COMMANDANT OF AUSCHWITZ
The Autobiography of Rudolf Hoess
"There were many Jehovah’s Witnesses in Sachsenhausen. A great number of them refused to undertake military service and because of this the Reichsfuhrer SS condemned them to death. They were shot in the presence of all the inmates of the camp duly
assembled. The other Jehovah’s Witnesses were placed in the front rank so that they must watch the proceedings.
I have met many religious fanatics in my time; on pilgrimages, in monasteries, in Palestine, on the Hejaz road in Iraq, and in Armenia. They were Catholics, both Roman and Orthodox, Moslems, Shiites, and Semites. But the Witnesses in Sachsenhausen, and particularly two of them, surpassed anything that I had previously seen. These two
especially fanatical Witnesses refused to do any work that had any connection whatever with military matters. They would not stand at attention, or drill in time with the rest, or lay their
hands along the seams of their trousers, or remove their caps. They said that such marks of respect were due only to Jehovah and not to man. They recognized only one lord and master, Jehovah. Both of them had to be taken from the block set aside for Jehovah’s
Witnesses and put in the cells, since they constantly urged on the other Witnesses to behave in a similar manner.
Eicke had frequently sentenced them to be flogged because of their antidisciplinarian behavior . They underwent this punishment with a joyous fervor that amounted almost to a perversion. They begged the commandant to increase their punishment, so that they might the better be able to testify to Jehovah. After they had been ordered to report for military service, which, needless to say, they flatly refused, indeed they refused even to put their signature to a military document, they too were condemned to death by the Reichsfuhrer SS. When told of this in their cells, they went almost mad for joy and ecstasy, and could hardly wait for the day of execution. They wrung their hands, gazed enraptured up at the
sky, and constantly cried: "Soon we shall be with Jehovah! How happy we are to have been chosen!" A few days earlier they had witnessed the execution of some of their fellow believers and they could hardly be kept under control, so great was their desire to be shot
with them. Their frenzy was painful to watch. They had to be taken back to their cells by force. When their time came, they almost ran to the place of execution. They wished on no account to be bound, for they desired to be able to raise their hands to Jehovah.
Transformed by ecstasy, they stood in front of the wooden wall of the rifle range, seemingly no longer of this world. Thus do I imagine that the first Christian martyrs must have appeared as they waited in the circus for the wild beasts to tear them in pieces. They faces
completely transformed; their eyes raised to heaven, and their hands clasped and lifted in prayer, they went to their death.
All who saw them die were deeply moved, and even the execution squad itself was affected.
These Jehovah’s Witnesses became even more fanatical in their faith as a result of the martydom of their comrades. Several of them who had already signed a declaration that they would cease to proselytize, a declaration which helped them to obtain their
freedom, now withdrew it, since they were anxious to suffer even more for Jehovah."
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