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Post by petere on Mar 8, 2020 3:12:52 GMT 12
Good old BBC delivers again, this time an interesting article about the biggest escape by German POW’s in Britain. In a couple of days it will be 75 years ago. The tunnels will be shown to the public, maybe a good tip for a visit if somebody here is in the neighbourhood. www.bbc.com/news/uk-wales-51755803 |
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Post by Dave Homewood on Mar 8, 2020 23:15:44 GMT 12
Very interesting. And none of them were murdered as retribution like the Nazis did to the Allies.  |
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Post by petere on Mar 8, 2020 23:21:43 GMT 12
One thing that puzzles me - of course the POW’s didn’t have the full picture of the situation regarding the war. But why try to escape in the final months of it? Why don’t just think : ”I’ll sit this one out....”
I mean, they could have been shot during the breakout?
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Post by Dave Homewood on Mar 8, 2020 23:26:20 GMT 12
Perhaps some of them were staunch Nazis who wanted to get away before the trials started? Loads of Germans were starting to make plans to escape to South America even as early as mid-1944, I read a report from July 1944 that lots of gold was being shifted from Germany into neutral Turkey and a lot of Germans were paying big money to their bosses to be allowed a 'holiday' where they'd head to either Turkey or Switzerland and make their way to Argentina.
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Post by petere on Mar 8, 2020 23:44:22 GMT 12
Yes perhaps. Got me thinking about a story about a Luftwaffe pilot, Franz von Verra. He was a POW in Canada,escaped to neutral USA in 1941, gets transport to Mexico and from there back to Germany. For that he gets a Knight’ s Cross. He is later killed in a Messerschmidt fighter with engine failure. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franz_von_WerraBut what an escape- Canada, USA, Mexico, Europe! |
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Post by Col on Apr 12, 2020 9:12:25 GMT 12
Yes perhaps. Got me thinking about a story about a Luftwaffe pilot, Franz von Verra. He was a POW in Canada,escaped to neutral USA in 1941, gets transport to Mexico and from there back to Germany. For that he gets a Knight’ s Cross. He is later killed in a Messerschmidt fighter with engine failure. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franz_von_WerraBut what an escape- Canada, USA, Mexico, Europe! Didn't realise it was his story I was watching in a film the other night -I was more interested in Frank Williams and other actors who had appeared in Dad's Army. If I had read your message first Petere, then I would have known what to expect. I thought the ending would see him return to Canada having falling asleep and the boat turning around at some point. When he did land in the USA, I then thought the climax would be America just having announced they were entering the war and that Von Werra was a P.O.W again. Hitchcock would've pushed for that ending! |
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Post by petere on Apr 12, 2020 23:48:59 GMT 12
Yes it is an amazing story really. Sometimes reality beats fiction.😊
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