Articles
This section is quite different to the rest of the site - it contains stories and articles not necessarily connected to either Conscript Heroes or the Pat O'Leary escape line - but I hope the reader will find them of interest anyway. As you will see from the credits, many people have contributed to the information used in these articles, but with some notable exceptions, the words are mostly my own. I will be adding to this collection as time and circumstance permit ...
In early 2008 I was able to add three new articles about USAAF evaders. The first had been previously posted elsewhere on the internet, the second is a translated extract from a French book whilst the third was only ever intended for the man's family. I am particularly grateful to all three authors for allowing me to publish their work here, and hope you find them as interesting as I do.
In late 2008 I added two lists of escapers and evaders, one of British MI9 Reports and one of US MIS-X Reports. Both lists can be accessed from the EEIE pages (see below), along with IS9 Reports and Liberation Reports, and continue to evolve as new information is added.
In 2009 I started looking at escape lines in Brittany. Using Roger Huguen as my main source, I have written three articles, the first about Louis Nouveau and the Pat Line connnection, the second about Oaktree and the third about the Shelburn escape line.
In early 2010 I added two more lists of evaders - one of men helped by Georges Broussine's Bourgogne escape line and one of Freteval evaders.
In April 2010 I launched a website entitled WWII Escape and Evasion Information Exchange - its intended purpose should be self-explanatory. The EEIE site is linked to this one and although it has articles of its own, it also shares some of the articles listed below. Please note that some of the articles on this page have the EEIE header.
Latest article added 30 August 2023

The Pat O'Leary Line - 101 Sqn Wellington R1699
The Pat O'Leary Line - Tony Brooks
The Pat O'Leary Line - Escapers from Saint Hippolyte - Part 1
The Pat O'Leary Line - Escapers from Saint Hippolyte - Part 2
The Pat O'Leary Line - Leslie Wilkins
The Pat O'Leary Line - Winskill and Party
The Pat O'Leary Line - Between Prison Escapes
Jack Deall and Fred Gare - having escaped from the Germans, they then had to escape from the French
The first successful escapers from Saint Hippolyte - the Wellington crew who returned from France in 1941
Lt Richard E H Parkinson - the last man to escape from the French internment camp at Saint Hippolyte-du-Fort
Kate Bonnefous - Catherine Bonnefous, Etta Shiber, and some of the men they helped in 1940
Escapers from the Camp de Chambaran - and some others who were "released"
Escapers from the Heilag at Rouen - after repatriation plans fell through, they made their own arrangements
Fort de la Rivere - more about the men who escaped the French internment camp on 5 September 1942
Ian Grant Garrow DSO - my tribute to one of the founders of the Pat O'Leary escape line
The Hotel de Paris - one of the Pat line's most important safe houses in Toulouse
William Guy Lockart - his tour with 161 SD Squadron flying Lysanders to France
The Last Days of the PAO - details of the last three evaders taken to safety by the Pat O'Leary Line
Operation Sherwood - a list of servicemen sheltered in the Freteval forest by MI9 Mission Marathon
Bourgogne - a list of servicemen helped by Georges Broussine's Bourgogne escape line
Evasion in Brittany - Louis Nouveau and the Pat Line connection
Evasion in Brittany - the Oaktree Mission of Val Williams and Ray Labrosse
Evasion in Brittany - the Shelburn escape line
MIS-X Research - can you help the US National Park Service find out more about Fort Hunt and PO Box 1142 ?
One Last Letter - from F/O Count Jacques M J A d'Ursel RAF - courtesy of Michael Moores LeBlanc
Harold Cole - Pat Line Courier
Shelburn - a list of servicemen brought out on the five Bonaparte operations
Roland Lepers - my father's French courier from Bethune to Marseille
World War Two and Beyond - a P-47 pilot brought home courtesy of SOE - by Ken Williams
Tail End Charlie - how four crewmen from a B-17 were helped to safety - by Dominique Lecomte
Tragedy in the Pyrenees - by Warren B Carah
Seawolf and Seadog - felucca operations from Gibraltar to the southern French beaches in 1942
Victor Reynolds - Our Man in Estramoz - by Alberto Franco
La Resistance dans le Ternois - by René Guittard - in both English and the original French
Odd Bod Ken Nolan - shot down over Arnhem and hidden by the Dutch Resistance - by Ken Nolan
In Some Corner of a Foreign Field - in memory of Pte Alfred Edward 'Sandy' Riley 2/6 East Surreys
Receipt for a Dead Canary - extracts from the memoir of Elizabeth Lucas Harrison
Early Escapers - some escapers who got back before the escape lines were established
The Chauny Escape Line - details of the men helped by Etienne Dromas and his Chauny organisation
Escape from Besancon - the real story of Gordon Laming's escape from Frontstalag 142
Who was George - evader Bill Knagg's modern-day search for his war-time helpers
Operations Titania and Rosalind - the last PAO sea evacuations from southern France
Tom Kenny and the Arrests at Room 530 - a close call for the Marseille Organisation
Six Weeks at Miranda - after travelling the length of France and crossing the Pyrenees ...
The Big Party - perhaps the largest party of servicemen taken south from the Pas de Calais
The Last Passeur - in remembrance of Paul Barrau, who died in 2005 - by Scott Goodall
Message in a Matchbox - first news of Pat O'Leary and Tom Groome from Dachau
Operations Bluebottle I and II - the first PAO sea evacuations from southern France
Six Days in September - one party's journey from the Pas de Calais to the Pyrenees
Johnny Hopper - his war against the Germans - by Robert Wernick
News of Sgt Philo - a concerned mother's letter that crossed all the frontiers - by Derek Richardson
The Great Ramble - the odyssey that inspired a best selling novel about escape and evasion in France
Bob Milton - a pilot who crashed in France March 1941, and returned to England in January 1943
Charles Murchie and Harry Clayton - my tribute to their pioneering work in the Marseille Organisation
Stella Lonsdale - an Englishwoman recruited as a German agent, then sent to England by Pat O'Leary
Alex Nitelet - Belgian fighter pilot, Pat Line parcel and radio operator for Pat O'Leary
Create or Quarantine - a day in the life of a young woman at Ravensbrueck
On Their Way Back - the Fillerin family from Renty, Pas de Calais, and some of their 'parcels'
For Ari Rabinowich - Ari was an SOE radio operator that a FANY friend knew at Thame Park
Dominique Edgard Potier - Ed Potier was a Belgian MI9 officer who died at Reims in January 1944
Andrée Borrel - Andrée worked with the PAO before she escaped to England and joined SOE
Rudolf Ptacek - Rudolf was one of the three Spitfire pilots who escaped from France with my father