The Great escapes of World War 2

Television documentary series made for The History Channel that chronicles legendary breakouts by prisoners of war during World War II. This tape documents two ‘great escapes’. The first is the famous escape by Allied soldiers from Stalag Luft III which was immortalised in the movie “The Great escape” (1963) starring Steve McQueen. Using only eating utensils, 600 men worked for a year to dig a tunnel from the designs of ‘tunnel king’ Wally Floody. 76 men escaped through the tunnel in 1944. Archival photographs and the personal recollections of surviving escapees highlight the complexity of the operation, while historians reveal the Nazi’s harsh response to the escape. The second escape documented is that by 25 Nazi officers from an Arizona prisoner-of-war camp: the largest escape from a US camp. It is a little known fact that most of the 500,000 German prisoners of World War II were actually held in POW camps within the US. Surviving German POWs and their American guards are interviewed and rare photographs, films and dramatic re-creations employed to explore this perfectly executed operation, from the Germans’ request for digging tools, to the capture of the last escapee. Also featured is a comprehensive overview of the resistance movements throughout occupied Europe A second tape entitled “More great escapes of World War 2” is also available.