Franz von Werra (1914-1941) was a German World War II fighter pilot who was shot down over England and captured. He is generally regarded as the only Axis prisoner of war to succeed in escaping from a Canadian prisoner of war camp and returning to Germany, though a second man, a U-Boat rating named Walter Kurt Reich is said to have jumped from a Polish troopship (presumably the ex-liner Sobieski) in the St. Lawrence river in July 1940 and alleged...
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Franz von Werra (1914-1941) was a German World War II fighter pilot who was shot down over England and captured. He is generally regarded as the only Axis prisoner of war to succeed in escaping from a Canadian prisoner of war camp and returning to Germany, though a second man, a U-Boat rating named Walter Kurt Reich is said to have jumped from a Polish troopship (presumably the ex-liner Sobieski) in the St. Lawrence river in July 1940 and allegedly managed to return to Germany via the United States, Mexico and Italy.
Franz von Werra was born on 13 July, 1914, to impoverished Swiss parents in Leuk, a town in the Swiss canton of Valais. Later he and his sister were given into the care of an aristocratic German family.
In 1936, von Werra joined the Luftwaffe. At the beginning of the war, he served in the French campaign with Jagdgeschwader 3. An able officer, he became Adjudant of II Gruppe, JG 3, despite his often boisterous 'playboy' behavior and a degree of self-promotion (he was...
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