Rudolf Höss

Rudolf Franz Ferdinand Höss (also Höß, Hoeß, or Hoess; Template:IPA; 25 November 1900 – 16 April 1947)Template:Sfn<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>Template:Sfn was a German SS officer and the commandant of the Auschwitz concentration camp. After the defeat of Nazi Germany and the end of World War II, he was convicted in Poland and executed for war crimes committed on the prisoners of the Auschwitz concentration camp and for his role in the Holocaust.

Höss was the longest-serving commandant of Auschwitz Concentration Camp (from 4 May 1940 to November 1943, and again from 8 May 1944 to 18 January 1945). He tested and implemented means to accelerate Hitler's order to systematically exterminate the Jewish population of Nazi-occupied Europe, known as the Final Solution. On the initiative of one of his subordinates, Karl Fritzsch, Höss introduced the pesticide Zyklon B to be used in gas chambers,Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn where over a million people were killed.<ref name="en.auschwitz.org.pl">Piper, Franciszek & Meyer, Fritjof. "Overall analysis of the original sources and findings on deportation to Auschwitz". Review of the article "Die Zahl der Opfer von Auschwitz. Neue Erkentnisse durch neue Archivfunde", Osteuropa, 52, Jg., 5/2002, pp. 631–641.</ref>

Höss was hanged in 1947 following a trial before the Polish Supreme National Tribunal. During his imprisonment, at the request of the Polish authorities, Höss wrote his memoirs, released in English under the title Commandant of Auschwitz: The Autobiography of Rudolf Hoess.<ref name=":5">Template:Cite book</ref>

Early life

Höss was born in Baden-Baden into a strict Catholic family.<ref>Michael Phayer (2000), The Catholic Church and the Holocaust: 1930–1965 Indiana University Press, Template:ISBN; p. 111.</ref> He lived with his parents, Lina (née Speck) and Franz Xaver Höss. Höss was the eldest of three children and the only son. He was baptized Rudolf Franz Ferdinand on 11 December 1901. Höss was a lonely child with no companions of his own age until he entered elementary school; all of his associations were with adults. Höss claimed in his autobiography that he was briefly abducted by Romanies in his youth.Template:Sfn Franz was a former army officer who served in German East Africa and ran a tea and coffee business. He brought his son up on strict religious principles and with military discipline, having decided that he would enter the priesthood. Höss grew up with an almost fanatical belief in the central role of duty in a moral life. During his early years, there was a constant emphasis on sin, guilt, and the need to do penance.Template:Sfn

Youth and World War I

Höss began turning against religion in his early teens after an episode in which, he said, his priest broke the Seal of the Confessional by telling his father about an event at school wherein Höss had pushed another boy down the stairs, causing him to break his foot. Höss also felt betrayed by his father, because he had used the information against him. Höss had described this event during his confession.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Soon afterward, Höss's father died, and Höss began moving toward a military life.

When World War I began, Höss briefly served in a military hospital and then, at age 14, he was admitted to his father's and his grandfather's old regiment, the 21st Regiment of Dragoons. When Höss was 15, he and the Ottoman Sixth Army fought at Baghdad, at Kut-el-Amara, as well as in Palestine.<ref>Hilberg, Raul, Destruction of the European Jews (New York: Quadrangle Books, 1962), p. 575</ref> While stationed in the Ottoman Empire, Höss rose to the rank of Template:Lang (sergeant-in-chief), and at 17 was the youngest non-commissioned officer in the army. Wounded thrice and a victim of malaria, Höss was awarded the Iron Crescent, the Iron Cross first and second class, and other decorations.Template:Sfn He also briefly commanded a cavalry unit. When the news of the armistice reached Damascus, where Höss was serving at that time, he and a few others decided not to wait for Allied forces to capture them as prisoners of war. Instead, they decided to attempt to travel all the way back to their homeland of Bavaria. This attempt forced them to traverse through the enemy territory of Romania, but they eventually reached Bavaria.Template:Sfn

Freikorps Fighting & Joining the Nazi Party

After the Armistice of 11 November 1918, Höss completed his secondary education and soon joined some of the emerging nationalist paramilitary groups, first the East Prussian Volunteer Corps, and then the Freikorps unit associated with the Baltic area, Silesia and the Ruhr—the Roßbach Freikorps.<ref name=":32" /> Höss recalled this early mission into the Baltic in his autobiography:

The fighting in the Baltic States was more savage and more bitter than any I had experienced [in the first] World War... There was no real front, for the enemy was everywhere. When it came to a clash, it was a fight to the death, and no quarter was given or expected... [Houses were] set on fire and burned the occupants to death. On innumerable occasions I came across this terrible spectacle of burned-out cottages containing the charred corpses of women and children...Although later on I had to be the continual witness of far more terrible scenes, yet the picture of those half-burned-out huts at the edge of the forest beside the Dvina, with whole families dead within them, remains indelibly engraved on my mind.<ref name=":32">Rudolph Höss. Commandant of Auschwitz, 1951. p. 44.</ref>

Höss participated in the armed terror attacks on Polish people during the Silesian uprisings against the Germans, and on French nationals during the French Occupation of the Ruhr. The Roßbach Freikorps transformed into a feeder group for the early Nazi movement once its activities were unequivocally banned following their participation in the Third Silesian Uprising. The group's leader, Gerard Rossbach, became the first adjutant of the SA. After hearing a speech by Adolf Hitler in Munich, Höss joined the Nazi Party in 1922 (member number 3240) and renounced his affiliation with the Catholic Church.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

On 31 May 1923, in Mecklenburg, Höss and members of the Freikorps attacked and beat to death local schoolteacher Walther Kadow on the wishes of farm supervisor Martin Bormann, who later became Hitler's private secretary.<ref name="Martin Bormann">Template:Cite web</ref> Kadow was believed to have tipped off the French occupational authorities that Freikorps paramilitary soldier Albert Leo Schlageter was carrying out sabotage operations against French supply lines. Schlageter was arrested and executed on 26 May 1923; soon afterwards Höss and several accomplices, including Bormann, took their revenge on Kadow.<ref name="Martin Bormann"/> In 1923, after one of the killers confessed to a local newspaper, Höss was arrested and tried as the ringleader. Although he later claimed that another man was actually in charge, Höss accepted the blame as the group's leader. He was convicted and sentenced (on 15Template:Sfn or 17 March 1924<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>) to 10 years in prison, while Bormann received a one-year sentence.Template:Sfn Höss served out his prison sentence in the Brandenburg penitentiary. Due to his exemplary behavior while an inmate there, he gained privileges such as the light in his cell being kept on after 10 PM lights out, being allowed to write letters to relatives every two weeks, and a job in the prison's administration.<ref name=":5" /><ref>Template:Cite book</ref> These privileges were in part due to him being considered a "delinquent motivated by conviction" (offender whose motives had been on moral political or religious grounds) and partly because of prison officials who sympathized with Höss's cause and his political views.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

Höss was released from prison in July 1928 as part of a general amnesty and joined the Artaman League, an anti-urbanization movement, or back-to-the-land movement, that promoted a farm-based lifestyle. On 17 August 1929, Höss married Hedwig Hensel (3 March 1908 – 15 September 1989<ref name=harding2013a>Template:Cite news</ref>), whom he met in the Artaman League. Between 1930 and 1943, they had five children: two sons (Klaus and Hans-Jürgen) and three daughters (Heidetraut, Inge-Brigitt, and Annegret). Klaus, Höss's eldest son, was born in 1930; Heidetraut, Höss's eldest daughter, was born in 1932; Inge-Brigitt was born on a farm in Pommern in 1933; Hans-Jürgen, Höss's younger son, was born in 1937; and Annegret, the youngest child, was born at Auschwitz in November 1943.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref><ref>"Hitler's Children", BBC documentary</ref>

During this time, Höss worked and lived at a farm in Sallentin, whose owner wanted to establish a horse stable, and his experience with horses from being in the cavalry in World War I gave him the necessary experience to do so. Höss would later join the cavalry squadron of the Schutzstaffel on 30 September 1933, and become a SS-Anwärter.<ref name=":4" /> Also during this time, Höss was noticed by Heinrich Himmler during an inspection of the SS in Stettin.Template:Sfn They also were previously acquainted (according to Höss) from their Artaman League days,<ref name=":4" /><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> although other sources claim they knew each other from Höss's involvement in the Nazi party in the 1920s.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref><ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

SS career

On 1 April 1934, Höss joined the SS, on Himmler's effective call-to-action,Template:Sfn and moved to the SS-Totenkopfverbände (SSTemplate:NbspDeath's Head Units) that same year. Höss was assigned to the Dachau concentration camp in December 1934, where he held the post of Block leader. His mentor at Dachau was the then SS-brigadier general Theodor Eicke, the reorganizer of the Nazi concentration camp system. In 1938, Höss was promoted to SS-captain and was made adjutant to Hermann Baranowski in the Sachsenhausen concentration camp. There, Höss led the firing squad that, on Himmler's orders on 15 September 1939, killed August Dickmann, a Jehovah's Witness who was the first conscientious objector to be executed after the start of the Second World War. Höss fired the finishing shot from his pistol.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> He joined the Waffen-SS in 1939 after the invasion of Poland. Höss excelled in that capacity and was recommended by his superiors for further responsibility and promotion. By the end of his tour of duty there, Höss was serving as administrator of prisoners' property.<ref name=Testimony>Douglas O. Linder, "Testimony of Rudolf Höß at the Nuremberg Trials, April 15, 1946" available online at Famous World Trials: The Nuremberg Trials: 1945–48, UMKC School of Law. Template:OCLC</ref><ref name="Bartrop111">Template:Cite book</ref> On 18 January 1940, as head of the protective custody camp at Sachsenhausen, Höss ordered all prisoners not assigned to work details to stand outside in frigid conditions reaching Template:Convert. Most of the inmates had no coats or gloves. When block elders dragged some of the frozen inmates to the infirmary, Höss ordered the infirmary doors to be closed. During the day, 78 inmates died, and another 67 died that night.<ref name=":3">Template:Cite book</ref>

Auschwitz command

Appointment order of Rudolf Höss as Commander of Auschwitz Concentration Camp

Höss was dispatched to evaluate the feasibility of establishing a concentration camp in western Poland, a territory Germany had incorporated into the province of Upper Silesia. His favorable report led to the creation of the Auschwitz camps and his appointment as commandant.<ref name=":4">Template:Cite book</ref> The camp was built around an old Austro-Hungarian (and later Polish) army barracks near the town of Oświęcim; its German name was Auschwitz.Template:Sfn Höss commanded the camp for three and a half years, during which he expanded the original facility into a sprawling complex known as Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp. Höss had been ordered "to create a transition camp for ten thousand prisoners from the existing complex of well-preserved buildings," and he went to Auschwitz determined "to do things differently" and develop a more efficient camp than those at Dachau and Sachsenhausen, where he had previously served.<ref name=hughes/> Höss lived at Auschwitz in a villa with his wife and five children.<ref name="observer-harding">Template:Cite news</ref>

The earliest inmates at Auschwitz were Soviet prisoners-of-war and Polish prisoners including peasants and intellectuals. Some 700 arrived in June 1940 and were told that they would not survive more than three months.<ref name=Jozef>Template:Cite news</ref> At its peak, Auschwitz comprised three separate facilities: Auschwitz I, Auschwitz II-Birkenau and Auschwitz III-Monowitz. These included many satellite sub-camps, and the entire camp complex was built on about Template:Convert that had been cleared of all inhabitants.<ref name=Testimony/> Auschwitz I was the administrative centre for the complex; Auschwitz II Birkenau was the extermination camp where most of the murders were committed; and Auschwitz III Monowitz was the slave-labour camp for I.G. Farbenindustrie AG, and later other German industries. The main purpose of Monowitz was the production of a form of synthetic rubber called "buna" and synthetic oil.

Most infamous at Auschwitz I, the original camp, was Block 11 and the courtyard between Blocks 10 and 11.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> High stone walls and a massive wooden gate shielded Nazi brutality from observers. Condemned prisoners were led from Block 11, naked and bound, to the Death Wall at the back of the courtyard.<ref>"Death Wall" Auschwitz.org</ref> A member of the Political Department then shot the prisoners in the back of the head, using a small-caliber pistol to minimize noise. As punishment, Höss also employed standing cells in Block 11. On many occasions, he condemned 10 random prisoners to death by starvation in a Block 11 cell in retaliation for the escape of one inmate.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

Mass murder

In June 1941, according to Höss's trial testimony, he was summoned to Berlin for a meeting with Himmler "to receive personal orders".<ref name=Testimony/> Himmler told Höss that Hitler had given the order for the "Final Solution". According to Höss, Himmler had selected Auschwitz for the extermination of Europe's Jews "on account of its easy access by rail and also because the extensive site offered space for measures ensuring isolation". Himmler described the project as a "secret Reich matter" and told Höss not to speak about it with SS-Gruppenführer Richard Glücks, head of the Nazi camp system run by the SS-Totenkopfverbände.<ref name=Testimony/> Höss said that "no one was allowed to speak about these matters with any person and that everyone promised upon his life to keep the utmost secrecy." He told his wife about the camp's purpose only at the end of 1942, since she already knew about it from Fritz Bracht. Himmler told Höss that he would be receiving all operational orders from Adolf Eichmann, who arrived at the camp four weeks later.<ref name=Testimony/>

Commander of Auschwitz I Richard Baer, Auschwitz chief medical officer Josef Mengele and Höss, 1944

Höss began testing and perfecting techniques of mass murder on 3 September 1941.<ref>Pressac, Jean-Claude (1989). Auschwitz: Technique and Operation of the Gas Chambers Template:Webarchive p. 132. First experimental gassing in Block 11.</ref> His experiments led to Auschwitz becoming the most efficiently murderous instrument of the Final Solution and the Holocaust's most potent symbol.Template:Sfn According to Höss, during standard camp operations, two or three trains carrying 2,000 prisoners each would arrive daily for four to six weeks. The prisoners were unloaded in the Birkenau camp and subjected to "selection", usually by a member of the SS medical staff.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref><ref>"The unloading ramps and selections" Auschwitz.org</ref> Men were separated from women, and only those deemed suitable for Nazi slave labor were allowed to live. The elderly, infirm, children, and mothers with children were sent directly to the gas chambers. Those found fit for labor were marched to barracks in either Birkenau or one of the Auschwitz camps, stripped naked, shorn of all hair, sprayed with disinfectant, and tattooed with a prisoner number.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> At first, small gassing bunkers were located deep in the woods to avoid detection. Later, four large gas chambers and crematoria were constructed in Birkenau to make the killing process more efficient, and to handle the sheer volume of victims.<ref name=Testimony/>

Höss experimented with various gassing methods. According to Eichmann's trial testimony in 1961, Höss told him that he used cotton filters soaked in sulfuric acid for early killings. Höss later introduced hydrogen cyanide (prussic acid), produced from the pesticide Zyklon B, to the process of extermination, after his deputy Karl Fritzsch had tested it on a group of Russian prisoners in 1941.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn With Zyklon B, he said that it took three to 15 minutes for the victims to die and that "we knew when the people were dead because they stopped screaming."<ref name=Affidavit>Template:Cite web</ref> In an interview at Nuremberg after the war, Höss commented that after observing the prisoners die by Zyklon B, " ...this gassing set my mind at rest for the mass extermination of the Jews was to start soon."<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

In 1942, Höss began a forced sexual relationship with an Austrian communist political prisoner at Auschwitz, Eleonore Hodys<ref name=":0">Template:Citation</ref> (or Nora Mattaliano-Hodys).<ref name=":1">Template:Cite book</ref> She became pregnant and was imprisoned in a standing-only arrest cell. Released from the cell, Hodys had an abortion in a camp hospital in 1943 and, according to her later testimony,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> just barely evaded being selected to be killed. These events and corruption rumours may have led to Höss's temporary recall from the Auschwitz command in 1943.<ref name=":1" /> The level of corruption at Auschwitz had risen so high that, in the autumn of 1943, Lieutenant Konrad Morgen and his assistant Wiebeck were tasked with investigating both the embezzlements taking place in the camp and Höss's illegal relationship.<ref>In 1964, during the Frankfurt Auschwitz Trials, Morgen remembered: "Examination of the lockers yielded a fortune in gold, rings, pearls and money, in all kinds of currencies. The conduct of the SS staff was beyond any of the standards that you'd expect from soldiers. They gave the impression of being degenerate and brutal parasites". Template:Cite web</ref> Morgen interviewed Hodys and Höss and intended to proceed against Höss, but the case was dismissed. Morgen, Wiebeck and Hodys gave testimony after the war.<ref name=":0" /><ref name=":1" />

After being replaced as the Auschwitz commander by Arthur Liebehenschel, on 10 November 1943, Höss assumed Liebehenschel's former position as the head of Amt D I in Amtsgruppe D of the SS Main Economic and Administrative Office (WVHA); Höss also was appointed deputy of the inspector of the concentration camps under Richard Glücks.

The ramp at Birkenau, 1944. Chimneys of Crematoria II and III are visible on the horizon.

Operation Höss

On 8 May 1944, Höss returned to Auschwitz to supervise Operation Höss, where 430,000 Hungarian Jews were transported to the camp and killed in 56 days.<ref>Jozef Boszko, Encyclopedia of the Holocaust vol. 2, p. 692</ref> Even Höss's expanded facility could not handle the huge number of victims' corpses, and the camp staff were obliged to dispose of thousands of bodies by burning them in open pits.<ref>Wilkinson, Alec, "Picturing Auschwitz", The New Yorker, 17 March 2008, pp. 50–54.</ref> In May and June alone, almost 10,000 Jews were being gassed per day.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Because the number of people exceeded the capacity of the gas chambers and crematoria, mass pit executions were established. Jews were forced to undress, then led to a hidden fire pit by Sonderkommando where they were shot by the SS, then thrown into the flames.

Ravensbrück

Höss's final posting was at Ravensbrück concentration camp. He moved there in November 1944 with his family who lived close by. After the completion of the gas chamber, Höss coordinated the operations of killing by gassing, with a death toll of over 2,000 female prisoners.Template:Sfn

Fall of the Third Reich

In April 1945, Höss and his family went to Darss, together with Richard Glücks, before continuing to Schleswig-Holstein. In the traveling party was the wife of Theodor Eicke, her daughter, and several other families belonging to prominent Nazis. Höss had been tasked with keeping them out of enemy hands.<ref name=":4" /> During their escape, they learned about the death of Hitler.Template:Citation needed

Höss and his wife were downcast at the news that the Führer was dead. Since Höss had procured poison for his family, in case they were captured by the Russians, they considered the idea of suicide together with their children, like the Goebbels family and other Germans previously had done:

Instead, Hedwig and the children were taken to the home of the children's old governess, who lived at Michaelisdonn, while Höss and his son Klaus continued on alone.Template:Citation needed

Arrest, trial, and execution

Höss on trial in Poland in 1947

In the final days of the war, Himmler advised Höss to disguise himself as a member of the Kriegsmarine. Adopting the pseudonym "Franz Lang" and working as a gardener, Höss lived in Gottrupel, Schleswig-Holstein, with his family and evaded arrest for nearly a year.<ref name="TGAM" /><ref name="Guardian20130831">Template:Cite news</ref>

In 1946, Hanns Alexander, a German Jew who had fled to England in 1936, becoming a Nazi hunter working for the British government's "No. 1 War Crimes Investigation Team", managed to uncover Höss's location. Alexander, who was then a captain in the Royal Pioneer Corps, travelled to Höss's residence with a group of British soldiers, many of whom were also Jewish. Alexander's men unsuccessfully interrogated Höss's daughter Brigitte for information; according to Brigitte, the soldiers subsequently started to beat her brother Klaus, leading Höss's wife to give up his location.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref> According to Alexander, Höss attempted to bite into a cyanide pill once he was discovered by the soldiers.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Höss initially denied his identity: Template:Blockquote

In his memoir, Höss also claimed to have suffered mistreatment at the hands of his British captors and to have signed the transcript of his first interrogation under duress.Template:Sfn

On 15 April 1946, Höss testified at the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg, where he gave a detailed accounting of his crimes. Höss was called as a defense witness by Ernst Kaltenbrunner's lawyer, Template:Ill.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>Template:Sfn The transcript of Höss's testimony was later entered as evidence during the 4th Nuremberg Military Tribunal, known as the Pohl Trial for principal defendant Oswald Pohl.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Affidavits that Höss made while imprisoned in Nuremberg were also used at the Pohl and IG Farben trials.Template:Citation needed

In his affidavit made at Nuremberg on 5 April 1946, Höss stated:

On 25 May 1946, Höss was handed over to Polish authorities, and the Supreme National Tribunal in Poland tried him for murder. In his essay on the Final Solution in Auschwitz, which Höss wrote in Kraków, he revised the previously given death toll:Template:Sfn

The location where Höss was hanged, with plaque

Höss's trial lasted from 11 to 29 March 1947 and he was sentenced to death by hanging on 2 April. The sentence was carried out two weeks later on 16 April beside the crematorium of the former Auschwitz I concentration camp. Höss was hanged on a short-drop gallows constructed specifically for that purpose, at the location of the camp's Gestapo. The message on the board that marks the site reads:

Höss wrote his autobiography while awaiting execution; it was first published in a Polish translation in 1951 and then in the original German in 1956, edited by Martin Broszat.Template:Sfn It later appeared in various English editions and consists of two parts, one about his own life and the second about other SS men with whom he had become acquainted, mainly Heinrich Himmler and Theodor Eicke, among several others.Template:Sfn Höss blamed his subordinates and kapos, prisoner functionaries, for the mistreatment of prisoners.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Höss claimed that he was unable to stop the abuse despite his best efforts. Höss also stated that he was never cruel and never mistreated any inmate. Höss blamed Hitler and Himmler for using their powers "wrongly and even criminally". He saw himself as "a cog in the wheel of the great extermination machine created by the Third Reich".

After discussions with Höss during the Nuremberg trials at which he testified, the American military psychologist Gustave Gilbert wrote the following:

Four days before being executed, Höss's acknowledgement of the enormity of his crimes was revealed in a message to the state prosecutor: Template:Blockquote

Shortly before his execution, Höss returned to the Catholic Church. On 10 April 1947, he received the sacrament of penance from Fr. Template:Ill, S.J., provincial of the Polish Province of the Society of Jesus. The next day, the same priest administered to him Holy Communion as Viaticum.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

Template:Multiple image On the morning of 16 April 1947, Höss was hanged. At the request of former camp prisoners, the execution was carried out in Auschwitz, the camp he once commanded. Approximately 100 witnesses were present, including former prisoners and various high-ranking officials of the Polish government. Höss's was the last public execution in Poland.<ref name="Auschwitz.org">Template:Cite web</ref> His body was cremated, and his ashes were scattered in the forest.

Family

Höss married Hedwig Hensel on 17 August 1929. They had five children: Template:Tree list

1. 1. Klaus Höss: born 6 February 1930, died in Australia in the 1980s.<ref name=harding2013a />
   2. Heidetraud Höss: born 9 April 1932, died prior to 2020.<ref name="IsraelHayom">Template:Cite news</ref>
   3. Inge-Brigitt Höss: born 18 August 1933, died October 2023.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="observer-harding" />
   4. Hans-Jürgen Höss: born in May 1937.
   5. Template:Tree list/final branchAnnegret Höss: born 7 November 1943.

In a farewell letter to his wife, Höss wrote on 11 April 1947: Template:Blockquote

The same day in a farewell letter to his children, Höss told his eldest son: Template:Blockquote

An inmate who worked as a gardener recalled that Klaus, the eldest son, used to play "...with a pistol, with a carbine and shot straight into the garden. A few times this put us in danger. The child did so out of stupidity, aimed at people and said: 'I'll shoot the Polish pig.Template:' "<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

According to Janina Szczurek, a Polish woman who worked as a seamstress for the family, the Höss children used to run in the garden and watch the prisoners work.<ref name=":2" /> The Höss children once wanted to play, and she sewed the oldest son<ref name=":2">Template:Cite book</ref> a kapo armband and the other children's badges "triangles in different colors" such as worn by the prisoners. As they were running around in the garden, Höss came home, saw what his children were wearing and tore off the badges and ordered the children in the house. Szczurek was not punished but given a warning.

Hans-Jürgen's younger son, Rainer, presented himself as a researcher determined to expose his grandfather's crimes. However, Rainer has been accused of trading on his name and defrauding the families of Holocaust victims for financial gain. Rainer has reportedly been criminally convicted 13 times, most recently for fraud in August 2020.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Hans-Jürgen's eldest son, Kai-Uwe, an evangelical pastor, who had previously kept out of the public eye, said, "I just want him [Rainer] to stop defrauding people using the names and ashes of millions of Holocaust victims."<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Inge-Brigitt, also simply known as "Brigitte", another daughter of the commandant, never read her father's memoir, saying it did not interest her and that "the Nazis always get a bad press and no one else does."<ref name="and14" /><ref name="observer-harding"/> Nonetheless, she criticized Rainer's actions, saying he had not been born at the time, could thus not know what had happened, and so must be "a lying, drug-addicted, fame-seeking, money-hungry, evil young man".<ref name="and14">Template:Cite magazine</ref> For a long time, Inge-Brigitt was secretive about her childhood, including to her own children and the press; journalist and writer Thomas Harding (great-nephew of Hanns Alexander, the man who tracked down and arrested Höss) had to talk to Inge-Brigitt for three years before she agreed to an interview in 2013, the first interview ever given by one of Höss's children, where Inge-Brigitt described him as the "nicest father in the world".<ref name="observer-harding"/> She acknowledged that what happened in the Auschwitz camp was "very wrong" and claimed to have been oblivious to the atrocities as a child, knowing only that the camp had prisoners.<ref name="HardingWife">Template:Cite magazine</ref> In a 2021 interview to Harding, her last before her death in 2023, the then 88-year-old Inge-Brigitt, while condemning the atrocities committed at the Auschwitz camp, seemingly defended Höss, stating: "It was not my dad's fault. I don't think he knew what he got into when he started. Because he was very unhappy many times. And when I talked with my mom after all this happened, you know, she told me he was a very unhappy man." When Harding voiced his disagreement with Inge-Brigitt's characterization, she ultimately and reluctantly agreed that Höss was responsible.<ref name="observer-harding"/>

See also

• Death Is My Trade (novel)
• Death Is My Trade (film)
• The Zone of Interest (novel)
• The Zone of Interest (film)
• Sophie's Choice (novel)
• Sophie's Choice (film)
• The Commandant's Shadow (documentary)

References

Notes Template:Reflist

Bibliography Template:Refbegin

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• Ravenswood, Linda, Frau Kommandant Hoess' Pink Cardigan, Rivets Literary Magazine, 2010.
• SS Personnel Service Record of Rudolf Höss, National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, Maryland, US.
• Template:Cite book

Further reading

• Höss, Rudolf (1951) "Commandant of Auschwitz: The Autobiography of Rudolf Hoess" – via Internet Archive.
• Fest, Joachim C. and Bullock, Michael (trans.) "Rudolf Höss – The Man from the Crowd" in The Face of the Third Reich New York: Penguin, 1979 (orig. published in German in 1963), pp. 415–432. Template:ISBN.
• Primomo, John W., (2020). Architect of Death at Auschwitz: A Biography of Rudolf Höss. North Carolina: McFarland & Company. ISBN 978-1-4766-8146-7.
• Template:Cite news

External links

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