Page - 145 - in Österreich-Ungarns imperiale Herausforderungen - Nationalismen und Rivalitäten im Habsburgerreich um 1900

© 2020, V&R unipress GmbH, Göttingen ISBN Print: 9783847110606 – ISBN E-Lib: 9783737010603 passed through Thalerhof between 1914 and 1917. A second camp at There- sienstadtwasalsobuilt.Someinmateswereexecuted,whileotherswereoffered improvedconditions if they signedupasUkrainians andagreed toattendUk- rainianlanguagecourses.Thosewhorefusedtodososuffereddailyprivationsin increasinglyharshconditions–1,767deathswererecordedbetweenSeptember 1914 andAugust 1917.16Thediary of oneLemko, Feofil Kurillo, described the trialsofeverydaylifeatThalerhofingreatdetailoverthecourseofalmostawhole year. In a typical entry from16May1915, hewrote: “Theybakebread inTha- lerhof, but it’s not the same [thing] any more, since potato peals and other impurities are added to the flour.Understandablymanyof us get seriously ill afterconsumingsuchindigestiblefood….”.17Thiscaseofnegativemobilisation ofethnicity tookaheavy tollwhichcontinuedtoaffect thecourseof interethnic relations in the region longafter theendof thewar. The impendingRussian occupation ofGalicia between the autumnof 1914 andMay 1915 promised to reverse this hierarchy of national identities, pro- motingRussophileGalicianswhilepersecutingUkrainophileactivists.Awareof their harsh fate under Russian occupation,many of the latter fled the region alongwith the retreatingHabsburg troops. Inorder to accommodate the large number of Galician refugees, the Austrian Government set up three refugee camps in 1914–1916. The first one, atWolfsberg inCarinthia,was intended to hold asmany as 10,000 refugees in the autumnof 1914, although the highest number reachedwas actually 7,635 on7 January 1915. In the second camp, at Gmünd inLowerAustria, theAustrianMinistryofEducation set upa six-year school for 850 girls and another one for 800boys. The schools had twenty-six teachers. In1915330Ukrainianactivistsorganised literacycoursesandbuilt a Ukrainian church capable of accommodating 2,500 people. A third camp, at GrödignearSalzburg,openedinearly1916.18Throughtheseculturalactivitiesin therefugeecamps, locatedinnon-Ukrainianpopulatedterritories, theAustrian Government helped create a sense ofUkrainiannational identity inmuch the sameway theself-helporganisationssetupbyLithuanianandLatvianrefugees inRussiadid.19 16 GeorgHoffmann/Nicole-MelanieGoll/PhilippLesiak,Thalerhof1914–1936:DieGeschichte eines vergessenen Lagers und seiner Opfer (Mitteleuropäische Studien, 4), Herne 2010, p. 29–138; thedeath toll is citedonp.177. 17 Dnevnik lemka iz Talergofa (s 14–go sentiabria 1914g. po 22–oe avgusta 1915g.), in: Ta- lergofskii al’manakh,URL:<http://www.zaistinu.ru/old/ukraine/church/almanah3-x.htm#al- manah3_dnewnik> (lastaccess January26,2018). 18 Serhii Popik, Ukraintsi v Avstrii 1914–1918: Avstriis’ka polityka v ukrains’komupytanni perioduVelykoiviini,Kiev1999),p. 69–74. 19 PeterGatrell, AWhole EmpireWalking. Refugees inRussia duringWorldWar I (Indiana- MichiganSeries inRussianandEastEuropeanStudies),Bloomington1999,p. 141–170. TheHabsburgMobilisationofEthnicity 145