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Militaria and Political Auction
Lot 1338:
World War II
Art 6.25" × 6.75" 1p. c. 1944
[Sagan, Poland] File Miscellaneous
World War II (abbreviated WWI), or the Second World War was a worldwide conflict fought between the Allied Powers and the Axis Powers, from 1939 until 1945. Armed forces from over seventy nations engaged in aerial, naval and ground-based combat. Spanning much of the globe, World War I resulted in the deaths of over 62 million people, making it the deadliest conflict in human history. The war ended with an Allied victory.
Original Drawing done by Sgt. Bob Neary as a Prisoner of War in Stalag Luft III –
"The Great Escape" POW camp – of a POW in the Wash Room cleaning up, ostensibly . after digging the escape tunnel Description:
Pencil sketch, 6.25" x 6.75", of a POW standing on a Red Cross box pouring water over a naked man from a jug. The sign ion the wall says "Waschen Sie Zimmer" (Wash Room). Light and dark pencil. Not signed. The cleaning of a tunnel worker was done in secret as the shower rooms were watched over by guards. Drawn on the verso of a section of an official German rations list.
Stalag Luft III POW camp was situated in Sagan, 100 miles southeast of Berlin, now called Zagan, in Upper Silesia, Poland. All the prisoners of war were flying officers of the British Royal Air Force and Fleet Air Arm and American U.S. Army Air Force. The first camp compound opened in March 1942, followed by other compounds in 1943 and
1944. It held about 10,000 officers. Stalag Luft III was immortalized in the 1963 motion picture, "The Great Escape, " starring Steve McQueen. On the night of March 24-25, 1944, 76 of the 600 prisoners involved in the plan escaped through tunnels they had dug before German guards spotted them. The escape from the camp was the single greatest freedom attempt by POWs in World War II. Of the 76 who tried to escape, 50 were recaptured and executed by the Gestapo on Hitler’s orders, three successfully escaped, and the rest were returned to Stalag Luft II.
Sgt. Robert P. (Bob) Neary was a gunner with the 450th Bomb Group, 720th Squadron, who was shot down, captured, and sent to the Stalag Luft III POW camp. The camp was evacuated in January 1945 as Russian forces pushed into eastern Germany. Neary was moved to Nuremberg-Langwasser, then to Moosburg’s Stalag VII-A on April 13, 1945, when he and the others were informed of the death the previous day of President Roosevelt. Sixteen days later, the camp was liberated by Gen. Patton’s Third Army. "I shall never forget the most beautiful sight I have ever seen, " wrote Set. Neary in his privately printed book of sketches, "Stalag Luft III, " "the Swastika coming down and the Stars and Stripes rising gloriously in Moosburg, not far from camp. Several hours later, General Patton came into camp to meet a thunderous ovation according him by the shrieking mob of deliriously happy and supremely grateful prisoners, who literally swarmed over every accessible spot to see their Liberator…
Provenance: The War Museum
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