“I never imagined the case would be reopened after 80 years. I was six weeks old when the Gestapo arrested my father,” says Adam Kękuś. Eighty-three years later, he is holding his father Franciszek’s watch in his hands. On February 17, 2026, the Arolsen Archives returned it to him at the Museum of Krakow.

Adam Kękuś recognized the watch from a photo the family had of his father, Franciszek. In the picture, he is leaning casually in the doorway of his barbershop. After starting his career as an apprentice in rural southern Poland, he had worked his way up to become a respected master barber in fashionable Krakow.

Franciszek Kękuś was born in 1907 in Rajsko, which is now in southern Poland. “There was this really lovely old house with a thatched roof. And a beautiful field next to the house. There were plum trees in the garden – mainly Hungarian and Damson varieties,” Franciszek’s son, Adam Kękuś says, remembering his grandparents’ garden. Adam was accompanied by his wife Krystyna and his son Marcin on February 17, 2026, when he came to the Museum of Krakow.

An apprentice barber who loved cycling

Adam has fond memories of his childhood and teenage years. He used a number of touching photos he brought with him to the ceremony in Krakow to tell his father Franciszek’s life story: When he finished school, Franciszek began an apprenticeship as a barber and moved to Krakow. He was passionate about his profession, but he also loved going on cycling trips in the Tatra Mountains. “He went there as often as he could. You can tell that from the photos, especially the ones that were taken before the war,” Adam says.

Franciszek married Zofia Kania on February 4, 1940. Later that same year, the couple had a daughter, Ewa. Their son, Adam, was born in 1942. Adam was six weeks old when the Gestapo marched into Franciszek’s barbershop in December 1942 and arrested him. Why they took him to the Gestapo prison on Montelupich Street remains unclear. Shortly before the end of the year, he was deported to Auschwitz, where he was assigned prisoner number 85101. His watch and all the clothes he had with him were taken away from him.

Dehumanizing treatment in Auschwitz and Neuengamme

According to documents from the camps, Franciszek Kękuś underwent a medical examination on February 4, 1943, conducted by staff from the SS Hygiene Institute. He was declared healthy, and from that point on, he was subjected to grueling forced labor. In late summer 1944, the Nazis transferred him to the Neuengamme concentration camp. The SS sent his watch on after him.

The Neuengamme concentration camp was liberated in May 1945. “My father came back in the summer of 1945. He was in terrible shape. He turned up at home in rags, unshaven, and starving. When my sister saw him, she was so frightened, she hid under the bed. I didn’t,” Adam recalls. His father wanted to get back to living a normal life as soon as possible and forget about his time in the concentration camps.

How do you go on living?

At first, it looked as if Franciszek Kękuś was adjusting well. “He picked himself up pretty quickly and soon returned to work. That was his life, after all,” his son says. But things were not as they seemed. Franciszek could not forget what he had been through. He received psychiatric treatment to help him come to terms with the trauma, but the electroshock therapy commonly used at the time only made things worse. Although he remained a devoted and loving father, his son began to notice a change in him.

Franciszek lost more and more of his zest for life. By then, Adam was 14 or 15 years old – a teenager. “My father became quiet and withdrawn – somehow distant. I see things differently today, but for me, something was happening back then. I saw it, but I didn’t realize what it was,” Adam says. Shortly before Christmas, on December 13, 1958, Franciszek Kękuś took his own life. He was 51 years old. “He was still a young man,” says his son.

The watch is returned

Three years later, in 1963, Franciszek’s watch and the personal belongings of other prisoners from Neuengamme concentration camp arrived at the Arolsen Archives . But in the early postwar years, it was difficult to identify the rightful owners or their relatives. Not until 63 years later could Franziszek’s watch be returned to his family – thanks to modern digital research tools, and a a team of five #StolenMemory volunteers. For Adam, it was clearly a deeply moving moment.