I Escape!: The Great War's Most Remarkable POW

J. L. Hardy's account of his experiences as a prisoner of war during the First World War details his numerous escape attempts while held by the Germans for three-and-a-half years. Hardy made twelve escape attempts in total, five of which succeeded. In early 1915, Hardy attempted to escape from Halle Camp near Leipzig by breaking through a brick wall into an adjacent ammunition factory, but after five months of work the plan proved impracticable. Transferred to Augustabad Camp near Neu Brandenburg in summer 1915, he escaped within ten days by slipping away from a bathing party with a Russian officer. They traveled fifty miles to the Baltic coast, swimming a river and narrowly avoiding recapture before reaching Stralsund, where they were arrested while attempting to secure passage on a Swedish schooner. Returned to Halle, Hardy made a solo escape by picking locks and breaking through a skylight, then traveling by train to Bremen before being recaptured. At Magdeburg, he escaped with a Belgian officer and reached Stralsund again via Berlin, but was arrested on the island of Rugen before finding a fishing boat to Sweden. Transferred to Fort Zorndorf, where escape was considered virtually impossible, Hardy continued making escape attempts.