August Lyss was born on 14 January 1888, in Jurken (East Prussia). In 1919, he joined the police force in Wiesbaden, Germany. As his career proceeded, he held various positions in Hanover and Wuppertal until he was given charge of the identification service in the Hamburg police in 1938. This position included responsibility for the ‘Office for Gypsy Affairs’ [Dienststelle für Zigeunerfragen] of the Criminal Police, and soon after he also took over the Inspectorate of ‘Preventive Fight Against Crime’. In 1939 and 1940 Lyss participated in the planning and execution of the registration, imprisonment and deportation of the Roma and Sinti of Hamburg and its region.
In the Protectorate
In May 1941 he was transferred to the German Criminal Police in Prague, Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. Apparently building on his previous experience, he was appointed head of the identification service and immediately started preparations also for the registration, detention and deportation of the Roma and Sinti in the Protectorate, probably on behalf of his superior Friedrich Sowa (1896–unknown). In summer 1942, Lyss gave orders to the commandants of the ‘Zigeunerlager’ Lety near Pisek and Hodonin near Kunstadt, Josef Janovský (1888–1956) and Štěpan Blahynka (1894–1956), on the management and treatment of detainees. During a visit to the camp in Lety on 12 September 1942, he ordered the camp commandant to prepare a list of inmates proposed for deportation to Auschwitz concentration camp.
He was also substantially involved in organising the registration of ‘Gypsies’ in the Protectorate on 2 and 3 August 1942 as well as in the preparation and organisation of the deportations of Roma and Sinti from the Protectorate to Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration and extermination camp in 1943.
After the War
In his trial after the war, Janovský declared that Lyss had been his immediate superior in the police forces and reported that Lyss supported his brutal treatment of the camp inmates at Lety. The diary of Jiří Letov (1897–1963), who worked together with Lyss on a regular basis, confirms this.
Lyss left Prague at the end of the war and returned to Hamburg. He retired in January 1946. He was categorised as ‘exonerated’ by the Denazification Committee of the State of Schleswig-Holstein in February 1947 and died on 12 May 1975 in Hamburg.
