Description

‘A truly revelatory story of courage, treachery, intrigue, divided loyalties and vengeance’ Damien Lewis, author of SAS Great Escapes

‘A gripping, unsettling journey into the strange moral fog of the war’s last days – and the shadows we inherit long after’ Iain MacGregor, author of The Lighthouse of Stalingrad

The nephew of the King. The son of the Viceroy of India. Churchill’s nephew.

Thrown together in late 1944 into the notorious prisoner of war camp at Colditz Castle, these men were among the Prominente: a small group of captives who were scions of the British establishment and pawns in the endgame being played by the Nazi leadership.

As German defeat loomed, the head of the POW camps, SS General Gottlob Berger, made a pivotal decision: to disobey direct orders from Hitler to ‘kill them all’ and grant them safe passage back to the Allied frontline. This Nazi overseer, later convicted of war crimes, held the future of the Prominente in his hands.

George Lascelles, Earl of Harewood, was one of the men who survived. Eighty years later, drawing on archives and family records from Britain and Germany, his son David retraces their extraordinary journey and asks what motivated Berger’s fateful choice – remorse? Honour? Or simple self-interest?

Publisher Review

A fascinating story about the fate of the VIP prisoners of Colditz that is grounded in some remarkable family and military history detective work. Beautifully and poignantly told — Robert Verkaik, author of THE TRAITOR OF COLDITZ Utterly enthralling. Not just a little-known wartime story, but a fascinating reflection on the war’s legacy for the next generation — Alwyn Turner, author of A SHELLSHOCKED NATION Visceral and meticulously researched… a triumph — John Jay, author of NINETTE’S WAR A remarkable and moving quest to understand contrasting lives and generations cast into each other’s paths by the hazards of family, nationality and conflict. Lascelles brings a filmmaker’s eye to composition… At once intimate and panoramic, his research discloses unsettling echoes within Europe’s most infamous historical epochs — Professor Jane Caplan, University of Oxford A gripping true story from the heart of Nazi Germany’s escape-proof fortress… Out of Colditz positively sizzles — Damien Lewis, author of SAS GREAT ESCAPES