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75 years ago, on the night of April 12, 1945, St. Stephen’s Cathedral in Vienna was on fire. World War II was coming to an end, Easter Sunday had already been April 1. On this day, the first advanced departments of the Red Army marched to Vienna, the Wehrmacht, the SS and the Volkssturm resisted, but were lost. The Soviets were supposed to stop at the belt and on the Danube Canal, but both “main battle lines” only briefly resisted Soviet superiority.
The First District had been evacuated by the SS and Wehrmacht and was not an immediate combat area. German anti-aircraft positions opened fire across the Danube, St. Stephen’s Cathedral took a few hits. At the same time, hordes of Viennese ransacked the shops and camps in the area and set buildings on fire to hide the traces. Suddenly, the department stores were burned in the vicinity of the cathedral, now the bullet holes in the ceiling had fatal effects: the interior of the church was cold, like a bellows, the hot air was sucked in from the outside. The 500-year-old larch wood from the roof structure started to burn. On the afternoon of April 12, the 22-ton Pummerin crashed to the ground with a terrible roar.
The “Wiener Zeitung” was able to find the last witnesses who witnessed the fire in the Cathedral of Saint Stephen and can count it today. Hellmut Butterweck, 17, took refuge in Leopoldstadt. “From the attic I saw that St. Stephen’s Cathedral was on fire,” he says. “Then I went down to the basement and said that Steffl was on fire and people said: no, that too!” Says Butterweck, who later became known as a publicist.
Viennese Robert Schigutt also saw the Steffl burn. In 1945 he lived near the Schafberg. “I went up the hill, you have a view of the city center. And there I saw the Stephansdom burning. Lichterloh. That hurt like a Viennese,” remembers the subsequent doctor.
The cathedral must be put in ruins
But in reality it should have gotten worse: because when the Russian troops had already reached the city center and the Germans had withdrawn through the Danube Canal, the Austrian resistance took advantage of the hour and raised the white flag on the Steffl tower. The German order was issued to fire the tower. Wehrmacht captain Gerhard Klinkicht, born in Hannover, commanded an anti-aircraft position beyond the Danube in Bisamberg. He received the following command: “In retaliation for raising the white flag at St. Stephen’s Cathedral, the cathedral must first be placed with 100 rubble and ash grenades. If that is not enough, continue firing until it is destroyed.” Klinkicht rejected the order. For conscience. Refusal to give orders could have cost your head and neck.
In 1997 Klinkicht was honored by Archbishop Christoph Schönborn with a plaque at St. Stephen’s Cathedral.
