The real history behind the classic war movie and the men who plotted the daring escape from a Nazi POW camp. Between dusk and dawn on the night of March 24th-25th 1944, a small army of Allied soldiers crawled through tunnels in Germany in a covert operation the likes of which the Third Reich had never seen. The prison break from Stalag Luft III in eastern Germany was the largest of its kind in the Second World War. Seventy-nine Allied soldiers and airmen made it outside the wire-but only three made it outside Nazi Germany. Fifty were executed by the Gestapo. In this book Jonathan Vance tells the incredible story that was made famous by the 1963 film The Great Escape. It is a classic tale of prisoners and their wardens in a battle of wits and wills. The brilliantly conceived escape plan is overshadowed only by the colorful, daring (and sometimes very funny) crew who executed it-literally under the noses of German guards. From the men's first days in Stalag Luft III and the forming of bonds among them, to the tunnel building, amazing escape, and eventual capture, Vance's history is a vivid, compelling look at one of the greatest "exfiltration" missions of all time.