SAS GREAT ESCAPES

By the bestselling author of SAS Band of Brothers and Zero Six Bravo, here are seven incredible escapes made by Second World War heroes, superhuman endurance, breath-taking bluff and nerve and the use of audacious disguise or wreaking total bloody mayhem, and all seven dared to win all. The one escape set in Greece was Cpt Roy Farran's 600 mile sea journey aboard a caique from Athens to Alexandria in August 1941. The two in North Africa during 1942-43 involved Cpl John 'Jack' Byrne in Operation Squatter and Lt Thomas Langton's march across the desert unknown to him during the Alamein Battle. There is one in France with F/O Lew Fiddick (RCAF), Capt Henry Druce and Lt Col Brian Franks in Operation Loyton around Moussey in the Vosges. All showed important language skills and the ability to get on with locals, and an element of luck. After his escape from PG78 at Sulmona Lt George Paterson transformed his pragmatic SAS skills to more of an SOE agent working with partisan resistance between the borders of Switzerland and Italy. Sgt John 'Gentleman Jim' Almonds supplied immediate details of minefields he had crossed. Lt James Hughes was the sole survivor of the successful Operation Pomegranate, the preliminary attack on San Egidio Airfield in January 1944 immediately prior to the Anzio landings. Taken together these decisions and actions became vital in the development and speedy conclusion to the war. Lewis reveals that behind the scenes authorities were making moves to repatriate some of the 50,000 Allied POWs. 332pp, colour and archive photos.