Colditz- Prisoners of the Castle - Ben MacIntyre

This might seem a really odd inclusion for VEXD. Far removed from the usual book reviews you’ll find on this site, but bear with me and all will become clear. Its actually a great read - the sort of book that you’re really sorry when you reach the last page. Its also actually a very political book, in that it brings you up very close to the British class system and, in particular, the braying public school boys that infest the top levels of British society. When I was a kid I devoured books about the war - Reach for the Sky (Douglas Bader), The Dambusters, the Wooden Horse Escape and many more. All of them uncritical tales of derring-do where brave heroes defend the country and gives it to anyone who dares to challenge British authority. Britain the plucky underdog coming good in the end thanks to our exceptional bravery and fortitude in the face of evil and overwhelming odds. This book could easily have been another in that vast canon - an uncritical beatification of British heroes incarcerated in a dungeon like castle in the depths of enemy territory. Instead however it paints a different picture. One that reflects all the prevailing attitudes and class politics of the time. A not uncritical inspection of how British Society was organised and run, with its attendant class snobbery and racism. In particular, author Ben MacIntyre makes very clear the role of the British public school system. Even within the castle there is a clear hierarchy and pecking order amongst competing public schoolboys. In particular the amazing (to me) revelation that under the terms of the Geneva Convention all officers who became prisoners of war were entitled to an orderly (an army term for a servant) to look after them - cleaning, cooking etc. The more senior officer were actually entitled to two. Therefore a contingent of orderlies were also present in the castle to serve as lackeys and ensure that officers’ boots were clean and the latrines were well maintained etc. I don’t remember them featuring much in the escape films but as so often in books and movies, heroes have to have nice manners and accents. Can you believe there was even a Colditz version of the Bullingdon Club? The accounts of British “flying ace” Douglas Bader, a renowned pilot who whose own cocksure arrogance had seen him lose both legs in a plane crash prior to the war, are also particularly revealing. His disdain for others grated even with those fellow officers forced to suffer him in their quarters. His own orderly having to dutifully carry him on his back up and down every staircase in the castle for 3 years, during which time Bader never once thanked him. I recall that this pomposity continued throughout his life. When a new pub was established at the site of Tangmere Airfield near Chichester West Sussex, a place where Bader had served, and which was to be named in his honour , he upset so many people at the opening ceremony -making clear his dislike of the pub, the beer and the sign with his picture on it, that many wished they has simply called it The Hurricane. These great British Heroes also visited appalling racism on a fellow officer of Indian origin who despite every provocation stuck to his sworn oath to serve the British Army. Its with some satisfaction that you read about him easily knocking down and beating one of his public school tormentors, a mess companion, who had suggested that he would give him a thrashing in the boxing ring.

And so a very different read from the book you might be expecting, and all the better for it. The final chapter includes something else, seldom mentioned in other, very sanitised accounts of wars, the heroes who fight in them and the myths we choose to tell ourselves. Not 200 yards from the gates of Colditz Castle was another place, - a munitions factory, where Jewish slave labourers, working in appalling conditions, were used to make arms for the German war machine. Average life expectancy 3-4 months.