Under the wire - William Ash

Bill Ash is one of a rare breed - an American prepared to sacrifice his citizenship and risk his life to fight the Nazis at a time when the USA was still neutral. He joined the Royal Canadian Air Force and before long found himself in England and flying Spitfires in combat.;Then, in March 1942, Bill was shot down over the Pas de Calais. He survived the crash-landing and, thanks to the bravery of local civilians, evaded capture for months. It was in Paris that he was betrayed to the Gestapo. Tortured and sentenced to death as a spy, he was saved from the firing squad by the intervention of the Luftwaffe who sent him to the 'Great Escape' POW camp, Stalag Luft III. It was from there that Bill - already branded a trouble-maker by his captors - began his extraordinary 'tour' of Occupied Europe, breaking out of one camp, being dispatched to the next - in Poland, Germany and Lithuania. Bill became one of only a handful of serial escape artists to attempt more than a dozen break-outs - over the wire, under it in tunnels, through it with cutters or simply strolling out of the camp gates in disguise. These were years of extraordinary hardship, frustration and brutality - each time he was recaptured his punishment was a long spell in solitary. He was a real-life 'Cooler king'- but through it all he maintained not just remarkable courage, but also an anarchic sense of humour, great humanity and an unstoppable desire for freedom.;From its honest, funny and exciting reflections on life in wartime Britain to the vivid, compelling, sometimes poignant recollections of his time as a POW, UNDER THE WIRE is more than just another memoir. It stands as a tribute to the bravery and resolve, not only of Bill Ash, but of an entire generation