14/04/2024
The first owner of the building erected between 1935 and 1937 at 88 Legionów Street in Oświęcim was a sergeant in the Polish army, Józef Soja. Having left home in September 1939, he went to war with his military unit. In May 1940, the sergeant's wife, Józefa Soja, was also forced to leave the family home. The building, located on the south side of town, shared the fate of other buildings within the Zasole district, and was handed over to the SS, after the occupants had been evicted earlier.
The further fate of the building between 1940 and 1944 was closely linked to the Hoess family. Seconded by Heinrich Himmler in May 1940, Rudolf Hoess arrived in Auschwitz (Oswiecim), then occupied by the Third Reich, with orders to supervise the concentration camp under construction there. Acting as the commandant of Auschwitz-Birkenau until the autumn of 1943, Rudolf Hoess led the creation of Auschwitz, the largest German N**i death camp and centre for the mass extermination of Jews in Europe. After numerous promotions, Hoess was transferred to Berlin in November 1943. He returned to Auschwitz on official business in May 1944, supervising the extermination of Hungarian Jews on Himmler's orders. Höss's wife Hedwig lived with their five children in the building on Legionów Street continuously until the end of 1944, leading a comfortable life just 150 m from the crematorium behind the camp wall.
Text: zabytek.pl
