The World of
the Habsburgs

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1914
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1915
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1917
1918
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Post-war

Black marketeering, profiteering and self-subsistence

Food supplies as a subject of correspondence

As the war went on, the food supply situation in the Austrian half of the Monarchy began to assume catastrophic dimensions, particularly in the larger cities. The relevant authorities attempted to secure supplies by introducing measures such as rationing or ‘meat-free days’, but this did little to relieve the dismal situation during the latter years of the war. Black marketeering and profiteering increasingly led to widespread resentment among the population and an atmosphere of general mistrust.

In a letter to her husband dated 8 January 1918 Mathilde Hanzel speaks of a ‘civil war in the hinterland’, describing the prohibitive prices, shortages and illicit trading that characterized the supply situation in Vienna: ‘Now profiteering is everywhere, flour is 12-17 K [crowns], sugar 6 K, fat 24-32 K, in short it is shameful, and it is high time that the war stopped, otherwise ever more articles will fall victim to illicit trading and most people will be forced to starve.’

For Mathilde Hanzel, as for the majority of women in the First World War, the absence of her husband meant that she had to bear the sole responsibility for the care and feeding of her children and others in the family. In order to feed her two children with an adequate diet she attempted – like broad sectors of the Viennese population – to obtain food and non-consumable goods by other ways and means. These survival strategies arising from necessity ranged from the growing of vegetables or acceptance of support from other members of the family and friends to foraging trips into the countryside surrounding Vienna. Mathilde Hanzel writes for example in autumn 1917: ‘For the winter I want to buy in white turnips and carrots as well as apples. We’re starting to hoard turnips even now; it’s quite incredible the things one ends up doing in this war.’

The hordes of people swarming out from the towns into the countryside with rucksacks on their backs represented a mass phenomenon that grew as the war dragged on. As the supply situation was better in many rural areas compared to the towns, farmers were confronted „with a veritable stampede“ of city folk scouring the countryside for food. Official attempts were made to try and stop these ‘hoarding trips’, with checks made on passengers’ rucksacks at railway stations, when any goods found were immediately confiscated. However, this was not very efficient and alienated the Viennese population, who had little tolerance for such measures.

Translation: Sophie Kidd

Bibliografie 

Breiter, Marion: Hinter der Front. Zum Leben der Zivilbevölkerung im Wien des Ersten Weltkrieges, Unveröffentlichte Dissertation, Universität Wien 1991

Hautmann, Hans: Hunger ist ein schlechter Koch. Die Ernährungslage der österreichischen Arbeiter im Ersten Weltkrieg, in: Botz, Gerhard/Hautmann, Hans (Hrsg.): Bewegung und Klasse. Studien zur österreichischen Arbeitergeschichte, Wien/München/Zürich 1978, 661-682

Healy, Maureen: Vienna and the Fall of the Habsburg Empire. Total War and Everyday Life in World War I, 2. Auflage, Cambridge/New York 2006

Rebhan-Glück, Ines: „Wenn wir nur glücklich wieder beisammen wären …“ Der Krieg, der Frieden und die Liebe am Beispiel der Feldpostkorrespondenz von Mathilde und Ottokar Hanzel (1917/18), Unveröffentlichte Diplomarbeit, Wien 2010

 

Quotes:

„civil war in the hinterland“ : Mathilde Hanzel to Ottokar Hanzel, 08.01.1918, Sammlung Frauennachlässe, Nachlass 1, Institut für Geschichte der Universität Wien (Translation: Sophie Kidd)

„Now profiteering is everywhere ...“: Mathilde Hanzel to Ottokar Hanzel, 08.01.1918, Sammlung Frauennachlässe, Nachlass 1, Institut für Geschichte der Universität Wien (Translation: Sophie Kidd)

„For the winter I want to buy  ...“: Mathilde Hanzel to Ottokar Hanzel, n. d., Sammlung Frauennachlässe, Nachlass 1, Institut für Geschichte der Universität Wien (Translation: Sophie Kidd)

„farmers were confronted with a veritable stampede“: Breiter Marion, Hinter der Front. Zum Leben der Zivilbevölkerung im Wien des Ersten Weltkrieges. Unveröffentlichte Dissertation, Universität Wien 1991, 77

„Official attempts were made to try to stop …“: Healy, Maureen: Vienna and the Fall of the Habsburg Empire. Total War and Everyday Life in World War I, 2. Auflage, Cambridge/New York 2006, 55

Contents related to this chapter

Aspects

Persons, Objects & Events

  • Person

    Ottokar Hanzel

    Ottokar Hanzel was a mathematics and descriptive geometry teacher from Vienna. During the First World War he was a Landsturm captain on the Italian front.

  • Person

    Mathilde Hanzel (geb. Hübner)

    Mathilde Hanzel, a teacher in Vienna, was a member of the AÖFV, an association that militated constantly during the First World War for peace.

  • Development

    Daily life on the (home) front

    How was daily life at home and on the front between 1914 and 1918? Was the life of a middle-class woman similar to that of a worker? Did officers experience warfare in the same way as other ranks? Or were the experiences of the population at home and the soldiers at the front too individual and diverse for generalisations?

  • Object

    Personal war testimonies

    For a long time, the First World War was narrated only from the point of view of prominent personalities or generals. The way in which the people of the Austro‑Hungarian Monarchy experienced and survived it remained unheard. Personal documents like this diary give us new and diverse insights into how individuals experienced, understood and felt about the war.

  • Object

    Shortages and poverty

    When the population reacted to shortages of bread and flour in January 1915with panic buying, the Kriegs-Getreide-Vekehrsanstalt [Wartime Grain Trade Department] introduced ration cards. Individual quotas were determined and handed out on presentation of bread and flour ration cards. But even the allocated rations became more and more difficult to supply, and the cards became worthless.

Developments

  • Development

    Gender roles: change/no change?

    It is a widely held view that the First World War revolutionised the traditional roles of men and women in society. Photos of tram conductresses, female coach drivers and postwomen would appear to confirm this, as does the assumption by women of the traditional male role as providers for the family. But did things change that much, and what was left of the supposed changes after 1918?

Memories