High in the Tuscan hills above Florence an elaborate medieval castle converted to a POW camp on Mussolini's personal orders holds one of the most illustrious groups of prisoners in the history of warfare The dozen or so British & Commonwealth senior officers
Includes:: three knights of the realm & two VCs The youngest of them is 48 the oldest 63 One is missing a hand & an eye Another suffers with a gammy hip Against insuperable odds these extraordinary middle-aged POWs plan a series of daring escape attempts culminating in a complex tunnel deep beneath the castle One rainswept night in March 1943 six men will burst from the earth beyond the castle's curtain wall & slip away By assorted means the three Brits two New Zealanders & a half-Belgian aristocrat will attempt to make it to neutral Switzerland over 200 miles away