Józef Odi

Józef Odi

(Józef Odi Arrival Photograph at the Auschwitz Death Camp on August 26, 1942.)

Józef Odi was born on August 15, 1923 in Brzeziny Śląskie, Poland.

He was 16 years old when he went against his Pro-German Father and joined the Polish Army when the Germans invaded in 1939.

He was captured by the Soviets (who were allies with Nazi Germany from 1939-1941) and then by the Germans.

He was tortured at the Mysłowice Prison before being sent to Auschwitz on August 26, 1942 when he was 19 years old.

He received the Prisoner Number: 61615.

He was forced to disinfect Prisoners’ Uniforms and sorted  belongings taken from those sent to their deaths.

In January 1945 he was transferred to Ebensee (a Sub-Camp of Mauthausen Concentration Camp in Austria.)

After the War he worked at the Auschwitz Memorial.

He married Miram who was a Pole living in France but was visiting Relatives in Warsaw when the Germans invaded in September 1939.

Their shared experiences of survival brought them together.

She was arrested by the Germans in 1941 for her Resistance Work.

She spent 18 months of torture at the Pawiak Prison before she was sent to Majdanek.

She survived 2 other Concentration Camps: Ravensbrück and Buchenwald.

The immediate Post-War Period left them with few options for housing or work.

When Józef learned that Volunteers were needed to guard and preserve the site of Auschwitz, he accepted the role, and Mira joined him soon after to work as a Guide with fluency in French.

Józef,  worked tirelessly to protect items like piles of shoes, glasses, and letters that memorialized the Victims’ final moments.

Initially, the Family lived in the so-called “Gate of Death” Gatehouse at Birkenau, where their first Daughter was born in 1946.

This notorious building, which Prisoners once passed on their way to the Gas Chambers, became the first home for the Odi Family.

in 1947, the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum was officially established.

In 1956 their Second Daughter, Anna, was born in a Hospital in the town of Oświęcim (next to the Auschwitz Death Camp.)

Józef Odi passed away in 1989 at 66 years old.