 At the outbreak of war in September 1939 the Łukasiewiczes’ home was bombed by the Luftwaffe: all his books, papers and correspondence were destroyed, except for one volume of his bound offprints. The Łukasiewiczes lived in provisional accommodation for academics. The German occupiers closed the university and Łukasiewicz found employment for a meagre salary in the Warsaw city archives. Additional financial support came from Scholz. Łukasiewicz taught in the underground university. From late 1943, fearing the imminent arrival and occupation of Poland by the Red Army, and under suspicion by some colleagues of being pro-German and anti-Jewish, Łukasiewicz expressed the wish to Scholz that he and his wife should leave Poland. As a first step to their going to Switzerland, Scholz managed to obtain permission for the Łukasiewiczes to travel to Münster. They left Warsaw on 17 July 1944, just two weeks before the outbreak of the Warsaw Rising. Following the 20 July 1944 bomb plot against Hitler there was no hope of them obtaining permission to leave for Switzerland. They stayed in Münster, enduring allied bombing, until January 1945, when they were offered accommodation by Jürgen von Kempski at his farm in Hembsen (Kreis Höxter, Westphalia), where they were liberated by American troops on 4 April.