Lobnik / Lobnig played an important role during the national liberation struggle. Ivan Županc-Johan and Stane Mrhar, who stayed at an homestead locally known as Wölfl for quite a while, organised OF committees there as early as the autumn of 1942. The local farms and homesteads were home to a number of fighters and OF activists, including Karel Prušnik-Gašper, Franc Pasterek-Lenart, Jurij Pasterk and others. The first committee of the Anti-Fascist Women's Front (AFŽ) was also founded here in April 1943, led by Ivanka Sadolšek-Zala, later secretary of the AFŽ Regional Committee for Carinthia.
There were no OF opponents in the valleys of Lobnik / Lobnig: everyone supported the anti-fascist resistance. One of these families was the Pasterk family, locally known as Tavčman. Jurij Pasterk was the first of the three Tavčman boys to join the Liberation Front OF. Together with Karel Prušnik-Gašper, he founded the first so-called "lobnik" OF committee in Carinthia. In the autumn of 1942, the Gestapo managed to break into the liberation organisation and among the about 180 arrested, Jurij Pasterk, his wife Katrca and his sisters Nina and Tina were also detained. Jurij was sentenced to death by the infamous Freisler "Volksgerichtshof" and was beheaded, together with twelve fellow prisoners from Sele / Zell, Obirsko / Ebriach and Suha / Zauchen, in Vienna in April 1943.
Juri's brother, Franz Pasterk, was mobilised in the German army, but he joined the partisans already in October 1942. Because of his military abilities, he became commander of the 1st Carinthian Partisan Battalion. During the successful attack on Mežica on the night of 3-4 April 1943, he was seriously wounded and died the same day.
In memory of Franz and Jurij Pasterk, the Association of Carinthian Partisans attached a plaque to their birthplace with following inscription:
This is the birthplace of the national hero Pasterk Franc-Lenart,
born 12 March 1912, killed as a commander of the 1st Carinthian
Battalion on 6 April 1943 and Jurij Pastrek, who was the owner
of this house, born 12 April 1903 and beheaded in Vienna on 29 April 1943.
Glory to the freedom fighters.
Location:
In the middle of Železna Kapla / Bad Eisenkappel, right next to the cemetery, if you are driving towards Celovec / Klagenfurt, the road turns up north, i.e. to the right, to Lobnik / Lobnig.