Hundreds of people have held an emotional candlelit vigil in the Austrian town where Josef Fritzl kept his daughter in a cellar for 24 years. The residents of Amstetten were showing solidarity for the woman, Elisabeth, and the children she bore him. "We want to show that Amstetten is not a town for criminals", said the mayor. Police say DNA evidence confirms Mr Fritzl's confession that he is the father of his daughter Elisabeth's six surviving children. Several hundred people gathered for an emotional tribute on Tuesday evening to Mr Fritzl's family. The event was organised by a local convent school. Children, their parents, teachers and nuns lit candles and stood in the rain to express their solidarity and outrage. 'Appeared normal' Officials said Elisabeth, now 42, and three children who had lived with her in the cellar had an "astonishing" reunion with her other children, who lived an apparently normal life with Mr Fritzl as his "grandchildren". The two halves of the family met at the clinic where they are receiving psychiatric treatment. Mr Fritzl's wife, who was told by her husband that their daughter had run away from home to join a religious cult, also had an emotional meeting with her daughter, officials said. Three of the children were kept in the cellar with their mother and had never seen daylight until their release a few days ago. The other three were adopted or fostered by Mr Fritzl, after he forced Elisabeth to write letters saying she could not look after them. Lower Austria police chief Franz Polzer said the 73-year-old, had completely deceived his wife, his family and authorities in the town, 75 miles (120 kilometres) west of Vienna. Social workers had made regular visits to the family, officials said, but found nothing out of the ordinary. They had reported that Mr Fritzl's wife was attentive, and that the children living upstairs played musical instruments and were involved with clubs at school, where they were doing well. Regarding the cellar itself, Amstetten authorities authorised the building of an extension with a basement to the Fritzl property in 1978, city spokesman Hermann Gruber told the APA. Inspectors who had examined the project in 1983 - the year before Elisabeth went missing - said nothing looked suspicious, the APA reported.