Wittmann bookstore The yellow building shown in the photograph above has been owned by the Wittmann family since 1928. It is located on Augsburgerstrasse with the door facing Klosterstrasse. During the heyday of the artist's colony in Dachau, several painters had their studios on the upper floor of this building. The building has been used for various businesses, and is now a bookstore. When the Dachau concentration camp was in operation, Albert Zeitler, a prisoner in the camp, was sent here to do some electrical work. Sybille Wittmann secretly gave him food, which was against the Nazi policy, although they allowed food packages to be sent to the camp. In the last years of the war, the Nazi SD (Security Service) had an office in this building. After the war, some of the former Dachau prisoners took over this office and set up a police protection service to protect Dachau residents from looting. When the concentration camps were liberated, the common criminals were set free along with the other prisoners. Towns such as Weimar and Dachau, which were close to the major camps, suffered when former prisoners, bent on revenge, attacked and plundered the towns. The Dachau camp had a large library of 15,000 books for the prisoners in one of the barracks, which Zeitler brought to the Wittmann building and used to set up a lending library after the war. Ludwig Thoma, the famous writer who lived in Dachau, had his law office across the street in the Rauffer house. He was a frequent visitor at what is now the Wittmann house. Rauffer HouseBack to List of Historic PlacesBack to Table of ContentsHome |