Most people have seen the Steve McQueen movie The Great Escape. This is about that tunnel.

The story is awesome; the interactive map is also creative, not nearly as much as the fortitude it took to engineer the escape itself. The animation alone is worth looking at, but the story of the tunnel is amazing.

This is a fascinating look at a tunnel that was built in a German POW camp which allowed 76 Allied POWs to escape.

Check it out. Run your cursor over each number, and it will tell you about it.
Then click on the word next in the same site and the story will unfold.

Click on the link below.
http://www.kerman94.com/tunnelharry.html


The Outcome

Of the 76 men who escaped, 3 made it home to the UK. 23 were recaptured and sent back to Sagan. Hitler personally ordered the execution of the other 50 men.

The commandant of Stalag Luft III, Lindeiner, was court-martialed by the Gestapo for not preventing the escape.

Morale among the prisoners was low when the executions became common knowledge and few were keen to attempt further escape attempts.

Although only 3 men managed to reach safety and 50 men were murdered, the escape caused havoc among the Germans. Thousands of police, Hitler Youth members and soldiers were diverted from wartime duties to search for the escapees.

 

Yeah that's a good book.

My favorite prisoner of war book, however, is No Picnic On Mt. Kenya. It tells the story of some Italian POWs in Africa who decided to make mountianeering equipment, break out of prison camp, and climb the nearby Mt. Kenya.

Since they were much too far from any friendly border to actually escape, once their climb was complete they returned to camp. They "broke in" to camp, so about a week after they escaped, they all of a sudden showed up again at morning roll call.

Initially the British camp officers were more amused than angry and didn't really believe their story, but when a late season mountaineering expedition climbed the peak and found the Italian flag the prisoners had left there, the press found out about it. This embarassed the British, and so they received some delayed punishment.

 

Now that's some funny stuff, there, Garrison.

 

I left out a lot, too, like the fact that they could only see one side of the mountain from camp, so they used a picture of the mountain on a condensed milk label as their map for what the other side looked like.

It's a great story. The author was an Italian diplomat who was captured as a civilian POW when Ethiopa fell to the Allies. So part of the reason the security was lax was because this was a civilian POW camp, not a military POW camp.

 

AWESOME...

 

Very interesting.

 

Great web site, Dave. Thanks.