"The Boys from ..."

I’m sure that, like me, none of you had ever heard of the Austrian town of Amstetten until it shot to notoriety in 2008 when police revealed Josef Fritzl had imprisoned his daughter in a cellar under his house there for twentyfour years and fathered seven children with her.

Well now it’s back in the news, for it appears that for the past sixtysix years it’s most famous honorary citizen has been Adolf Hitler, for like many Austrian towns it declared ’der Führer’ to be an honorary citizen after Nazi Germany annexed Austria in 1938; but, unlike in most other towns, his name was not removed in 1945.

Now Amstetten Town Hall delegates have dispossessed Hitler of the citizen of honour title, although it has been reported the Town Hall debate on the subject was “very emotional” and the right-wing Freedom Party’s  faction controversially abstained from voting.

“Debate” ! … “emotional” ! … “abstained” ! … It all sounds a bit strange to me, but then of course many Austrians were good little Nazis and very happy to welcome Hitler back to the country of his birth after the ‘Anschluss’. Perhaps some of those nubile young maidens from the ‘Bund Deutscher Mädel’ branch in Amstetten got a bit carried away at the time and Adolf did a ‘Joe Fritzl’, which resulted in more than an honorary citizenship.

When asked … “Why all the fuss ?”

… This delegate refused to answer !