Hans Maier

Hans Maier was an Austrian Jew who had fled to Belgium in 1939. He settled in Brussels. He was arrested as “suspect” on 10 May 1940 by the as yet independent Belgian State. He was one of the 8,000 German Jews Belgium deported to France. Interned in the camps in the South, he passed through Saint-Cyprien, and then Gurs, where he escaped on 6 June 1941. Once back in Belgium, he was an active member of “Travail allemand”. This was a clandestine offshoot of the German communist party, whose object was the demoralization of German troops in Belgium.

By 1943, he was the leading light of the Austrian “Travail allemand” structure, which operated under the name “Österreichischen Freiheitsfront” (Austrian Freedom Front). Putting their lives at risk young Austrian women, some of whom were Jewish, approached Austrian soldiers to distribute Die Wahrheit, which was penned by Hans Maier. He was arrested on 23 July 1943, and was tortured in Fort Breendonk, where he remained for more than three months. To avoid a public trial for high treason trial, the Sipo-SD finally labelled him “pure-bred Jew” and sent him to the Dossin Barracks for evacuation on Transport 23 on 15 January 1944. When he arrived at Auschwitz-Birkenau, the camp SS, who were unaware of his file, approved the 31-year-old man as fit for concentration camp work. He was identified by registration number 172.364 in Auschwitz and Monowitz.

In January 1945, the death march first took him to Dora-Mittelbau, in February, a particularly deadly annex of Buchenwald, and then to Bergen-Belsen, in April, where he was liberated on the 15th by British troops. His torture at Breendonk was undoubtedly the worst episode of his prison and concentration camp experiences. It is the central theme of his essay Jenseits von Schuld und Sühne. Bewältigungsversuche eines Überwältigten (Beyond crime and punishment – An essay to overcome the insurmountable) , which he published in 1966 under the pen name Jean Amery.