STALAG LUFT III - THE GREAT ESCAPE
Stalag Luft III (German: Stammlager Luft, main camp for aircrew) was a Luftwaffe-run prisoner-of-war camp during World War II that housed captured air force servicemen. It was in the German province of Lower Silesia near the town of Sagan (now Żagań, Poland), 160 kilometres (100 miles) southeast of Berlin. The site was selected because it would be difficult to escape by tunnelling due to the sandy ground.
The camp is best known for two famous prisoner escapes that took place there by tunnelling, which were depicted in the films The Great Escape (1963) and The Wooden Horse (1950), and the books by former prisoners Paul Brickhill and Eric Williams from which these films were adapted.
The photographs were made in 2015, 70 years to the week of Liberation from the camp on the night of 27th January 1945, around the main route of entry for POWs, the train station through to elements that remain of the camp.
A selection of these images and story were published in The Daily Telegraph weekend magazine.
Train Platforms, Zagan
Remains of Zagan train station platforms. POWs disembarked onto these after being shot down, captured, interrogated and eventually taken to Zagan via train to begin the short walk through the dense pine woods to Stalag Luft III POW Camp. These platforms are also where POWs who took part in The Great Escape boarded their trains soon after escaping from Tunnel Harry less than ½ a mile away.
Zagan Station Train Tunnel
The underground tunnel entrance/exit for Zagan train station. All POWs entering Stalag Luft III passed through this. It was this stairway that POWs who took part in The Great Escape could not find in the dark, until daylight revealed it was in a recess in the side wall of this underground pedestrian tunnel. This meant many missed their planned trains leaving in the dark resulting in quick decisions to walk across country or wait on the platform in daylight where some were captured less than ½ a mile from the exit of Tunnel Harry.