ESCAPE FROM GERMANY

by Aidan Crawley ‧ RELEASE DATE: N/A

A history of R.A.F. escapes, successful and unsuccessful, from prison camps during World War II, covers whys, hows and means. Weighing the positives of captivity -- security of a sort, a chance for self-improvement perhaps, against the positives of escape -- as a wartime duty, military diversion, morale booster, and informant, most Air Force men tried their hand at individual or mass exits (the latter referring to a group of more than five). The author points out that the Germans went mainly by the rules of the Geneva Convention, except for the infamous mass murder in Stalag Luft III, so attempted escape was worth the gamble involved. The means involved extensive intelligence systems in the prisons, wire cutting, forgery and disguise, tunnels. Grimson, termed the greatest escaper of all, with six outs to his credit, never reached home. With the end of the war came evacuation and release, which meant long marches in deprived and disorganized conditions. This effort to give an overall picture seems like stone-skipping compared to the far deeper splash of first-person war adventures which have revealed techniques of complexity along with dramatic immediacy of experience.

Pub Date: N/A

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1956

Categories: NONFICTION