Rudolf Monz (1912 - 1940)

🕯️In solemn remembrance of Rudolf Monz
(October 6, 1912 – January 19, 1940)

Rudolf Monz was born into a time marked by intense persecution for people of his background. As a member of the Yenish minority, he experienced the increasing marginalization and brutality of the Nazi regime firsthand.
His life's journey took him from his birthplace in Lauterach, Vorarlberg, to Hall in Tyrol, where he lived with his parents at Weissenbachstrasse 7. His fate is a tragic and early example of the systematic persecution of the Yenish people by the Nazis, which began long before the start of the Second World War.
As early as the summer of 1939, on July 1st, Rudolf Monz was arrested and deported without trial to the Dachau concentration camp. The Nazi authorities cynically called this arbitrary measure "protective custody" (Schutzhaft). After a brief, provisional release at the end of September, he was immediately arrested again and taken back to the hell of Dachau.
Just a few months later, on January 19, 1940, Rudolf Monz died under unexplained circumstances at the young age of 27. The camp administration lied about the cause of his death, stating "heart and circulatory weakness" – a notorious, euphemistic code phrase used to conceal the cruel reality of the camps: murder, maltreatment, torture, and systematic starvation.
Rudolf Monz fell victim to an inhumane ideology. His death reminds us to keep alive the memory of the forgotten victims of the Nazi era, which included thousands of Yenish people, and to resolutely oppose all forms of discrimination and racism.
His dignity was taken from him. His name remains.