Guests of the Third Reich

The British POW Experience in Germany 1939-1945

By: Anthony Richards

Narrated by: Jonathan Keeble

Length: 7 hrs and 11 mins

Publisher's summary

More than 170,000 British prisoners of war (POWs) were taken by German and Italian forces during the Second World War. Conditions were tough. Rations were meagre. 

The days dragged, and there was a constant battle against boredom. The men, but not officers, had to work, often at heavy labour.  

Guests of the Third Reich will provide an overview of what daily life was like for prisoners, from staging theatre productions to keep morale up to working allotments and planning audacious escape attempts.   

Utilising IWM's collections of letters, diaries, memoirs and sound interviews, this gripping, poignant narrative conveys the story of those in captivity in Germany during the Second World War in a personal and engaging way.   

©2019 The Imperial War Museum (P)2019 Headline Publishing Group Ltd

Dry, Diary Style Retelling

I was hoping this was going to be a comprehensive overview of life as as a POW in the Reich. It's not like that. It reads like a series of diary entries. Unfortunately many of these type books are like this. There's no congruency. It's like a series of short stories. And for the reader, it is very easy to get distracted because there isn't anything fluid connecting the storylines. Although it is very informative and interesting in regards to what the prisoners did to pass the time, and how they survived. Especially at the end when describing what it was like under the Russians at the very end...now this is another story in itself. But it composes the last 15 minutes.

Jonathan Keelbe does a top notch job narrating. All around excellent work.