Stalag Luft III Williams, the book "Stolen Journey" by Philpot and the 1950 film "The Wooden Horse". There had been escape attempts (one of which inspired the film "The Wooden Horse") and many tunnels had been started and discovered before completion. In March 1943, Royal Air Force Squadron Leader Roger Bushell conceived a plan for a mass escape from the North Compound, which took place on the night of 24/25 March 1944. He was being held with the other British and Commonwealth airmen and he was in command of the Escape Committee that managed all escape opportunities from the north compound. Falling back
World War I prisoners of war in Germany recognized that it was a camp devoted to intelligence collection. This "Listening Hotel" was similar in organization and purpose to the Dulag Luft camp at Frankfurt in the Second World War. These camps were often located in regions where the climate or the terrain made life difficult, but also near the front, where the prisoners might be taken to rebuild trenches or cart away bodies. The goal of the reprisal camps was to put pressure on enemy governments to ameliorate conditions of detention for German prisoners, and to punish prisoners (for instance following an escape). Life for prisoners sent to