set to filling small cars with coal. This took me away from the boys,
and at first I was very much discouraged. But the new place where I
worked was a large coal shed and quite dark; right at the back I found
an unused door which was unlocked. Opening it, I discovered an iron
ladder leading to the ground, and I said to myself, "This is just the
chance we've been looking for." That night I told the boys of my find,
and they said, "Yes, but how are we going to get there?" for between
this coal house and the platform where the boys worked was a distance
of one hundred yards. But I told them how I thought it could be
managed, and we made our plans to try it that way.

We planned to make our "getaway" on the Tuesday of the following week,
so we set about collecting provisions for our journey. All our pals
were willing to contribute, and they gave us bully-beef and biscuits
from their scanty stores. We could hardly wait for the time set for
our starting, but at last the night came.

Every night at twelve o'clock the guards left their posts and marched
the prisoners back to a hut for lunch. It was on our way back from
this lunch that we hoped to get away. The guards always left us at the
foot of the stairs leading up to the coke ovens, and they stayed at the
foot of the ladder until the last prisoner was mounted. This night we
had made up our minds that we should be the first ones up the ladder,
for time meant everything to us. A guard was stationed at the foot of
the ladder leading from the coal shed, and we had to make the distance
before he did. Our path lay past the coke ovens, across a bridge to
the coal house, through it and down the ladder. We didn't dare run,
for we were surrounded by German civilians, but I assure you the time
we made wasn't slow.

Blackie and Sammy came with me instead of stopping at their ovens, and
we trusted to the friendly darkness to keep them from being detected.
We won our race and reached the bottom of the ladder a full minute
before the guard reached his post; so we were off on the run for a
small wood which was about six hundred yards away. We reached it in
safety and congratulated each other on our escape. We stayed there
only long enough to get our wind, then we started off at a good brisk
walk; as far as we knew we had not been missed, for there was no
pursuit. We walked until 4 A.M. across the country, then we came to a
large wood where we hid for the day.

Next nigh