He was a soldier of the Polish Home Army (Armia Krajowa), and again became a political prisoner under the post-war communist government of Poland for seven years.

[3] After the collapse of Polish resistance to the German and Soviet invasion, Piechowski along with fellow boy scout Alfons "Alki" Kiprowski (born 9 October 1921[4]), were captured by the German occupiers in their hometown of Tczew and forced into a work-gang, clearing the destroyed sections of the railway bridge over the Vistula, which had previously been blown up by the Polish military to impede Nazi transports.

[citation needed]Piechowski was sent to Auschwitz as a political prisoner, a Legionsgaenger – one wishing to join Polish military formations abroad.

He was in the Leichenkommando and assigned to bringing corpses to the crematorium, including those shot at the "Black Wall" by SS-Rapportfuhrer Gerhard Arno Palitzsch.

He fled with Bendera, an auto mechanic from Czortków (now Chortkiv, Ukraine), Józef Lempert, a priest from Wadowice, and Stanisław Gustaw Jaster, a first lieutenant and veteran of the Invasion of Poland from Warsaw.

They then all entered the car, with Bendera driving, Piechowski in the front passenger seat, Lempert and Jaster in the back.

Jaster carried a report that Witold Pilecki (deliberately imprisoned in Auschwitz to prepare intelligence about The Holocaust and who would not escape until 1943) had written for Armia Krajowa's headquarters.

[citation needed] The prisoners abandoned the stolen escape vehicle in the vicinity of Maków Podhalański, approximately 60 kilometres (37 mi) from the camp.

He soon found work doing manual labor on a nearby farm, where he made contact with the Home Army and took up arms against the Nazis within the units of 2nd Lt. Adam Kusz nom de guerre Garbaty (so-called "Cursed soldiers").

[14] This information had come from his boy-scout friend, Alfons "Alki" Kiprowski, who remained a prisoner at Auschwitz for some three more months after his escape.

[citation needed] He declined the Order of the White Eagle when Maciej Płażyński tried to award it to him after the democratic transition.

[citation needed] Piechowski was the subject of the 2006 documentary film Uciekinier ("Man on the Run"), which was produced by Marek Tomasz Pawłowski and Małgorzata Walczak and won several international awards.