Herbert Parson

Herbert Parson was the second most powerful man in the party apparatus in Tyrol. He was completely loyal to Gauleiter Hofer. His office was on this floor of the New Landhaus. His sphere of influence increased from the end of 1943. After the occupation of Italy by the German Wehrmacht, Hofer spent most of his time in Bozen.

Parson had no direct connection to Tyrol. Born in Berlin in 1907, he grew up in Oberalm near Hallein in the Salzburg region. At the age of 18 he joined the Nazi movement. From 1932, when Parson was only 25 years old, he held leading positions in the NSDAP in Salzburg. In 1936 he moved to Berlin to work for the National Socialist refugee relief organisation. There he met Gauleiter Franz Hofer, who was his immediate superior. In August 1938, Hofer offered him a post in the Innsbruck Landhaus, where he initially ran the Gauleiter’s office.

When Hofer moved to Bozen, the two men remained in close contact with daily telephone calls, sometimes lasting over an hour. Parson spent the last days of the war with the Gauleiter on Hofer’s private property, the Lachhof, 10 kilometres east of Innsbruck. There he was taken prisoner by US soldiers on 3 May 1945.

After the war, he tried to divert attention from his role within the repressive Nazi apparatus. At his trial, he explained his sphere of power with an alleged quote from Hofer: “Parson has to know everything and decide nothing”. His defence was based entirely on this assertion, which was supported by several witnesses. Ilse Lechner, Hofer’s secretary, denied that Parson had had any “independent decision-making authority”. But the sheer number of Nazi crimes shows how many people were actively involved in the system of persecution. The court sentenced Parson to five years of hard time in prison and forfeiture of his assets.