 |
Sometimes we find ourselves up against a home-repair challenge. Well, maybe I use the word “we” too loosely. I should just speak for myself. For me, if the challenge involves much more than shutting off the lights, closing the garage door, or emptying the dishwasher, I’m in trouble. I’m not a handy-man in the slightest. If you’re like me (and I know I am), you probably wear one of those WWMD bracelets. Then, when faced with a leaky faucet, cracked drywall, or a broken door-handle, you simply look at your bracelet and ask, “What Would MacGyver Do?”.
Today’s History Lesson takes us to eastern Germany (modern-day Poland) for a story that would impress even Angus MacGyver. We mentioned Stalag Luft III just a month ago, and we’re headed back there. This large prison camp housed more than 10,000 inmates, all of them from various air forces. In early 1943, captivity (and probably prison food) got the best of some of them, and they hatched an elaborate escape plan.
Three tunnels would be dug that went out of the camp below the walls. But this was prison, and it was 1943, and it was 45 years before they could get any ideas from characters played by Richard Dean Anderson. So they improvised on their own.
The Red Cross supplied powdered milk in tin cans, which were fashioned into tools, buckets, air ducts…yeah, they built air ducts. To push the air, they made air pumps out of those tin cans, parts from the prison beds, and whatever else they could find. They pumped air through the tin-can ducting so the guys digging could breathe and keep their candles lit…candles? Yep, but they didn’t get them at Hallmark. At chow time, they skimmed the fat off their soup into (you guessed it) those little tins, let it solidify, then made wicks out of string. Eventually, electricity and lights were run.
The three tunnels dug (named “Tom”, “Dick”, and “Harry”) were 30 feet below ground and several hundred feet long, so a lot of dirt and sand had to be moved, and hiding all that fill was a challenge. So they filled socks with the material and hit them in their pants. As they milled about the camp and worked their gardens, the dirt would fall out from their pants.
Eventually the decision was made to fill up “Dick” with the dirt from the others and “Tom” was later discovered. But work on “Harry” continued for more than a year. Then it was a matter of waiting for the right (in other words, moonless) time. And that time was March 24, 1944.
In the complete darkess, 76 men made their escape. But the tunnel was a little shorter than planned, coming up just short of the woods near the camp. The 77th man was discovered as he emerged, and the gig was up. A massive manhunt succeeded in capturing all but 3 of the escapees, and 50 of them were executed.
Despite its tragic conclusion, the story of the escape is totally engaging. The movie The Great Escape captures much of what the prisoners accomplished in this most ingenius of escape attempts. But movies tend to exaggerate, so books are usually better sources.
Recommended Reading: The Great Escape from Stalag Luft III – There are numerous great sources available…this is just one. Nova (a show on PBS) also did a pretty good documentary on the escape. Also, check out this little website…pretty clever.
Today's History Lesson 