With its manicured garden and spacious interior, the three-story villa was once described as “paradise” by the mother who raised her five children there. And much was done to preserve the household’s tranquility, given its immediate neighbor: the largest and most notorious Nazi concentration camp, Auschwitz. Inside the family home, Rudolf Höss – the longest serving SS commandant of Auschwitz – dreamt up the most efficient way to kill the millions of Jews, Roma, homosexuals and political prisoners that the Third Reich had decided to eliminate. Tall trees and a high concrete wall obscured the view and the screams of the camp so that Rudolf’s wife Hedwig and their five children – Klaus, Heidetraud, Brigitte, Hans-Jürgen and Annegret – could live shielded from the atrocities committed just feet from their door. Theirs was a joyful life. The children played with turtles, cats, rode horses and swam in the nearby river.…
