A Spark of Humanity in Dark Times: Ludwig Sölder's Rescue of Zlata and Her Mother

Photo Ludwig Sölder.  In: Wopfner,Helmut  (Hrsg.): Unsere Sternkorona Hall in Tirol. Mitgliederverzeichnis 1888 – 1998. Thaur 1998, p.160.

The history of World War II is filled with countless stories of cruelty and inhumanity. But there are other stories, quiet tales of courage and decency that shine like a bright star in a dark night. One of these is the story of Tyrolean Ludwig Sölder.

From Tyrolean Student to Wehrmacht Soldier

Born in Thaur in 1921, Sölder attended the Franciscan grammar school in Hall. In 1939, amidst the turmoil of the Nazi regime, he was conscripted into the Wehrmacht and served with an infantry division in occupied Croatia. In the coastal town of Crkvenica, his fate would become forever intertwined with that of two other people.

The Decision That Changed Everything

In 1943, Sölder received a fateful order: to surround the house of two Jewish women, a mother and her daughter named Zlata Schulteiss, who were accused of supporting partisans. As an experienced frontline soldier, Sölder did not see enemies, but two helpless and desperate human beings. Instead of blindly following the order, he made a decision that could have cost him his life: he commanded the soldiers to withdraw and instructed the women to report to him the next morning.
What followed was an act of immense civil courage. Sölder recognized the innocence of the two women and, on his own authority, issued them a "certificate of harmlessness," which he stamped with his company's seal. This document became their shield, their ticket to survival.

The Legacy of Conscience

Sölder acted against the inhumane ideology of the regime he served and instead followed his conscience. At great personal risk, he saved two innocent people from arrest, deportation, and almost certain death. Both women survived the war.
In 1945, after being wounded, Sölder returned to Tyrol and studied in Innsbruck. The significance of his deed was only fully recognized much later: in 1995, fifty years after the end of the war, Ludwig Sölder was honored in a ceremony at Innsbruck's city hall by the State of Israel and the Jewish Community of Innsbruck – in the presence of Zlata Schulteiss, the woman whose life he had saved.
His story reminds us that humanity is always a choice. Even in the darkest hour, a single individual can make all the difference.