Hitler's Austrian Roots: Exploring His Early Years

Adolf Hitler was born in Braunau am Inn, Austria-Hungary, in 1889. He was raised near Linz and lived in Vienna in the first decade of the 1900s before moving to Germany in 1913. Hitler was an Austrian citizen and volunteered to serve in the German Army at the start of World War I. After the war, Hitler lived in Munich, which was then overrun with bitter ex-soldiers and others angry at the new democratic government in Berlin. It was during this time that Hitler began to associate with groups formed to agitate against capitalism, communism, the Treaty of Versailles, democracy, and the Jews. In 1923, Hitler attempted a failed coup in Munich and was sentenced to five years in prison. He served just over a year of his sentence and, after his early release in 1924, he gained popular support by attacking the Treaty of Versailles and promoting pan-Germanism, antisemitism, and anti-communism. On February 25, 1932, Hitler became a citizen of Germany and, by the middle of 1934, he had achieved absolute power as Führer und Reichskanzler (leader and chancellor).

Hitler was born in Braunau am Inn, Austria-Hungary, in 1889

Adolf Hitler was born on 20 April 1889 in Braunau am Inn, a town in Austria-Hungary (present-day Austria), close to the border with the German Empire. Hitler was born in a small town in Austria, near the German border, in what was then known as Austria-Hungary. At the time, Austria-Hungary was a multi-ethnic empire, dominated by ethnic Germans and Hungarians.

Hitler was the son of a local customs official, Alois Hitler, and his much younger third wife, Klara Pölzl. Alois was an illegitimate child, and his father's identity remains unknown. Hitler's mother, Klara, was his father's third wife, and he was the fourth of six children, three of whom (Gustav, Ida, and Otto) died in infancy. Hitler had a turbulent relationship with his father, who was harsh and distant, but was closer to his mother.

Hitler's family moved to Passau, Germany, when he was three years old, and he acquired the distinctive lower Bavarian dialect, which marked his speech throughout his life. The family returned to Austria in 1894, settling in Leonding, and later moved to Hafeld, near Lambach, where Hitler attended a state-funded primary school. In 1897, the family moved again, this time to Lambach, where Hitler took singing lessons and sang in the church choir.

Hitler's father, Alois, had a successful career in the customs bureau and wanted his son to follow in his footsteps. However, Hitler was more interested in art and hoped to attend a classical high school. When his father refused, Hitler intentionally performed poorly in school, hoping that his father would eventually relent. However, Alois died suddenly in 1903, and Hitler's mother allowed him to leave school.

In September 1904, Hitler enrolled at the Realschule in Steyr, where his behaviour and performance improved. After passing a repeat of the final exam in 1905, Hitler left school without any ambitions for further education or clear career plans. In 1907, he moved to Vienna to study fine art and applied to the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna but was rejected twice. After his mother's death from breast cancer in 1907, Hitler ran out of money and lived in homeless shelters and dormitories. He earned money by doing odd jobs and painting watercolours of Vienna's sights.

During his time in Vienna, Hitler was exposed to racist rhetoric and populist politicians who exploited the city's prevalent anti-Semitic sentiment. He read widely, consuming literature that promoted prejudice and utilised Christian fears of being swamped by an influx of Eastern European Jews. It was during this period that Hitler's anti-Semitic and nationalist ideas began to take shape, although he would later claim that his anti-Semitism developed later, during his time in Munich.

In May 1913, Hitler received the final part of his father's estate and moved to Munich, Germany. When he was conscripted into the Austro-Hungarian Army, he was deemed unfit for service, and after the outbreak of World War I in 1914, he voluntarily enlisted in the Bavarian Army. He served through all four years of the conflict, rising to the rank of corporal, and was decorated for bravery.

After the war, Hitler remained in the army and was appointed as an intelligence agent in a reconnaissance unit. In September 1919, he joined the German Workers' Party (later renamed the National Socialist German Workers' Party, or Nazis), and in 1921, he became the leader of the Nazi Party. Hitler's rise through the ranks of the Nazi Party and his eventual seizure of power as the dictator of Nazi Germany are well-documented, as are his policies, which led to the Holocaust and the deaths of millions during World War II.

While Hitler became a German citizen in 1932 and renounced his Austrian citizenship in 1934, his Austrian origins are an important part of his story, and understanding the socio-political context of his birthplace provides insights into the development of his ideologies.

He moved to Germany in 1913 and renounced his Austrian citizenship in 1925

Adolf Hitler was born in Braunau am Inn in Austria-Hungary in 1889 and was raised near Linz. He moved to Vienna in the first decade of the 1900s, before moving to Germany in 1913.

Hitler's nationalism was not about the German state, but about the German ethnic nationalism in line with the Pan-Germanism movement. He considered himself an ethnic German who just happened to be born in the Austrian Empire rather than the German Empire. Both were dominated by ethnic Germans but included other nationalities, the Austrian Empire more so than the German one. Hitler believed that all ethnic Germans should live under one German state.

Hitler's time in Vienna was from 1909 to 1913, and it was during this period that he later claimed to have developed his antisemitic outlook. Vienna had a large Jewish minority (about 10% of the population when Hitler lived there). It was also a hotbed of ethnic conflict, as members of all the different populations of the Austrian Empire (Czechs, Poles, Croats, Hungarians) migrated to the rapidly growing capital. Hitler observed the success of the city's popular mayor, Lueger, who was regularly re-elected on a virulently anti-Semitic program.

Hitler volunteered to serve in the German Army at the start of World War I, despite being an Austrian citizen. He served through all four years of the conflict, although he rose only to the rank of corporal. He identified completely with the German cause, and was deeply disturbed by the defeat of 1918. Like many disappointed soldiers, he believed that the army had been “stabbed in the back” by traitors.

Hitler moved to Munich after the war, a city overrun with bitter ex-soldiers and others angry at the new democratic government in Berlin. He began to associate with some of the many groups formed to agitate against all the evils affecting Germany: capitalism, Communism, the unpopular Treaty of Versailles, democracy, and the Jews. By September 1919, Hitler had clearly come to see the Jews as the organizing force behind these problems.

Hitler was stateless for almost seven years after renouncing his Austrian citizenship in 1925. This meant that he was legally unable to run for public office, and still faced the risk of deportation. On 25 February 1932, the interior minister of Brunswick, Dietrich Klagges, who was a member of the Nazi Party, appointed Hitler as administrator for the state's delegation to the Reichsrat in Berlin, making Hitler a citizen of Brunswick, and thus of Germany.

Hitler's father, Alois, was illegitimate and there is no evidence of a Jewish grandfather

Hitler's father, Alois Hitler (né Schicklgruber), was born out of wedlock in 1837 in the hamlet of Strones, a parish of Döllersheim in the Waldviertel of northwest Lower Austria. His mother was Maria Schicklgruber, an unmarried peasant whose family had lived in the area for generations. The identity of his biological father is unknown, and the space for his father's name on the baptismal certificate was left blank and marked "illegitimate".

Historians have proposed various candidates for Alois's biological father, including Johann Georg Hiedler, his younger brother Johann Nepomuk Hiedler (or Hüttler), and Leopold Frankenberger (a purportedly Jewish man, whose existence has never been documented). In 1842, when Alois was five, Johann Georg Hiedler married Maria Schicklgruber, and he was later added to the birth certificate and accepted as Alois's biological father. In 1876, Alois had his last name changed to "Hitler", derived from his stepfather's surname.

The claim that Alois's biological father was Jewish stems from the so-called "Frankenberger thesis", which was put forward by Adolf Hitler's former lawyer, Hans Frank, during the Nuremberg Trials. Frank claimed that, at the time of Alois's conception, Maria Schicklgruber was working as a cook for a Jewish family in Graz and that her child may have been fathered by their 19-year-old son, Leopold Frankenberger. However, historians have dismissed this claim as baseless, as there is no evidence of a Frankenberger family living in Graz at the time, and Jews had been expelled from the region in the 15th century and were not allowed to return until the 1860s, when Alois was around 30.

Hitler's mother, Klara, died of breast cancer when he was 17

Adolf Hitler was born in Braunau am Inn, Austria-Hungary, on 20 April 1889. He was the fourth of six children born to Alois Hitler and his third wife, Klara Hitler (née Pölzl).

Klara was born in the Austrian village of Weitra on 12 August 1860. She worked as a domestic servant in her teenage years and was hired as a maid at 16 by her second cousin, Alois, and his wife. When Alois's second wife, Franziska Matzelsberger, died in 1884, Klara and Alois married in 1885.

Klara and Alois had six children together, but only two survived to adulthood: Paula and Adolf. In 1903, Alois died, leaving Klara a widow. She sold the family home and moved with Adolf and Paula to an apartment in Linz, where they lived frugally.

In 1906, Klara discovered a lump in her breast but initially ignored it. By January 1907, the pain had become unbearable, and she consulted the family doctor, Eduard Bloch. Bloch diagnosed Klara with breast cancer and recommended a mastectomy, informing her son, Adolf, that his mother had a small chance of survival.

Adolf, who had a close relationship with his mother, was devastated by the news. He moved back home to care for his mother and was by her side throughout her treatment. Despite the surgery, the cancer had already metastasized to the pleural tissue in her chest, and her condition was terminal.

In the final months of his mother's life, Adolf centred his world around her healing. He slept in the kitchen, the warmest part of the house, with his mother, and saw to her treatment. However, all efforts to save her were futile, and on 21 December 1907, Klara Hitler passed away at home in Linz from the toxic side effects of iodoform, an experimental form of chemotherapy. She was 47 years old.

Adolf was inconsolable at his mother's death and carried the grief for the rest of his life. He later wrote in his autobiography, Mein Kampf, that he had "honoured his father but loved his mother" and that her death was a "dreadful blow". He even carried a picture of her with him wherever he went, including down into the Berlin bunker where he met his end in 1945.

Hitler's time in Vienna (1909-1913) is when he claimed to have developed his antisemitic views

Adolf Hitler was born in Braunau am Inn in Austria-Hungary in 1889 and raised near Linz. He moved to Vienna in 1907, where he lived until 1913. It was during this period that Hitler claimed to have developed his antisemitic views.

Hitler moved to Vienna to pursue his dream of becoming an artist. However, he failed to gain acceptance to the Vienna Academy of the Arts and soon fell into poverty. He lived in homeless shelters and men's homes, earning a meagre living selling paintings of Vienna's landmarks. It was during this period that Hitler's political ideology began to take shape. He read newspapers, pamphlets and books on German history and mythology, developing a hodgepodge of racist, nationalistic, anti-Semitic attitudes.

Hitler was influenced by two political movements during his time in Vienna. The first was the German racist nationalism propagated by the Upper Austrian Pan-German politician Georg von Schönerer. The second was the antisemitism of Karl Lueger, Mayor of Vienna from 1897 to 1910. Lueger's antisemitism was more practical and organisational than ideological, reinforcing anti-Jewish stereotypes and casting Jews as enemies of the German middle and lower classes. Hitler drew his ideology largely from Schönerer but adopted Lueger's strategy and tactics.

Hitler's time in Vienna also exposed him to the city's diverse population, including its Jewish community. In his autobiography, Mein Kampf, Hitler describes a chance meeting with a man in "a black caftan and black hair locks" that caused him to question: "Is this a Jew? [...] Is this a German?" He began to study Jews in the street and immerse himself in antisemitic literature, claiming that this led to his transformation "from a weak-kneed cosmopolitan [...] into an antisemite". However, Hitler's antisemitism did not extend to his personal relationships with Jews during this period. One of the most loyal buyers of his paintings in Vienna was a Jew, Samuel Morgenstern, and he also maintained a friendship with Josef Neumann, another Jew.

Hitler left Vienna in 1913 to avoid military service in the Austrian army. He moved to Munich, where he continued to paint and sell his work. When the First World War broke out in 1914, Hitler volunteered for the German army.

Frequently asked questions