Dr Tobias Portschy, born on 5 September 1905 in Unterschützen [Hungarian: Alsolövő] in the district of Oberwart, then part of Austria-Hungary and now in Austria, was the Nazi Gauleiter of the Burgenland Gau and, following its dissolution, deputy Gauleiter of the Styria Gau [German: Reichsgau Steiermark]. He was significantly responsible for the disenfranchisement, persecution, expulsion and deportation of the Burgenland and Styrian Roma and Sinti.
Upbringing and Career in the NSDAP
Tobias Portschy grew up as the ninth of 15 children in modest rural circumstances in Unterschützen, a ‘small, purely German and Protestant farming village’1BArch, SSO R 9361-III/548241, Curriculum Vitae of Dr Tobias Portschy, 18/06/1940. in the Hungarian part of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. He found conditions in Hungary and the policy of Magyarisation oppressive, and viewed the 1921 cession of the German-speaking western Hungarian territory from Hungary to Austria as a ‘liberation’. In the 1920s, he came into contact with German nationalist movements and attended the Protestant, ‘German’-oriented grammar school in neighbouring Oberschützen, which later produced numerous supporters of the National Socialist German Workers’ Party (NSDAP). Some of the graduates were among his closest confidants, both personally and professionally, particularly in the context of the NSDAP. After completing his Matura examinations, Portschy studied law in Vienna (PhD in 1937).
During a stay abroad in Göttingen, he became acquainted with the NSDAP, for which he worked tirelessly upon his return home. In June 1931, he became a member of the NSDAP and joined the Sturmabteilung (SA). Together with trusted associates, he gradually built up the NSDAP in Burgenland and rose through the party ranks. In June 1932, he became district leader of Oberwart (which, organisationally, still belonged to the Gau of Styria); following the ban on NSDAP activities on 19 June 1933, he went underground and was imprisoned several times for his prohibited Nazi activities.
Although this entailed professional setbacks for him, he continued to work for the party and was eventually entrusted in 1935 with the establishment of the (illegal) Burgenland Gau, which he headed as Gauleiter. Despite the ban, the National Socialists maintained a presence in public spaces, chiefly through propaganda, and called for a change in political power.
In the wake of the ‘Anschluss‘ on the night of 11–12 March 1938, the National Socialists led by Tobias Portschy overthrew the provincial government in Burgenland and took over the administration. Portschy subsequently served as Landeshauptmann [Provincial governor] and Gauleiter. However, his plans to maintain Burgenland as a separate Gau failed, and on 15 October 1938 the region was divided between the Gaus of Styria and Lower Danube [German: Reichsgau Niederdonau]. His homeland, southern Burgenland—and the Romani population living there, the vast majority of whom were Roma—was assigned to the Gau of Styria.
Portschy subsequently became deputy Gauleiter of Styria. Having risked and sacrificed so much for the NSDAP, he saw this as a demotion. Although he was now unable to implement many of the reforms he had announced for Burgenland (including land reform), he had nevertheless succeeded, in his capacity as Burgenland Gauleiter and Governor, in enacting measures within a very short time to deprive sections of the population—particularly Jews and Roma—of their rights. He had also publicly announced this shortly after the seizure of power in 1938: ‘The Gypsies and the Jews have had no future [OR no place in Germany] since the founding of the Third Reich. Believe us that we will resolve this issue with National Socialist determination.’2Quote from Portschy in the Oberwarther Sonntags-Zeitung, April 10, 1938, 3.
Early Anti-Roma Agitation
At the time of the ‘Anschluss’, around 8,000 of the approximately 11,000 Austrian Roma lived in the Burgenland region, and of these, around 3,000 lived in the district of Oberwart, which was also home to Portschy’s native village of Unterschützen. This was one of 120 villages in Burgenland where Roma were permanently settled, and Portschy’s worldview was significantly shaped by the forms of everyday antigypsyism that arose in such communities. Throughout his life, he made racist, stereotypical and derogatory remarks about Roma, emphasising, as he did in an interview in 1988, that he ‘had never liked them because they were parasites. They didn’t work. They didn’t contribute.‘3Portschy, Tobias. “Interview.” Wiener, no. 97, June 1988, 156.
Agitation against the Roma and Jewish populations had always been a central component of the racist propaganda of the Burgenland National Socialists. Even before the Nazi era, campaigns were conducted under the slogan ‘Burgenland zigeunerfrei!’ [‘Burgenland free of Gypsies!’], and the Burgenland Gau leadership forbade ‘party comrades’ from employing or giving gifts to Roma; nor were they allowed to employ Roma as musicians—one of the few areas where they had hitherto found a degree of social recognition. The policy aimed both to segregate Roma from the non-Roma population and to deprive them of a legal means of subsistence, thereby encouraging them to leave the country.
The Burgenland National Socialists accused Burgenland and Austrian politicians of failing to ‘solve’ the ‘Gypsy question’, which had been the subject of widespread public debate in the interwar period. Although various measures, such as the creation of a specific ‘Gypsy law’, had been repeatedly considered, their implementation had failed because of the Austrian constitution, which also protected Roma from disenfranchisement.
‘Denkschrift’ 1938
Once the ‘Anschluss’ had been completed, Portschy saw his chance had come. He continued to stir up hatred against Roma in speeches and writings, supported by large sections of the population, but at the same time, as announced, actively implemented his radical ‘proposed solutions’. He summarised these in a racist, 28-page ‘Denkschrift’ [Memorandum] entitled ‘Die Zigeunerfrage‘ [‘The Gypsy Question’], which he disseminated throughout Austria via articles in various newspapers.4For example, R. W. P. “Die Zigeunerfrage: Ein brennendes Problem in Deutschland.” Linzer Tages-Post, June 4, 1939, 13. In doing so, he emphasised on several occasions that he was not the originator of the various ideas set out in the memorandum, but that he had taken up and compiled measures that had already been discussed by democratic politicians in the preceding decades.
The document is both a declaration of German nationalism and a racist description of the supposed characteristics and ways of life of Roma. It concludes with a range of ‘special legal provisions’, including a ban on sexual intercourse between Roma and those of ‘German blood’, a ban on Roma children attending school, a ban on the practice of commercial trades outside the labour camps (which were to be established), a ban on treatment in public hospitals, and exclusion from military service. It also advocates coercive measures such as forced sterilisation and the establishment of labour camps: ‘Only by permanently preventing their reproduction, through forced confinement in labour camps and by facilitating voluntary emigration abroad, can we rid ourselves of the Gypsy plague […]. This is the National Socialist solution and thus the only real solution’.5Burgenländische Landesbibliothek, Portschy, Denkschrift zur “Zigeunerfrage,” 27.
Active Persecution of Roma in Burgenland
By the time the memorandum was published in August 1938, Portschy, in his capacity as Landeshauptmann and Gauleiter, had already implemented some of his proposals and gradually stripped Roma of their civil rights. On 17 March 1938, he issued a decree prohibiting Roma from voting in the referendum held on 10 April 1938. It is noteworthy that a group of Roma led by Franz Horvath (1885–1939) lodged a complaint with the Reich government on 12 May 1938 against this disenfranchisement,6Franz Horvath, “Daher habe ich mich kurz entschlossen, die hohe Reichsregierung anzurufen.” In RomArchive, 2017, www.romarchive.eu/de/collection/daher-habe-ich-mich-kurz-entschlossen-die-hohe-reichsregierung-anzurufen [accessed: 21/05/2026]. though to no avail.
Portschy also ordered a census and the systematic registration of all Roma living in the Burgenland Gau. On his instructions, Roma children were no longer permitted to attend school from the 1938/39 academic year onwards, and he informed the district authorities on 31 August 1938 that Roma were now also officially prohibited from making music. Both measures served to exclude Roma from society; while the first led to a sustained increase in illiteracy, the second contributed to the suppression of opportunities to earn a living and thus to growing poverty.
On the basis of the ‘Preventive Fight against Crime’, 232 Burgenland Roma were arrested by June 1938 and sent to Dachau concentration camp. In July 1938, Portschy finally presented his ‘burgenländisches Zwangsarbeitsmodell für Zigeuner’ [‘Burgenland forced labour model for Gypsies’]7Freund et al., Vermögensentzug, 97. and, under the slogan ‘Gypsies to road building’, introduced compulsory labour for all Roma ‘fit for work’, who were to be ‘employed in compact groups on public construction sites or at private enterprises supplying materials for such sites, such as quarries, etc.’ These work groups were to be ‘employed separately from the other workers’ and were subject to ‘strict site supervision’.8Grenzmark Burgenland, July 31, 1938, 1. Approximately half of the wages paid by employers to the forced labourers were diverted to social security contributions or went to the respective municipality in which the individual concerned held residency rights.
Erika Thurner (born 1952) noted that Portschy’s radical ‘proposed solutions’ even influenced the Nazi persecution programme, and that ‘various measures of discrimination and exclusion […] anticipated the central programme’: ‘Burgenland was racing ahead of the ‘Altreich’.’9Thurner, “Zigeuner im Burgenland,” 115. This is evident from the examples cited, be it the introduction of forced labour or the ban on school attendance for Roma children, which was implemented in the other Gaus only at the start of the 1939/40 school year, and throughout the German Reich in March 1941.
Persecution of Roma in the Gau of Styria
When Portschy moved to the Gau of Styria as deputy Gauleiter following the dissolution of Burgenland, he remained actively involved in the persecution of Roma, despite holding a range of other positions and being assigned multiple additional responsibilities. From 1938 to 1945, for example, he was a member of the German Reichstag; from 1940 to 1943, Gauobmann of the ‘Deutsche Arbeitsfront’ [leader of the DAF, German Labour Front, in the Gau of Styria]; and from 1940 onwards, he was a member of the Schutzstaffel (SS), where he held the rank of SS-Oberführer. In 1941–1942 he served as a mountain infantryman in the Wehrmacht and was subsequently, from 1942, ‘Mobile Deputy of the Gau Leadership’ in Styria. In this role, he was tasked with maintaining the ‘home front’, particularly the infrastructure, which became increasingly difficult as the bombing campaign intensified. He was also active in propaganda, appeared as a speaker at numerous gatherings, and devoted himself to both internal party training and public relations work.
Portschy’s relationship with his superior, the Styrian Gauleiter Siegfried Uiberreither (1908–1984), was fraught with conflict. However, they were in total agreement regarding the persecution of Roma. This was discussed at various levels (district leadership, district administration, Gau leadership, provincial administration, judiciary, police); many plans were drawn up and then discarded. Uiberreither and Portschy were actively involved, sending copies of Portschy’s memorandum to the Reich Chancellery and the Reich Security Main Office, corresponding with the relevant authorities in the ‘Altreich’ and repeatedly pressing for a ‘solution to the Gypsy question’.
On 5 June 1939, when the Reich Criminal Police Office ordered the arrest of Roma, 553 Austrian Romani men were sent to Dachau concentration camp, and on 29 June 1939, 440 Romani women were sent to Ravensbrück concentration camp. Among them were also Roma from Burgenland and Styria. Portschy had already announced months earlier that ‘work-shy elements and those with previous convictions would be sent to Dachau and sterilised.’10StLA, Landesregierung Zi 1-1940, note by the Provincial Governor in Graz, 31/07/1939. The consequences of these arrest operations were devastating, as many Romani men and women who were actually in employment had been imprisoned, leaving behind, above all, their children and other dependants without adequate care and support. This caused discontent in the affected communities, but also within the districts, which were now faced with increased welfare costs. Calls were made for the establishment of camps for those left behind. Gauleiter Uiberreither lodged an official complaint with the Reich Criminal Police Office regarding the round-up, and demanded—entirely in line with Portschy’s views—a ‘final solution to the Gypsy question’. He requested permission to place even the ‘decently employed Gypsies’ in forced labour camps, as ‘a Gypsy, standing outside the national community, is always asocial’.11Cited in Freund et al., Vermögensentzug, 87. In the end, he was not granted permission.
However, the ‘Immobilisation Decree’ issued by the Reich Security Main Office on 17 October 1939 prohibited Roma from leaving their place of residence or the place where they were staying, and this made it impossible for them to practise certain occupations (such as itinerant trades) and thus had consequences that threatened their very existence. Furthermore, a census of the Roma population was conducted from 25 to 27 October.
In the Gau of Styria, plans for the establishment of separate ‘Gypsy camps’ were repeatedly put forward at various levels, and in 1940 Portschy even approached Reich Minister of the Interior Wilhelm Frick (1877–1946), SS-Gruppenführer Reinhard Heydrich (1904–1942) and SS-Oberführer Arthur Nebe (1894–1945) regarding this matter. However, Portschy was not further involved in the establishment of the largest ‘Zigeuneranhaltelager’ [‘Detention camp for Gypsies’] in Lackenbach, set up in the neighbouring Lower Danube Gau on 23 November 1940; this was initiated by Bernhard Wilhelm Neureiter (1900–1966), the ‘Commissioner for Gypsy Affairs in the Racial Policy Office of the Gau Leadership of Niederdonau’.
Between 4 and 8 November 1941, 5,007 Austrian Roma, including people from the Styria Gau, were deported to the Litzmannstadt ghetto. The deportations of Roma to the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration and extermination camp, triggered by the ‘Auschwitz Decree’ of 16 December 1942, also affected Roma from Burgenland and Styria, who were ‘resettled’ in the course of 1943. Around 90 per cent of Austrian Roma did not survive the Nazi genocide.
Along with Siegfried Uiberreither and Bernard Wilhelm Neureiter, Portschy was one of the driving forces behind the antigypsy persecution policy in Austria. Susanne Uslu-Pauer (born 1969) described Portschy as a ‘pioneer, visionary and promoter of the persecution of ‘Gypsies‘ in Burgenland’.12Uslu-Pauer, “Verdrängtes Unrecht,” 61.
After 1945
At the end of the war, Portschy initially fled to Upper Styria using forged identity papers. In June 1945, however, he surrendered to the Allies and was interned at the British internment camp in Wolfsberg (Carinthia), which had been set up for regional Nazi elites from Styria and Carinthia. He was also held at the Graz Regional Criminal Court. On 11 February 1949, the public prosecutor’s office brought charges against him. He was accused of having acted as an ‘illegal’ on behalf of the party from 1933 to 1938 (during the period when the NSDAP was banned), and, amongst other charges, of having served as an illegal Gauleiter, later Gauobmann of the German Labour Front, as an SS-Oberführer, deputy Gauleiter and, at times, Gauleiter of Styria. The charges also specified that he had been awarded the Blutorden [Blood Order], the NSDAP Golden Party Badge, and the Golden Hitler Youth Badge of Honour. Notably, his persecution of the Jewish and Roma populations was not included in the indictment.
On 28 March 1949, Portschy was sentenced by a People’s Court to 15 years’ imprisonment as a war criminal. As early as 1951, he was granted a conditional pardon by the Federal President and released from custody. Banned from practising law, he set up an electrical business in Graz through a front man and settled in Rechnitz in southern Burgenland in 1979, where his wife Edith Portschy (1920–1987), a former BDM leader to whom he had been married since 1944, ran the ‘Hotel Rose’. There he received guests of various backgrounds from Austria and abroad (former ‘party comrades’, politicians, church dignitaries, neo-Nazis, etc.) and was courted in particular by politicians who hoped his endorsement would win them the votes of former National Socialists.
A member of the Freiheitliche Partei Österreichs (FPÖ) [Freedom Party of Austria] from 1959 to 1991, he remained well-connected politically throughout his life and enjoyed considerable social standing. Portschy never renounced National Socialism. Until his death, he publicly identified as a Nazi and never distanced himself from his actions or from the inhuman ideology he had espoused. His role as a perpetrator was downplayed both socially and in parts of the historical literature, and he was never held accountable for his persecution of the Jewish and Roma populations. As late as 1988, he declared: ‘I stand by every word of the memorandum [‘The Gypsy Question’]; that was my honest opinion.’13Portschy, Tobias. “Interview.” Interview by Kid Möchel, May 2, 1988. And in 1992, he similarly stated in an interview for the film Schuld und Gedächtnis: ‘The Gypsies must go because they are asocial. […] Those who do not work should not eat either!’14Quoted from Humer, “Schuld und Gedächtnis.” Proceedings brought against him for Nazi re-activism on the basis of these and other statements were discontinued following his death. Tobias Portschy died on 2 March 1996 in Rechnitz, Austria.
