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Concept
Gustav Schwarzenegger
Summary
Gustav Schwarzenegger (17 August 1907 - 13 December 1972) was an Austrian police chief (Gendarmeriekommandant), postal inspector, member of the Sturmabteilung (SA), and military police officer. He was the father of Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Gustav Schwarzenegger was born in Austria-Hungary, the son of Cecelia (née Hinterleitner, 1878–1968) and Karl Schwarzenegger (1872–1927). His patrilineal grandfather, Wenzel Mach, was Czech and came from the village of Chocov near Mladá Vožice. Wenzel had a child out of wedlock with Kunigunde Schwarzenegger, and the child was originally named Carl Mach but later adopted his mother's surname, Schwarzenegger.
According to documents obtained in 2003 from the Austrian State Archives by the Los Angeles Times, Schwarzenegger voluntarily applied to join the Sturmabteilung (SA) on 1 March 1938, eleven days before the country was annexed. Austria became part of Nazi Germany after being annexed on 12 March 1938. A separate record obtained by the Wiesenthal Center indicates he sought membership before the annexation, but was accepted only in January 1941.
Schwarzenegger also applied to become a member of the Sturmabteilung (SA), the Nazi Party's (NSDAP) paramilitary wing, on 1 May 1939, in the early years of the annexation of Austria, at a time when SA membership was declining. The SA had 900,000 members in 1940, down from 4.2 million in 1934. This six-year decline in SA membership was an extended result of the three-day-long purge known as the Night of the Long Knives, a political purge carried out by Adolf Hitler against the SA, seen at that time as too radical and too powerful by senior military and industrial leaders within the NSDAP.
Schwarzenegger had served in the Austrian Army from 1924 to 1937, achieving the rank of section commander, and in 1937, he became a police officer. After enlisting in the Wehrmacht in November 1939, Schwarzenegger had gained the appointment of Hauptfeldwebel (Company 1st Sergeant) of the Feldgendarmerie, which acted as military police units.
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