293 - Allied POWs in WWII
The WW2 Podcast
Angus Wallace
4.6 • 1.6K Ratings
🗓️ 15 January 2026
⏱️ 51 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This episode looks at a very different side of the Second World War. Not the battlefield, but captivity. It focuses on the experiences of Allied prisoners of war held in German camps and how they tried to survive, adapt, and maintain a sense of purpose behind barbed wire.
I am joined by Midge Gillies, author of The Barbed Wire University. A newly revised edition was released in 2025. Her book explores the lives Allied POWs led in captivity, from the routines and hardships of camp life to the ways prisoners supported one another and resisted the effects of long-term imprisonment. Education forms part of this story, but it sits alongside a wider picture of how men coped with boredom, uncertainty, hunger, and the psychological strain of captivity.
Together, we discuss how prisoners organised themselves, how knowledge and skills were shared, and what these improvised communities reveal about resilience and identity under extreme conditions.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This country is at war with Germany. |
| 0:04.2 | We shall go on to the end. |
| 0:08.1 | I remember the sheets of flame which came up and almost blinded us from our guns. |
| 0:24.2 | Hello and welcome to the World War II podcast. |
| 0:27.8 | Today we're looking at a very different side of the Second World War, |
| 0:31.0 | not the battlefield but captivity, and in particular, |
| 0:35.9 | how prisoners of war try to survive, adapt and even educate themselves behind Barb Wire. |
| 0:38.8 | In this episode of the podcast, I'm joined by Midge Gillis, author of the Barb Wire University, of which a newly revised edition was released in 2025. |
| 0:46.7 | Her book explores the Allied Prisoner of War experience. Midge, thanks for joining me. |
| 0:53.3 | I was going to start with, clearly hundreds of thousands of men are |
| 0:56.9 | captured at the start of the war, which I assume is a bit of a surprise to everybody. They've suddenly got all these |
| 1:02.5 | prisons. They've suddenly got all these prisons. But my query is for men who at the start of the war |
| 1:09.8 | have been soldiers, then they're captured, |
| 1:12.0 | they have to get to prisoner of war camps, |
| 1:14.5 | which I assume at that point, |
| 1:17.5 | there's some sort of security. |
| 1:18.7 | We're in a camp. |
| 1:19.7 | And for many men, |
| 1:21.2 | that transition could be quite a long period. |
| 1:24.6 | And so what's that like, |
| 1:25.9 | that journey from free man to incarceration? |
| 1:31.3 | Well, whenever they were captured, it tended to be quite chaotic. |
... |
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