Richard Schmitz served as Vice Chancellor of Austria, as well as its Minister of Social Welfare and of Education, and as Commissioner of Vienna. He was a member of the pro-HabsburgChristian Socialist party.
After an active role in the Heimwehr-Fascist clash with the Clericals, Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss appointed him Mayor of Vienna in 1934. He succeeded elected Mayor Karl Seitz. Ardently anti-Nazi, Schmitz was Mayor four years later when Austria was absorbed into the Third Reich in the Anschluss. Up until that point, Schmitz spoke out publicly against Nazism and its tactics.
Along with thousands of other prominent Austrians, Richard Schmitz was arrested and taken to Dachau concentration camp in Bavaria where he remained for the length of the war.
