able to attend the opening.
Chancellor Schallenberg with Austrian-born Holocaust survivor Kurt Yakov Tutter, who initiated this project
The Memorial To The Jewish Children, Women And Men Of Austria Who Were Murdered In The Shoah consists of a circle of stone walls which carry the name of every Austrian Jew who fell victim to the National Socialist regime. It shows that the victims were not numbers, but human beings, each with their own individual identity, hopes and dreams, as a person's name is inextricably linked to their individual persona.
Austrian Federal Chancellor Alexander Schallenberg greets Diaspora Affairs Minister Nachman Shai from Israel
Inspired by the Hall of Names at Yad Vashem, the National Memorial to the Belgian Jew Martyrs in Anderlecht near Brussels, the Mémorial de la Shoah in Paris, and the Dutch Holocaust Memorial planned in Amsterdam, the project initiator Kurt Yakov Tutter, a Holocaust survivor who once fled from Austria to Canada via Belgium while his parents were deported to the Auschwitz concentration camp and murdered there, had been lobbying with his non-profit Gedenkstaette Namensmauern (Memorial Walls of Names) for such a memorial to be built in Austria for almost 20 years.
Hannah Lessing, Secretary-General of the National Fund of the Republic of Austria for Victims of National Socialism
The “gathering of names”, a bipartisan project, started in 1995 under then Chancellor Franz Vranitzky and then Vice Chancellor Erhard Busek, and was conducted by the Documentation Centre of Austrian Resistance (DÖW). As part of the project “Registration of Austrian Holocaust Victims by Name”, initiated by the Israeli Yad Vashem Memorial, commissioned by the Austrian Ministry of Science and co-financed by the National Fund, the DÖW has been collecting the data of Austrian Holocaust victims ever since.
Austrian Federal Minister for the European Union and Constitution Karoline Edtstadler
In 2018, the Austrian Government decided to almost entirely fund the new memorial, whose construction costs are estimated to total $6 million (€5.3 million). Construction began in the summer of 2020 and was completed in October of 2021.
Watch the Inauguration Ceremony:
IMPORTANT INFORMATION regarding Victims Search:
How can I obtain confirmation that the names of my family members who were murdered in the Shoah are actually engraved on the Shoah Wall of Names Memorial?
Go to the website of the Documentation Centre of Austrian Resistance (DÖW), click on “Victims search”, and enter the first and last name of the person you are searching for. Once, results are displayed, make sure to only search in the data base for “Shoah Victims”.
Important note: If the name of an Austrian Shoah Victim is missing in the DÖW Data Base, it should be reported to office@doew.at