Johann Hugo Wilhelm Morawitz was born in Lojowitz (Lojovice) near Prague as the second son of Edgar Ritter von Morawitz, former lieutenant in the Austro-Hungarian army, and Kunigunde Elisabeth Mercy Austerlitz.

Carl Reininghaus was the oldest son of Julius Reininghaus and Emilie, née Mauthner Markhof. After his father's early death, his uncle Johann Peter Reininghaus bought his shares in Grazer Brauerei.

The hairdresser Walter Wellek was enlisted in the Reich Labour Service from February to June 1940 before beginning training in September that year at the Graphische Lehr- und Versuchsanstalt für Photographie in Vienna, which he completed in June 1943.