Do Go On - 508 - The Real Great Escape

Episode Date: July 16, 2025

You might have seen the 1963 Steve McQueen classic, but this week we look at the real story behind The Great Escape. Tunnels, disguises and forgeries combine for the the most audacious escape attempt in history. And for the fun we are joined by the hilarious Dane Simpson!This is a comedy/history podcast, the report begins at approximately 09:10 (though as always, we go off on tangents throughout the report).For all our important links: https://linktr.ee/dogoonpod Check out our other podcasts:Book Cheat: https://play.acast.com/s/book-cheatPrime Mates: https://play.acast.com/s/prime-mates/Listen Now: https://play.acast.com/s/listen-now/Who Knew It with Matt Stewart: https://play.acast.com/s/who-knew-it-with-matt-stewart/Our awesome theme song by Evan Munro-Smith and logo by Peader ThomasDo Go On acknowledges the traditional owners of the land we record on, the Wurundjeri people, in the Kulin nation. We pay our respects to elders, past and present. REFERENCES AND FURTHER READING:https://www.abc.net.au/listen/programs/nightlife/this-week-in-history-the-great-escape/10928200 https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/greatescape/three.htmlhttps://www.rafbf.org/great-escape/about-the-great-escapehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stalag_Luft_III https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20250320-the-true-story-of-the-great-escape https://rafa.org.uk/blog/2023/10/11/vaulting-horse-the-other-great-escape/ https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/explore-the-collection/stories/roger-bushell-and-the-great-escape/ https://www.pegasusarchive.org/pow/roger_bushell.htm https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20250320-the-true-story-of-the-great-escape https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johnnie_Dodge#Stalag_Luft_III_(North_Compound) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Melbourne and Canada, we got exciting news for you. And we should also say this is 2026. Jess, what year is it? 2026. Thank God you're here. Right now, I'm in Melbourne doing my show with Serenji Amana, 630 each night at the Cooper's Inn Hotel, having so much fun. We'd love to see you there. Canada, we are visiting you in September this year.

If you've somehow missed the news, we are heading up Vancouver, Calgary, Montreal and Toronto for shows. That's going to be so much fun. Tickets for all this stuff, I believe, are online. And I'm here too. And welcome to another episode of Do Go On. My name is Dave Orniki. And as always, I'm here with Matt Stewart and Jess Perkins. Hello.

Hey, Dave, so good to be here with you. Great to be here with you. And also with you. And with you. And this year, this year. This is our annual episode. I don't know if you've realised what you've dedicated yourself to, but we're doing 52 episodes. Oh, great.

I'm going to be here all year now. This year, joining us from the Mad Yarns podcast. It's our mate, Dane Simpson. Yay! Happy New Year! I don't know what I said that. We've done this every week for nearly 10 years. This year?

Yeah. It's an annual podcast. Anyway, Dane. You know what? It's the start of the financial year. Yes. I'm a really savvy financial kind of guy. Yes.

I go with the clock. Yeah. Yeah. The financial clock. You're finally accepting you do look like an accountant. That's why I hate him so much. Yes. Oh, that's not the only reason.

I'm a multi-dimensional. You can hate me for many reasons. But, Dane, how are you? Yeah, great. Great. Great. I'm at the top of my game right now, I don't have your glasses. So I'm already doing well. It's just kept up and strays all over the shop.

Mark, you said to Dane, oh, basically, Dave's going to tell us the story from history and we just sit here and annoy him. And Dave's gone, well, I can get it on that. Dane's gone, got it. I can do that straight away. Insights, got it. A regular listeners might know Dane from his episode of Dugan the Quiz Show. Yeah.

Yeah, that's right, which came out. Last year, we did an episode with you and Marcel where the topic was periodic table of the elements, because when I see you down, I thought, this guy knows science. This guy, this guy knows elements. And you proved yourself that night. Oh, absolutely. We did. Yeah, we did.

What a powerful team we were. VIP Chunky Bows. That's right. If you haven't seen it, I gave the both teams a bunch of, uh, letters that represent elements. And I said, who can spell the longest word using these letters? And Matt and Dan, we did it. We used every letter.

We used it. VIP, chunky boughs. That's what you do. Absolutely. That's what the VIP chunky boys do. Absolutely. Once they're finished. That's what I do after every show I perform.

I do a VIP chunky bag. That's just for the people who paid extra. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Everyone has to leave except for the people who will pay extra. You're checking wristbands.

You've also done a few episodes of who knew it with Matt Stewart, my pod and Dave's book cheat. But you've got, now you've, you've entering, and I feel a bit, I feel like you should have probably checked in with us first, but you've started your own podcast without even asking us. This is the widest I'll ever feel. So the pods, it's you and your mate, Isaac. Yeah, and we're just yarn.

It's just, it's called Mad Yarns. We just yarn. We just tell us a story. We're in. encourage people to spin a yarn with us. It's fun. It's silly. But yeah, it's very, I don't know, it's in its early stages.

We haven't got a very few out. By the time this comes out, probably two episodes would have been out by then. So, yeah, it's, we will work it out. So people will be able to binge it pretty easily. Yeah. At this point. Yeah. You could listen to both episodes.

You did that in a day. That's great, because when people see it, some people love seeing that we've got 500 and other people see it and go, well, I can't catch up with that. Yeah. Yeah, totally. I think that all the time. It's flying. Same with like TV series.

If there's like 20 seasons, I'm like, I'm not starting. I can't do that. So, 500. Crazy. Well, that. Thanks, much. How long do the episodes go for? As you're about to find out, between about an hour and a half and two hours.

Okay. Yeah. And so that's a thousand hours. At least, yeah. And then we have 200 and something bonus episode mini reports as well. They're about an hour as well. Yeah. Crazy.

They've done 100 book cheats. I've done 150 who knew it. So basically, you could train an AI to say whatever if you want, based on our voices. So you've got like three and a half thousand hours that you've put in to have two listeners. Yeah. And we love them. We said we always said we'd stopped on the podcast when more people are listening than we're doing it. So there's three of us today.

So we need five listeners. And we're done. Yet to happen. Yet to happen. Yeah. We're just one episode. That's all that will take you. That's crazy the amount of Nazis that listen to this too.

Yeah. Day has said every word. When he said every word, he said every word. He said, yeah. He said every word. For the AI. It's okay if it's for the AI. Yeah.

Jess and I really didn't enjoy some of those words. If you want me to be your GPS voice, that's available. Ooh. I don't think those words are not required on GPS. They're making new streets all the time. What are you one of those? Well, it's funny that you mention Nazis. Oh dear.

Oh, dear. Because we're going back. in time. It's not a great time this week, but we always start with a question to get us onto topic because I've written the report, Dane, Matt and Jess, they don't know what it's going to be, you don't know what it's going to be about. So how does the show work then? And we take it in terms of report on the topic. And that's what I've done this week. I've gone away. Our Patreon supporters, I put up three topics and they voted, so they voted for the Nazi story, not me. Of course I did. And you still put it up to them. Yeah. Anyway, I went away, done the research,

and now I'm going to tell you all about something from history. Did you need to do research on this one? I also think that the topics were, Do you want to hear dog poop or the mold in my fridge or nazis? Hey, that don't sound so bad. Now, we'll start with the question. That question is, what 1963 war movie starring Steve McQueen is based on a true story? It is the Great Escape. Today we are talking about the real Great Escape.

Oh, nice. So we're focusing on what I would call the good guys. Tom Dick and Harry. Yes. Yeah. So you're a fact. Let's go around there and have you seen the movie. Yes.

A long time ago. Can I double check when you say the good guys? Who are you talking about? The guys are trying to escape. Oh, okay. Because you just, you said that we're talking about Nazis today. No, they obviously come up as the bad. Okay.

Just so that everyone's on the same page. Yeah, yeah. Also, Dave, why is your heart going out to all of us? So Jess hasn't seen the movie? No. Fantastic. I haven't seen in ages, yeah. Yeah, I think I watched it growing up, maybe with my dad.

He started in the 60s, yeah. Yeah, I watched it a long, I watched it when I was a kid. I used to be on like Sunday afternoons or we're about the same age. Yeah, old as the wind. And I reckon it used to be repeated daytime weekends. Absolutely, yeah, it was, yeah. I reckon I watched it on telly during, like, midday movies. Yeah, it must be very cheap, obviously, to put it out.

Yeah. Even back then, but now it's the first time I've ever found a movie on YouTube. with ads. Oh. Usually someone's either pirated it and put it up. Or you can rent it from YouTube, but they were like, yeah, you can watch a couple ads in there. Oh, then, they're not ads from the TV that it was taped off. No, that'd be amazing.

Mmm, McCain's pizza. Yeah. Oh, McCain's, you've done it again. What does burrito mean? Do you remember that ad campaign where old El Paso had to do a campaign asking Vox Pop, asking a strands? What do you think burrito means? That's funny. Yeah.

I'm married I brothers. Oh, they're a hit band back of the 60s. That was one of the guys' answers. I think they were actors, but still. Do you remember when they were promoting lamb? Yeah. Oh, yeah. The roast lamb in particular, and then they're like, nah, like they're giving up a date with Tom Cruise.

Oh, no, I don't remember. They're like, oh, you've just wanted to date with Tom Cruise. Nah, mom's got lamb roast on. Oh, yes, no, I do remember. Yeah. No, that's the best. So they chose the lamb over Tom Cruise. They chose a roast lamb.

Tom Cruise is sitting there going, what the fuck? I don't even reckon he was consulted or paid. No way. He knew nothing about. And Tom Cruise, let me ask you this. What does burrito mean to you? So we're talking about the real great escape. So the movie is obviously based on this real event.

They got a bunch of it right. Also, a lot of it's been Hollywood-fired, which I'll sort of reference a couple of times. But this topic, as in the actual escape, was been suggested by a bunch of people. Thank you to Nick Slater from Cambridge. Adam Dabasheir from Quebec, Canada. Robin Leibundgut, pardon me, from Lassain in Switzerland,

Tim Randall from Brisbane and Queensland, and Jonathan Guppy from Bristol in the UK. Gapwhee, so good. Did it? Very forgetful. It's got like a 10 second memory. Gupy, I didn't get it. I was like, Tim Randall? Yeah, so thanks again to the people that voted for this topic.

Now, our story takes place at Starlag Luft 3, a German prisoner of war camp run by the Luftwaffe. That's the German Air Force during the Second World War, where they held captured Western Allied Air Force personnel. At the time, the German military followed a practice where by each branch of the military was responsible for the POWs of equivalent branches. So Air Force looked after Air Force. Ah, that's interesting. Yeah, that's interesting. Yeah, I guess maybe you know more about them. you can relate more to them.

Yeah. No other armies have done this, though. Like as in no other countries, during wartime, have taken on only their specific regiment or whatever it is. Yeah, that's so weird. These are the only people that have ever done this. Is that you telling us a fact?

I'm assuming. Okay. I don't know. I'm not. Yeah, it's super interesting. I hadn't heard it before this either. But I'm not as big of a fan of war as Davis. Oh, yeah.

Yeah, I'm a man of my mid-60s. All I watch is the history show. The camp was established in March 1942 near the town of Sagan, Loisalicia, in what was then Nazi Germany, but it's now part of Poland. It's 160 kilometres 100 miles southeast of Berlin. And the site was selected because its sandy soil

made it difficult for POWs to escape by tunneling. Oh, I was going to say that might make it easy to dig, but harder for the tunnels to stay up. Yeah, that's right. They collapsed pretty instantly. Right. The BBC writes, Starlag Luft 3 was the Germans' attempt at an escape-proof camp. Specifically for Air Force officers from the UK, Canada, Australia, Poland and other allied countries,

it was built and run by the Luftwaffe as a secure place to hold people they believed were escape risks. What they had not done, however, was considered the ramifications of trapping so many escape experts all in one place. It's so funny. They're putting their own rag tank team. They really have. They're forced to rag tank, too. is one of them a gymnast? Yeah, every room on the camp

had to have at least one gymnast. You've got to split up the gymnasts. Or contortionists. Or they had one of them as well. Yeah. One of each. Yeah. We need to win this ice hockey tournament.

Let's get all the best ice hockey players and we'll put them alone together in their own team. But losers. Exactly. We'll segregate them from everyone else. Surely they won't be able to do the thing we're trying to stop them doing. Yeah. The camp was built in the middle of a pine forest.

with clearing all the way around and was surrounded by several layers of fencing and guard towers. And because of the dirt and because of how many towers and fences they're like, no one could ever get out of here. Yes, the hubris is what does you. Yeah. It's almost like, yeah, you're taunting them. The unsinkable ship. Yeah.

Exactly. That's it feels like, wasn't it? We don't even need guards. Yeah, whatever. The guards can do like a, I don't know, maybe like a 10 to 4 kind of shift and then. You know, show their faces. guys could probably just, the prisoners can just look out to themselves after that, I reckon. Yeah, no one's ever escaped at night.

That's fine. Should we go into the barracks and check? Nah, it's fine. I can't hear anything, so I'm assuming everything's fine. What are they, quiet diggers? The camp itself was divided into sections. The North compound held British airmen, that is people of the British Air Force who actually came from across the world. So there's a bunch of Australian, Polish, New Zealand.

I'll go through the nationalities later, but a lot of them, served or were seconded by the British Air Force. So that's why they're all locked up together. So there was Aussies in on this? Yeah. Did not know that. Yeah, a bunch of Aussies. Yeah, they didn't make the movie.

I thought there was an Aussie character. Was there? Yeah, there's someone who does a really bad accent. Yeah, I remember that, yeah. Oh. An offensively bad accent. It wasn't Steve McQueen himself, was it? Yeah, why not?

He said, too, right, Cobb. I'm going to jump on this moment. No, right, cobobah. Ereau, I'm off. Um, are we going to talk about the ball bouncing? Oh, of the iconic. That's obviously so in the freezer. Yeah.

Yeah, it's great. I don't, I didn't come across whether that actually happens in real life. Oh, okay. So, yeah. I thought you said he did a lot of research. Yeah. Well, I, I thought it went scene by scene. Which I think that makes me think it probably didn't happen.

Yeah. actually happened real life. Did they really lock him up with a baseball mitt? I think you're fine. That style of ball was not actually invented until 1953. So that's where our story takes place in the North compound. The South compound was for American airmen. Each compound consisted of 15 single-story huts.

There were 3 by 3.7 meters and slept 15 men in five triple deck bunks. Hmm. In a three by three room, did you say? Yeah, three by three point seven room. So like pretty standard sort of bedroom size

but they had 15 men in there. Yeah. That's right. It would stink. Backpacked dorms like that. Blokes. Blokes. Just in general, stink.

Yeah, probably sings like Lynx Africa. It's like an old spot. Yeah. On Friday night. It's a special. How are you going on? Friday night. Oh, bring up the old spot.

Force. If you're hoping to maybe bring a lady home. Then, yeah, they'd absolutely get the old spice on. Thank you. Put a tie on the knob. 14 men have to stand outside. Hurry up. Where did you meet a woman?

We're in prison. Eventually, the camp grew to approximately 24 hectares or 60 acres in size and housed about 2.5,000 R.A.F. Officers, about 7.5,000 U.S. Army Air Force officers and 900 officers from other allies. Air Forces for a total of nearly 11,000 inmates. So it's huge. Wow.

Wow. A lot of escape artists. A lot. Yeah, it's like they're having like an expo. You know, like an industry convention. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's a conference. They've all set up stalls.

What like got them to that, what gives them that clarification of an escape artist? You know what? Did they get him in a headlock once and he's like pulled out of it? Oh my God. You're going to be here. Get out of this. This guy's magic. Oh my God.

He did it. Slippery. He's just oiled up his head. At what point when you get 11,000 escape guys together, at what point do they just sort of start standing on each other's shoulders? Climb over the fence. God, we can't stop 11,000 of them. According to Wicke now,

the prison camp had a number of design features that made escape extremely difficult. The digging of escape tunnels in particular is made difficult by several factors. The barracks housing the prisoners were raised 60 centimetres or 24 inches off the ground to make it easier for guards to detect tunneling. So they were kind of on stilts.

There's a gap between the floor and the ground, so you can't just start digging under your bed. Right. You can't, let alone three holes. That would be insane. No, that would be crazy. No one would ever do that. Wait, are they fucking their beds?

Yes. And 14 men are outside waiting. Come on your darling there? How'd you pick up? Well, just, you know, got some scissors. imagination. A bit of imagination. I like to think that there's 15 men out the front and someone forgot to take the sock off.

They're all waiting for no one. One, two, three, no. Oh, for fuck sake. We were not only for two hours. I was thinking, Jesus, taking a walk. It's just done a quiet. It's showing off at this point. Jesus.

Two hours. Now, one, then. Nobody wants that. It's not fun for anyone. Certainly not the pillow. Yeah. The camp had been constructed on land that had a very sandy subsoil. The surface soil was dark grey, so it would be easily detected if anyone,

dumped the brighter yellow sand fan underneath above the ground. The loose collapsible sand meant destructural integrity in a tunnel would be very poor, like we're saying. And a third defence against tunneling was the placement of seismograph microphones around the perimeter of the camp, which were expected to detect any signs of digging. Oh, wow. So this is what they've marked up the ground. So they've really thought about digging. Yeah.

I wonder what if they've thought about other ways of getting out. Hmm. That'd be so they just walk out the front place. Yeah. There's no fences. I, okay. You know what we should have bought? Locks.

Yeah. Ah, shit. I've put the whole budget on these microphones. They're really good though. Top of the line. Oh, they're great stuff. The guy at Bunnings, wouldn't stop going on about them. Bunnings is where you get your mics, is it?

Absolutely. Ground mics. Yeah, sorry. Yeah, come on. Come on, mate. You've been at this game 10 years. You should know your mics. We've actually marked the ground up in here today.

Let's say, listen. Was that Evan trying to dig out of the studio next to us? Oh, no. I was trying to dig in Evan, you get back in here Push a little daisies Some makeup I feel like that's what the ground would sing

That's what you did Oh my god The ground's singing to me The ground's going Ah, worms Get him out There's worms under my skin It's so gross

I'm trying to think of a single Velvet Underground song I couldn't think of a song I don't know if you know But I get plenty of roots Oh shit That's good The ground gets roots, which in Australia means sex.

I've also soiled myself. Oh, God. He's on fire over here. That's incredible stuff. It's nice to have an actual comedian on the show once. Sounds like a wild. Some of his material is a little dirty. Thank you so much.

Here he is. That sounds like you would, it would be very interesting putting the tie on the knob and spending some time with you in the bedroom. Roots, soiling yourself. Well, that's a bit of everything. That's it, actually. Oh, they're just the two. They're the big two things. That's what the whole 30 seconds is filled with.

In that order. So despite all of these precautions, there had been a few previous escape attempts, even at Starlag Luft 3. The most famous of which is known as the wooden horse escape. This escape involved flight lieutenant Eric Williams, who was a pilot whose sterling bomber was shot down over Germany. Lieutenant Williams and a few others created a vaulting horse,

kind of like a crude gymnastic pommel horse. Okay, gymnast. There we go. Over the top. Yep. They forgot. There was a bad idea to construct a trampoline on one side of the fence and then a trampoline on the other side of the fence.

Next to a foam pit. I was assuming it was going to be like a reverse Trojan. It is kind of Trojan-like. So what it is is like it's made with wooden red cross crates. That's how they made this vaulting horse. And every day this folding horse that went all the way to the ground. See, there's no, these days you see a pommel horse at the gym or whatever. You know, you can see in between the legs of it, but this thing, it's like a solid piece of wood.

And it was carried out of the recreation hut by four fellow prisoners, while one or two escapeers clung on inside. The vaulting horse was set down in the same spot near the perimeter fence every day. And whilst men jumped over it and made a bunch of noise, the two men hidden inside began excavating their tunnel using bowls as shovels and metal rods to poke through the surface of the ground to create air holes. Great. Wow. It sounds like a nightmare. Where's the, where's the dirt going? Yeah.

Another ingenious thing is at the end of each day, a wooden board was placed over the tunnel entrance and covered with the surface soil, and the soil that dug out was placed inside the horse, and then they'd carry that. So we would have weighed a ton because there's two adult men in there with a day load of soil. And then they'd carry that out, empty it off in the next day. Where do they empty it off? Throughout, this according to Royal Air Force Association.

The excavated dirt was a sandy, yes. yellow color and contrasted with the brown topsoil. So it was hidden in many ingenious places, including inside prisoners' trousers. That doesn't feel like a long-term solution. Well, these men would then walk around the compound, allowing the dirt to slowly trickle down their trouser legs and onto the ground. Shawshank's Redemptionment. Yes. They were usually followed by other prisoners, nonchalantly treading the sand into the surrounding dirt to mask the trail. Great. This sounds like an all right prison. We've got a lot of freedom in there.

You think, oh, Nazi prison, that doesn't sound like a lot of fun. Yeah. Look at them. They're not really limiting up to the name Nazis. Are they?

These air Nazis are pretty soft, are they? It sounds pretty woke prison. These guys have got recreational equipment? Yeah, come on. Are you guys feeling okay mentally? Do you just want to get the horse out and maybe play on it?

Have you planned a horse? Sometimes the horse. They love it. They love the horse. If you're a guard, you'd be like, these grown men are losing them. Every day they're like going, yay! Oh, trying to make as much noise as they can as they jump over the horse. I love to cover the noise.

Of someone making noise is, yay! Good one! Everyone, let's sing along. You're not really selling it. I reckon they would have been better actors than that. Yeah, they were great actors. Surely they sang songs. That would make, that would be the most, like, non-weirdest thing.

If they're all the scene like Walt Sing Matilda or something. Yeah. Or push them little days and make calm. Probably. All together. Obviously they're singing wean. Ween are very sing-alongables. Everybody now.

One little bit of make a camera. Everybody now. Do you know it's weird as my brain went to wiggles. Like they just. At a Nazi camp going, everybody clap. Everybody sing. La la la la la. And the Nazi's like, these Englishmen are losing them for a fucking line.

No, they're joining rock by your bear. Why are you doing? They're now asleep. Shh, sh, sh, sh. I guarantee you, they're going home singing. That's what I heard of them. These guys are. so weird they're going home that night going

shh, shh, shh, shh shh. Big red car, sugar, chugget, chugger. D-O-R-O-D-H-Y. So for three months, flight lieutenant Eric along with lieutenant, or lieutenant, as they would say, Michael Codner, Williams,

and flight lieutenant Oliver Philpott took it in terms to tunnel over 30 meters or 100 feet long enough to get out of the prison. Wow. That's so insane. It's so far. And they're digging with bowls. But you also said that this is sand. Yeah. So it's, it's not meant to be able,

they're not meant to be able to dig through it. So how did they say, because if you, if you dig down meters quite deep, you get underneath the sand, but it's like meters worth. And then they've got, and they're building a frame. Like I'm picturing the movie, they've got like a little rail and a frame, or is that all Hollywood nonsense? No, that's not Hollywood nonsense. That's true. But for this one, I don't believe that they had anything enforcing the tunnel, anything holding up the roof. So it was a little. bit dodgy, like it could collapse on them, basically at any time. But let's find out what happened. On the evening of October 29, 1943, Codner, Williams and Philpott made their escape.

Williams and Coddna were able to reach the port of Stettin, where they stowed away on a Danish ship and eventually returned to Britain. Philpott posing as a Norwegian... What? I thought this is going to be a big build-up. This is a previous attempt. Yeah, this is... This is the wooden horse. Right. I'm like, what the heck? They did it? Just like that? Is that the end of the episode?

The end credits. No, the other guy Philip Popp posing as a Norwegian margarine manufacturer was able to. I love the, that's a great backstory. Well, I make margarine. Yeah. I wouldn't question that. It's so insane. Okay.

Unfortunately, he talks to the one Nazi's like a big margarine expert. He's like, oh, I've got high cholesterol. That's really helped me. Yeah. Meta Leuette, who do you work for? Yeah. Name three other brands. Yeah.

He can't. He was able to board a train to Dan Z. now Gerdansk and from their stowed away and a Swedish ship that headed for Stockholm from where he was repatriated to Britain so all three men inside that wooden horse got home Wow

I flew from Darwin today to Melbourne. Not one person on that plane knows my occupation I didn't need a backstory I didn't need to go I'm from Norwegian I'm Norwegian and I sell butter everyone everyone yeah

yeah that's all you're saying the more sauce you sound yeah oh no to me you saw Marjorie Yeah, why don't you just shut up? It's sit at the... Sit on the pub. You really won't believe it's not butter, I swear.

Let me just... I've got some samples here. Yeah, they like trying to give you butt into the bread roll. You're like going, have you got any margarine? I'm actually a margarine guy. I reckon he's whack this in to have a little bit more of a story. Yeah, sounds more interesting. Parting it out of it.

I make margarine. I love... I escape from a Nazi jail isn't enough of a story. Yeah. That's true. So, the escape-proof prison was, in fact, not escape-proof. Wow. Great.

But not everyone wanted to escape. You see, as Matt's kind of already guessed, life of the prison wasn't too bad, especially when compared to other prisons run by the Nazis. Curried sausages. They're pretty good. Yeah. And chips. Some good cuisine.

Yeah. I don't know if you'd want it every day. You get sick of it. Sorry, Nazis. Do you mind if we mix up the menu a little bit? I should not happy with the sausage? Are you not happy with the sausage You're not happy with the sausage

The greatest sentence you've ever said In a German accent And And my wiener not bringing happiness I don't know what German video I do know what German videos You are It's mostly the Swedish chef

What if it was a vegan sausage. Vagat. We went to Berlin and Matt got a vegan sausage and the lady was so angry when she handed it out. Vagun! Vagant! We have a Vagunt! You're selling them!

It's so funny. I was offensive to them to order them, I think. It's on your menu. She's swearing at you. Yeah. Yeah. That does not mean vegan. Why did you get this?

Oh, you know, went in Berlin. You got to get a Vagun. You get a Vagun. Yeah, but yeah. I mean, Berlin, very arty city, you know, very arty. And my vina not to make you happy. Isn't like all their breakfast foods like just meat? Yeah.

Mm, yeah, so breakfast,ina, and for lunch, we have a... Lach wina. A lunch, vina. And for dinner today, uh, dinner, uh, dinner. enjoy Nazis in a presser to say enjoy

You've got like an apron on Please Enjoy It would make me very sad If you're not happy with my vina Stop You don't want to my vina He keeps making eye contact with me

While he's saying it I don't even I didn't even I didn't even realize I think that makes it worse. Just naturally. I didn't even realize. I just did that creepily.

What happens? Sorry, and would you like some of my vener? I'd love some more, thank you. Is there seconds? And yes, the sauerkraut on the sword. Oh, the sword? This is even Matt tried to escape the prison. He's like, all right, I'm a sausage salesman.

That's what about the story. And he gives away when he, you give it a way. way by actually saying, on the side. Say, I don't know, hang on, this guy's secretly Australian. Oh, no. No. Oh, no. Oh, no.

Oh, no. I can't do my own accent anymore. Sorry, that's sorry at the prison conditions because the Soviets never signed the Geneva convention that laid out how prisoners should be treated. So they were often kept in appalling conditions in Nazi prisons. The Allied prisoners at Starlight Lerlark Ler 3 were treated with much more decency and a lot of people speculate it's because they've signed the Genev Convention, but they're also hoping that that means German prisoners on the other side

are going to be treated a bit better. Right, right. But the Soviets in Germany, they're also, they're treating each other terribly. Obviously, it was still a prison and no one wanted to be locked up, and food was at times scarce. So it's not sausages for everyone every day. Well, they didn't have a lot of money. That's why the war was happening as well, like the Germans. Oh, yeah, and they were like, we're not going to spend it on these.

Yeah, of course. They're not going to spend it on other people from other people. The people who they're fighting in the war. Yeah. So I think there even was like conditions for how much food, different classes of citizen were getting. And the POWs on this side of the war were like a low industrial worker or something. And I even read the calorie count.

It's like not even quite enough to sustain. Oh, shit. You haven't finished your vina. You need your energy for the pommel horse tomorrow. You know you boys love you, poor horse. You, you, actually, this is, this is quite a big point, is that they're not getting enough calories to live, like just a normal every day. They're lifting hundreds of kilos. They must be ripped.

That wouldn't be an ounce of fat on them. Well, they'd be, they'd be losing weight. Rapidly. Yeah. And they'd be malnourish. And I think a lot of the time they were, they were kept going by Red Cross packages. Right. That was sent to the prison, and they had a system where.

They send them blood. Yeah. How'd it go in this? Oh, you didn't Dave mention they're vampires. Yeah, calorie dense blood. But they had a system where if you got sent something, you pulled it for everyone. Right. So it's kind of like, have you got enough for the whole class?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Put away the snacks. That's the system. Fair. We've all been to camp. Yeah. Come on. Put the chopper chops in the middle.

Come on. You say that to like a P-O-W comes back. Yeah, mate, we've all been to camp. Okay. I think we get it. Yeah. You went to a camp. Year six.

We went to Beachworth. Okay? We rode horses, we went for a bushwalk. It was great. Okay? We went to bra. We get it. You have to eat your Mars Bayer outside by yourself.

We get it. We get it. The menu's not up to scratch always. Okay. You know, sometimes it's, you know, sausage. Yeah. Sometimes it's a bit of unusual. Is that another kind of sausage?

Yeah. Yeah. So, Wiki breaks down life at the prison, which there was a lot of extracurricular stuff that they sort of distracted themselves with. They had a substantial library with schooling facilities available where many POWs studied for and took exams in subjects, such as languages, engineering or law. The exams were supplied by the Red Cross and supervised

by academics such as Master of King's College, who was a POW in Luft 3. So they've having to have like this very high up principle there. And he's like, I'll supervise the exams. The prisoners also build a theatre and put on high quality bi-weekly performances featuring all the current West End shows. That's so funny. So they got to practice acting before going out and having to pretend to be like Nazis, I guess. So when you're on the run, someone's like, yeah, my name is Macbeth. I'm a Scottish king. I was just lost in mind.

I was born by Caesarean, but just letting you know. Okay. That's a weird thing to say. Yeah. Yeah, so the prisoners use the camp amplifier to broadcast a news and music radio station named the station K-R-G-Y, short for Krigs defundger, which means POWs in German, and if you say that correctly, that is.

And also published two newspapers, The Circuit and the Crague Times, which were issued four times a week. You just can't stop white men doing podcasts. Exactly. And in any condition, someone has to listen to my voice. I've got somebody to say.

But it's great. They're enough for two newspapers four times a week. What are they reporting on? Yeah. I will say, Dane, now that you're one of us, you can't make that joke anymore. Welcome. Yeah. Boo.

Yeah, I do feel like I'm stepping into a world that I'm not ready for that, jokingly. Like, I want to still make jokes about it. I want my cake and eat it too. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But you're even doing a classic white man pot of, we're just telling stories.

Just telling yards. We're just hanging out. We're saying, hey, we're a couple mates. And we're funny. I mean, you two are, but. So I guess. I think the classic white fellow is to tell me how to live my life. Well, and that just, without knowing how to live your life.

Oh, that reminds me. Yeah, I've got a few. We'll do it off pole, but I do have some, I got some wisdom to drop on you later. Make your bed. Go to the gym. Yeah, it's mainly grind and stuff. Rise and grind. Speed A and three, right?

Then you've got three days a day. Three days every day. Yeah. Wow. Yeah. Every day. It's these weird people that think that they've got extra, like, knowledge, and you're going, nah, because you're all weird.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So Starling War III also had the best organized recreational program of any POW camp in Germany. What the hell? It sounds more like. It almost sounds like a boarding school. Yeah, there's a lot.

They're really making... They're very busy. They're making the most of it, trying to distract themselves. Each compound had athletic fields and volleyball courts. The prisoners participated in basketball, softball, boxing, touch football, volleyball, table tennis, and fencing, with leagues organized for most of these. They gave them swords.

Yeah. Brilliant. Yeah, well, you wait until he tells you about the pistol shooting range. And they're doing pole vaulting. They're two pole funny. They're doing a key cutting course. There's a lot happening. Who voted on softball and not baseball?

I wonder what's going on there. Maybe they only had those big balls. Softballs got those big chunky balls. Yeah, and the guards are saying, under arm only. Yeah, yeah. That's like there's a lot of rules. This isn't the Americans either. The British side, yeah.

No mention of cricket, though. Yeah, you did that play cricket. Remember rounders? Remember rounders? Yeah. Yeah, mini bat. Yeah. That's like only for primary school.

It's like a mix between cricket and baseball soccer. Yeah, I was pretty good at rounders and when I found it, I couldn't go professional. I was Dennis. You're good at rounders because the bat was small enough for your tiny hand. Yeah, because they look at a full bat. Yeah. It was awesome. What about British Bulldog?

Oh, yeah. We used to play that on on bitumen. Yeah. Which looking back is crazy. That's silly. Yeah. Yeah, same. We used to, literally, what is it?

Like, there's one kid on one side of a. field or an open area and then everyone lines up and you have to try and run through. Yeah. And it's like full. Let's have to tackle you. Yeah. Tackling to the ground. Did it?

And then they join you. I don't think anyone ever won because you just got smashed. You got smashed, but then they join you and then they run back and then the two of you now tackle. Yeah. And then there's four of you technically. Well, whatever. Yeah. It's.

That's wild. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I wasn't good at that one. You can run under their legs. I played touch British Bulldogs Don't touch me, don't touch me Please don't touch me

Barley I'm Bali Well that means everyone's going to want to touch you Very British Chihuahua You play Yeah There was another insane game That people played where you would get like a high school table

And then like the standard classroom When you bring it outside And then everyone on one side put their knuckles like in a fist facing up and then someone else would get a 20 cent coin and you just had a shot at smashing into the other person's knuckles. Oh. Right. And you would just go back and forth sort of like an air hockey table, but you would just end up

with the most cut open knuckles. Yeah. Cut open with dirty coins. Yeah. It was awesome. Right. Really good for people. Yeah.

Really good. We played wall ball. It was with a tiny little round rubber ball. And if you, if you kicked it into the wall, I think. you were allowed to pick it up and peg it at someone. That feels right. And if you picked up the book, like if you touched it with your hand. Wall ball.

Yeah. I've never heard of wall ball. If you picked it up like mid, mid, like if you touched it with your hand mid game, everyone was allowed to punch you in the arm. Oh, yeah. And so what people would do to get around the rule would just pick it up and then just peg it at the closest person so that they're running away from them. Right.

And then run off. It's like like tut, like. But, like, tipsies where there's a, like, a safe, safety. Yeah, that's the barley. I think the wall was the safe. Right. Yeah. So if you picked it up with your hand, threw it at someone and then go and touch the wall.

No one can punch you in the arm after that. Isn't it so funny that these games made complete sense to us at the time? It sounds like gibberish now. Exactly. It sounds so bullshit now, but at the time we're like, yes, okay, all of that sounds right. And then I'm also thinking of international listeners listening to us going, what the fuck are they talking about? I imagine these all these features.

feel very English to me for some reason. I mean, British Bulldog, obviously. Yeah. But someone about you kick a ball against the wall and you get it and you piff it. That feels like, I'm picturing like little Charlie Chaplin's, you know, like little, oh, squire. Like Dickensian sort of ball games. We didn't have a lot, but we still had fun with what we had.

A wall and a bowl. A wall. We had a ball? I'm just thinking the specific language we're using of, yeah, so if you caught the ball, you were like pivoted at someone. Right, right. You've got the boy, you can peg it at him. Okay. But like, your British bulldog isn't necessarily British.

That's a good point. In Australia, we just call a bulldog, we do that. Yeah, but we've got the Mexican wave. That's not from Mexico. Is that true? Nor do the Mexicans know that that's what we call it. Is that true? And apparently in Nutbush, America, they don't do that dance.

No, that's just us. The Chinese whispers, that nobody else calls it Chinese whispers. Really? No one. Especially not the Chinese Yeah, they call it telephone in America In America? Yeah

I think they do in the UK as well, maybe I'm pretty sure Chinese whispers has been phased out here as well But I don't play games anymore So I don't know What are the kids doing? Same with the burns Yeah

So it's You don't know In Australia we say there's weird things And then you go to that country And you're like, ha ha ha, it makes you a wave And they're like No

Is it? Oh, I did assume that that was a Mexican tradition. No. So, every Sunday. Why would they? I think where it comes from, I think there was some kind of sport that had Mexican people playing.

Right. Like, we were playing Mexico at the time. Maybe at an Olympics. And then the crowd did like a, like, went around. And then we just associated, oh, that's that time that we played Mexico. Oh. That's a Mexican wave. I think that's where that comes from.

That's wild. That is wild. I could be just adding to a new. Yeah. I like it. I'll Google it and we can talk about it later. Great. I just prefer that we've come up with our own.

Well, I'm going to check. If the story is not as fun as that, I won't tell them. You'll shut the laptop. Yeah. That's how we'll know. So where are we up to, Dave? So you're telling us all their recreational activities. Yeah, so they're doing a lot of activities.

They're singing. They're dancing. They're putting on shows. They've got newspapers, radios. They've got great sporting equipment. So a bunch of the people don't really want to escape. Because it's also extremely risky to escape. Because once you get out of the prison, it's not like your home.

Yeah, you're in the middle of Germany. You've got to try and figure out how to get home. But many felt it was their duty to try and escape for the war. So of the 1,200 men in this part of the prison, about 600 or half worked towards what is now known as the Great Escape. So a lot of people were in on this plan. Great. And the plan for this whole endeavor starts with one man, and his name is Roger Bushal, the mastermind of what would be known as one of the most audacious escape attempts in history. Great tea.

And he's like, yeah. I'm imagining a big bushy mustache, but I've loved that you're going to do. Yeah. He loved a cupper. He loved it. We loved it. A lot to cup. An English breakfast. Well, that English breakfast started as a South African breakfast in 1910. Oh. Apparently, it's known as the wave in North America and outside of North America known as Mexican wave. Oh, I lied then. And it... I'm waiting for the fun part because otherwise you're going to close the laptop.

Well, but it goes way older than I was thinking. No, it's not. It goes back to 1979. I thought they said 1879. But on, apparently, the Mexican national team in 1984 played in Monterey

and the wave got really big there and then it became when they traveled around they thought of that game and that's why it gets called them X-Owain. So you were right. So you were right. It was just in Montreux, not in Australia. Right.

There we go. Dane, I loved your version of the story better. I read the headlines and I make up my own. Dave loves Australia being in a story. Yeah, which they are in this one. Yeah. So Roger Bushel, the mastermind of this whole thing, was born in South Africa in 1910. He went to school in England at the age of 13 and according to the UK National Archives.

Initially, destined to join his father. in the mining industry, he applied to study engineering at university that was not keen on following in his father's footsteps. This was in no small part because he was claustrophobic, remarkable given the number of escapes he would go on making through tunnels as a prisoner of war. Wow. So it's an unlikely start. So he didn't want to be a miner because of claustrophobia, but he ends up mining for a living.

In a way smaller tunnels than they would ever mine. This could collapse. Yes, it's way less safe. It's structurally sound. What a way to get over your fears. You're like, oh, I guess I'm going to do this every day for years. It feels like I understand escaping some of these prisons, but this one I reckon you'd probably. You're like, you could get sent, you get out and then you get sent to a shit and one of the shit one.

Yeah, you're in the good one. And, you know, next weekend we get to put on the HMS Pinafore. I've been casting a lead roll. Yeah, so please. Because I was wondering when those three people escaped. I'm like, geez, they've left a, have they screwed over everyone they've left behind. but maybe everyone else is just like, we don't want to go.

Or is it too dangerous? You spread it around. Too many people know. The blood are a weak link. Yeah, usually it would be small groups that would actually go for the escape. Right. Threes, fours, that kind of stuff.

The bloody misses won't let me play softball at home. This is awesome. It's wrong. I'm semi-pro here. I know the food's not great here, but it's better than at home. The miss I can't cook a sausage for shit. So he was going to be a minor,

but then he was like, no, I'm a claustrophobic. So instead he'd studied. law at Cambridge and whilst working as a lawyer in the 1930s, he developed an interest in flying and in 1932 joined the Royal Air Force auxiliary and reserve volunteers. He was assigned to the 601 squadron known as the Millionaire's Squadron, as it had been established by a group of wealthy young aviators who got to fly and practice in the really cool planes on the weekend, because I would like sort of hire them out. Fun. And his dad's really, is he is wealthy. Do you want to,

Do you want to be a soldier in the war and fly plane and go and shoot? Yeah. How much do I get paid? No, no, no. It's a volunteer base. You've got a volunteer. Come on, mate. Well, yeah.

We'll give you exposure. It'll be great. This could be where your big break comes. And then they're like, yeah, we'll put you in the millionaire squadron. I'll be a millionaire. Oh, no. No, no, not like that. Sort of.

So the Pegasus Archive, which documents this time in military history, writes of his career as a lawyer, of which, she proved to be very successful. In 1931, Bushall defended a notorious London gangland boss on a charge of murder and succeeded in securing a not guilty verdict. Delighted with the conduct of his defence counsel, the man in question offered his hand to Bushall only to be told in no uncertain terms that although he was happy to do his duty and defend a blatant murderer, he would not shake his hand.

Oh, he's the Kardashian of his time. Yeah. So that Kardashian wouldn't shake someone's hand? He got O.J. off. Robert Kardashian. Right. Oh, Kim's dad. Sorry.

Gotcha. No, I'm with you now. Yeah, you're thinking of the wrong generation. When you said he got OJ off, I was also like, what? Oh, sorry. Oh, he watched the video as well. At the outbreak of war in 1939, he joined the Air Force full-time. Went pro and proved himself to be a worthy leader.

The Pegasusus Archive again describes him. Roger Bushel stood at 5 foot 10. and he was a heavily built individual. He possessed a charismatic personality and was warm and friendly by nature, but when the occasion called for it, his deep voice and piercing eyes could make him into an intimidating figure.

Who's that in my job? Are we, watch her. Friendly and warm and cutesy, but when you need to, oh, blown, no good dish, boys going. Are we going to find out that bushels wrote this? Because that's really positive so far. Bushels,

how do I say, heavy set, but like, striking. Handsome. Yeah, like an athlete. Yeah. Women loved him. Yeah. Really friendly bloke, everyone liked him.

But yeah, he could lead. Yeah. And his only weakness probably caring too much. Yeah. Probably striking eyes, though. It's funny you say leading because the next sentence for this description is, Bushall was a natural leader. And a bold organizational genius.

Okay. Again, Dave. Who are we thinking of? Who loves a spreadsheet? And he's a born leader. Brilliant. With a knack of making tough decisions in an instant, and so it is small wonder that when he went on to mastermind

the largest and most extravagant escape of prisoner of war ever attempted. So he was in the Air Force full-time and saw his first, and sadly last action of the war in 1940, when he was shot down whilst on patrol over the French coast, and was captured by the Germans and sent to Dulag Luft. Initially feared dead he wrote his family two weeks later, and the letter survives. It opens with,

my dear John, I don't know whether you have heard or not. Anyway, this will tell you that I am alive. And as you can see from the address, I am a prisoner of war. I was shot down as you know, but managed to get two of them first. He really talks himself up. Yeah, he does. And you know what? He didn't.

Exactly. He never even saw the bastards. They just shot him down. What the hell? Oh, God, I'm going down. I'm going to reckon they shot in. I reckon he ran out of fuel. He didn't check.

He landed in the prison. Ah, shit. I thought it was a runway. Damn it. I've got a bit distracted, sir. I've looked up who did the Australian voice in the movie. And it was James Coburn, who's like, Oh, yeah, very famous.

But how's this for a, I'm just looking through his filmography. He voiced loot and plunder in Captain Planet. No. Oh. Wow. Really? They have some incredible people on that show. That's why.

What an over, he's overqualified for the job, surely. Yeah. Academy Award nominee. Also, great villain name. Great villain. Great villain. Luke and plunder.

Is Henry J. Waternoose the third from Monsters, Inc? See another bad guy? Because he voiced him as well. Yes. That's the boss. Right.

James Coakhan could do it all, apart from Australian accent. That's part of convincing. Okay. Can you do it? Can you do an Australian accent? No. You're hired.

Do you reckon they all walked around whistling the tune? That's what it comes from. That's such a, that's another earworm. Yeah, it is, isn't it? That's very wiggly. It is. Can I just say that that's been in my head all week? Yeah.

Who, who came up with this? So is this, like one of those famous, um, tune people from movies. Yes, I actually did look up. Their name has escaped me now. The Great Escape. Just you're moving that microphone down and it just automatically going straight back up. It's really funny.

Yeah, it happens several times an episode. It's a real joy for me too. It's really hard too, deal with. I really love it. Yeah, Alma Bernstein, he also did the Ten Commandments, the Magnificent Seven, to Kill a mockingbird. The Great Escape, of course. Meatballs.

Wow. Cape Fear. Ghostbusters. Also, I love this one. Three amigos. I didn't know this, but the man with a golden arm. Oh. That's, so the golden gun was playing off that?

Was it? Maybe it is. Maybe that's, is that a joke name. Wow. Anyway, so he's, he, he's responsible for the soundtrack. The old true grit, the 1969 one? Oh, the original one. It really puts iron fist to shame, doesn't it?

Hmm. The old Twilight. from 1998. So we've gone off track here. Dave, do go on. So Roger Bushal in charge of the Great Escape. He was a POW from pretty early in the war.

Like I said, shot down in 1940. At that stage... Day one. Yeah. They don't know that there is years of the shit left. They don't know that. So I actually said that about the prison, though, like, it probably sounds like a more fun prison than it was.

Because the worst thing was, when you're in there, you don't know if ever you're going to get out. Yeah. Like, your team's going to win. Like, even if it was like, hey, you're going to get out in four years, you'd be like, count down to the four year mark. But you could be there for the rest of your life.

Yeah. And if the Nazis win, they don't really care anymore about treating you well to make sure the prisoner Nazis have been treated well. Yeah. So there was that. I think the sausage is going to get a lot worse. Yes. I think you might be one of the ingredients.

Do you reckon Adolv's people? It's people. Did he drop by it? I don't know. I don't think he would have been happy with what he saw. I don't think he would have been happy. What is all this happiness? What is he's going on here? I know.

Do you know what? If he's ever going to put his heart up and it's going to be appreciated by anyone, he would have this care. Yes. What do we think of my new landscape? I think I captured the pine trees quite magnificently if you'll see my shadow work. Mmm. The disqualification.

What do we think of this? What do we think? What do we think? Notting like, yeah. Okay, you can keep the pommel horse. Keep the pommel horse if you like my paintings. Do you like my paintings? No one's enjoying.

What I'm loving the most is how much you're having fun. It's fun to tear, talk in this action. I don't know. It's flopping around a lot But um And then you remember It's Hitler Hitler's who I'm being

Yeah Not a good guy Oh Oh this is a controversial take Real prick I captured that That's my My process

My background Um Is a bit of a prick Insecure Yeah I can't help It feel like You've done a Hitler

impression A lot before And it's not so much, but I, um, I, um, here's the man I, I find to be a despicable. Yeah. At any time I feel like you're going to say, my wife. Yeah, it's nice. Oh, um, and how do you say? My cousin.

Uh, yash, gosh, gosh. That's good. My niche. Was it his... Who was Eva Braun to Hitler apart from wife? It was like some sort of relative, wasn't she? I thought it was cousin, but it must be. He never had a lover earlier on that was family member.

I always thought she was. We are an hour in and Dave is doing a background on the story. That's right. We haven't started the greatest escape, yeah. But I've got to take... Roger Butchle, he's in charge of everything. He was the P.O. W from early on because he shot down. And it became obvious early on that he wanted to do one thing and one thing only, and that is escape.

Cool. Great. Lieutenant Commander James Buckley of the Fleet Air Arm had established the Escape Committee at Dual Loggerloft, which is so great that they've got an organisational structure for these things. They vote on it. Yeah, seriously, I think they did stuff. There was like secretaries and stuff. They registered their club with the prison. They didn't even find the holes.

They just found the secretaries notes. All that. Because they booked out the gym every Monday after the... What are they doing in there? Microphones were picking up the ground. Really just walk in there and they say, all right guys, let's dig tonight. So following James Buckley, who's in charge of the escape committee,

he's first meeting with Roger Bushall, he quickly recognized this man's potential and appointed him as his deputy. Again from the National Archive, his first escape, this is Roger Bushall, occurred in June 1941. He made it to within a few hundred yards, few hundred metres of the Swiss border,

and freedom before being stopped by German guards. Wow. He was like literally crossing a checkpoint confidently because he speaks German. He stopped the games up. He later was so annoyed he realized that if he'd crossed 200 metres either side at another checkpoint, he would have just walked right through. No one was even there. So he was that close to getting out.

Once recaptured, he was soon sent to Offlag 6B, only to escape from there with fellow officer, love this name, a Czech pilot named Jaroslav Zafuk. Oh, yes. We love Zafuk. Big fan. They just, they can escape like at will by the sound of it. Yeah.

Because each time they're going to re-plan it. I'm assuming it. New prison, new place. You got to work out all how it works. A recon. A scheme, yeah. Well, either commute's pretty good to you. You know, it's not like some bank robbers.

They've got to get up in the morning, schlep into the bloody. Yeah. On the train. Oh, you what? Yeah. It's also funny that they're, no, well, They escaped, so take them back to that inescapable prison. Yeah.

Yeah. Are you still believing this? They couldn't do it twice. Yeah. No, no, no, no, don't worry. We put a lock on that one now. First, it was basically an accident in that tunnel. I filled in that hole.

Yeah, all right. It's all good. Yeah. They got lucky this one time. You're right, I think I'd merged his earlier love interest, Jelly or Geli Rubol, this Hitler. That was his niece and an earlier love interests. She died and that's when Eva Braun got on the scene. I've somehow my head cannon

merged the two together. That's her efficiency. Yeah. So he's recaptured him and Jaroslav Zafuk four months later in October that same year escaped from the new prison. They made the way to Prague where they were hidden for nearly eight months before their location was betrayed. Oh, boo. And Bushel was initially questioned by the Gestapa, the German secret police, and warned that if he attempted to escape again, he would be executed. From there, he was sent to the inescapable prison that we all know and love, Starlag Luft 3. Starlog. Is this, you know, the Hogan's Heroes, was that?

Starlight 13, yeah. And what's this one called? Starlog, I looked it up, that means it translates basically as Main Camp. Right. As opposed to Mine Camp. Exactly. I mean, why am I even explaining German to you? And what is Mind?

camp for me? Does that mean my camp? Mine Kampf is Hitler's book. Yes. But what does it mean? It means it means Hitler's book. It means my struggle, I think. Oh, oh, man. Fuck it now.

Man, I couldn't hate this guy anymore. My struggle. What a fucking loser. Oh, my God. I love what tipped you over the edge of hating Hitler is that he wrote his book title. Oh, my struggle. Oh, my struggle. Oh, I'm sorry.

Adolf. Dude, it's going to blow your mind some of the things that he did in the wall. Oh, no, look, honestly, already had him pegged as a real piece of shit. But, like, some of the stuff's a bit made up, you know, like, I think, is that, like, supposedly he was a scat fan and stuff like this. I don't know if that's all true. They said he was vegetarian, which was always, like, all these sort of things to make him seem like a loser. I don't know which ones are true or which are. But the fact, that is true.

He wrote a book called My Struggle. Yeah. That's so... What a fucking loser. Do you know, when you said there's some things that Hitler did, that's... Well, that they say that he did, that it's made up. My heart skipped a big. Yeah, yeah.

Yeah. Oh, my God. And I'll like, please don't say that, Matt. What's all these things on? I'll try and need you to believe all sorts of things. My God. No, I met the allies, the propaganda. And I don't know if it's, you know, I had one ball, vegetarian,

all these sort of things were meant to make him seem, maybe they're true, I don't know, but. Yeah. But it's funny to think that if that was a made-up thing, like, he doesn't even eat meat. This guy, come on, sign up to the war ever, this guy. Might struggle with eating meat. It does sound like my... I don't like it.

Sounds like my dad trying to bag him out. Like, because that's that my dad, he would just, he wouldn't go, he's an idiot. He goes, he doesn't eat me. Yeah. Can you believe how soft this guy is? Soft as butter, mate. Oh my God. Hey, do you want something real, I try margarine.

I got some samples in the car. He's as soft as the soy eats. So, he's been threatened. You got one more shot. If you escape again, we'll execute you. But Roger Bushal was not ready to give up, despite being sent to the escape-proof prison. Isn't that interesting? One thing you can say about the Nazis, reasonable.

They give you a chance. It's crazy. That's right. What a weird in different parts of their operation. Yeah. In this place, they're letting you play games. They're letting you escape multiple times. Yeah.

I love that they're playing the three strike rule, but you can't play baseball. Stop, Paul. You might get hurt. We don't have helmets. Jeez. God, if you get hurt under our watch, that'll look bad for us. I'll lose sleep. I'll worry about you, boys.

Yeah, there's something about these guys that they see is more worthy than others. Weird. Hmm. Mm. I think a big part of it was they're worried about their own men on the other side, not being treated badly. Because of his reputation for escapes, Roger Bushel was immediately brought on board the camp's escape committee. They had their own committee. Headed by Lieutenant Commander James Buckley, who Bushel knew from his time in Doolagl Luft, one of the other prisons.

After being transferred to another prison, James Buckley handed up. over the position of head of the escape committee to Roger Bushal and also handed over his code name Big X. I don't like it. I couldn't tell Jess would love or hate for it. Big X. That sucks. Big X.

It's sort of like we talk about movie titles back in the day and we're like, you could have chosen anything and you went for that long randomly. Like, Big X could have been an eagle. And he also inherited it. Like, it's someone else's Big X. He could be something else. Big Y. It's confusing.

It's also, it's not like the size and X really without. anything else, you need perspective. Yeah. Like if you're big X, you'd need to have a normal size letter next to it. Yeah. Otherwise, it's just like an X. Yeah. Is it that big? How do we know?

No, I don't like it. I don't like it. But okay, big X it is. Whatever. And if DMX has taught me anything, X gone give it to you. He chose that because he had a theme song in mind. I've got it. I've got my theme song.

Got it again. Play it again. Play it again. Is that the Chihuahua version? It's cool. X. Give it to you. So after sussing out the camp and its potential weaknesses, Big X announced his

audacious plan, they weren't going to build one tunnel or even two tunnels. They would build three at once, codenamed, as Dan said, Tom, Dick and Harry. Brilliant. The ingenious part of the plan being that if the Germans discovered one massive tunnel, they'd unlikely consider that two more were also being dug at the same time. So they'd think they'd dealt with a problem and sort of start snoozing a bit. Yeah, they'd relax a little bit. That's the end of that problem.

Yeah. But really, they're digging two more. And the, here's, because I was a kid when I watched this, and I didn't know the phrase every Tom Dick and Harry. Yep. That phrase was already a thing, yeah? And then they named the tunnels because of the phrase, or did the phrase come because of the tunnels? I think the tunnel. I think the phrase is already around. Yeah. And so. That would be my instinct.

Yeah. Yeah, I think so. And a big part of it was they never wanted to refer to them as the tunnel. Bushrell actually banned everyone from even saying the word tunnel in case the guards overheard it. So if you were talking about Tom, Dick and Harry, they're pretty common British names. So it might sound like you're just talking about a dude that you know. Yeah. Or one of the guys here.

But you know, you know the phrase every Tom, Dick and Harry. Yeah. Sort of sounds like everything. That sort of does fit in line with the tunnel. I don't know. It just, it fits it. Now that I'm saying it out loud, I assumed what you're saying is true, but now that I've said it out loud, I'm like, oh, maybe it's the other way around.

I don't know. That it came from the, I'm just doing a quick Google here. This is from the Google AI, which I trust with my life. Yep. Every Tom Diggins Harry means any person, blah, blah, blah. The phrase is an idiom that's been used in English for centuries. Right. Variations even dating back to Shakespeare.

Right. Oh, that's cool. I love that Shakespeare was writing characters called Macbeth and also Tom Dick and Harry. Yeah, there you go. So it was a phrase around. I guess there is a reason that's why they picked Tom Dick and Harry. Yeah. So it was pretty crazy to build three tunnels at once,

but possibly even more audacious was Bushel or Big X his plan to get out so many people in one escape. Usually it would be small groups like we heard of before, three or four. Yeah. 20 would be seen as heaps. That's a massive escape. Huge. Initially, he aimed high and thought of getting the whole camp out in one go. 11,000?

Oh, no. So on his side, that'd be great. No, and his compound there was 1,200 at the time. But, yeah, that's still a lot. 11,000. We're going to escape everyone over seven weeks. They won't even notice that the camp slowly getting away. And the German's like, I'm even getting the guards out.

Didn't everyone? Didn't people used to work here? Like, the commandant's like, what the hell? Things are running so smooth. Luckily. I haven't had any issues there for all. Hang on. Hang on.

A real excess of food. It's almost like there's. less people here now. No one's brought me in my latte this morning. Hang on a second. That guy came in for thirds. He then, so you thought, let's get everyone, he then scaled it back slightly, but still the audacious aim was to get out 200 men in one go.

Wow. So, like, it's still huge. That's a big jump from the three or four you were saying. Three or four was like pretty common. 20, which someone had attempted before was seen is like, holy shit. And he's done that times 10. That's like a do-go on live show. All trying to sneak out.

Hey, don't want, we're watching you. Which is easy because Dave and I are watching one audience member, and Jess is having a break. She's having a race, we do it in shifts. So trying to get 200 out, all of whom would be wearing civilian clothes and possessing a complete range of forged papers and escape equipment to get them from well behind enemy lines back to Allied territory. And the other problem, like normally you lose a few and it might be a little while before they're noticed. But you are going to notice quickly when so many have gone. When you wake up and there's 200 people missing. So the search will happen a lot quicker.

It starts immediately, yeah. You can't just fake roll call with two guys not being there. Yeah, you're almost sure that some of them aren't going to make it, you'd think. But maybe the more that are out there, the better chance some of them will. Yeah, that's right. I think he's doing a numbers game. Let's try and get as many home as possible. Hello, Qantas.

Can I have 200 flights to Engel? I'd like to pay in points. As discussed on the escape from Colditz Castle episode that I did many years ago about POWs, any escapers who made it home or safely to Allied territory was considered as scoring a home run. That's what they marked it as. Probably a softball home run. Yeah. Three strikes, home runs.

Yeah, they really want baseball. They really want baseball to be out of the coronial name. So Big X was hoping for 200 plus home runs in one night, which would be wild. Yeah. A real victory for the Allies. It took an unbelievable amount of planning and cooperation from the camp. Like I said earlier, it's estimated that half the camp are about 600 people were part of the plan or contributed in some way, and they've all got to shut the hell up about it.

Many were bored and didn't think it would actually go anywhere, but others committed everything to getting out. And it became like their obsession. Again, from the Pegasus' archives, from the outset, security had been a priority, and as such, no prisoner ever asked questions or drew attention to any happenings in the camp, which might be regarded as odd. As Roger Bushel himself put it to a group of new arrivals, if you see me walking around with a tree trunk sticking out of my ass,

don't ask any questions, because it'll be for a damned good reason. That's fun. They're building the biggest pommel horse ever. I like to think that that's unrelated. I think that that was a sex thing. Yeah. This is all the cover for the fact he likes to flood trees.

Guys, shut up, it all makes sense. Now, am I. that branch. I'm being my girl for that branch. Years later, people were like, hang on, he never, the tree never really came into it. Yeah, years later. Hang on, see.

You can't. Huh. Oh, yeah. Ah. Anyway, where'd he end up? Well, how'd he move to the bush? Yeah, that's a tree change. Like, I think that they just came into the barracks one day and he was just with a branch,

just whacking it into his butt. And then he's like, don't question. And also don't tell anyone. It's got to do with the escape. At that point, he hadn't even thought of escape. He's like, now I've got to get a plan together. Three tunnels. That sounds crazy.

I'll explain this. I'll throw the heat off me for a minute. His big X was an oak. A bit of fun. So let's meet this crack team. Now, there's literally dozens have gone. I could tell you about, all with full lives and backstories. There were men from the UK, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Norway, South Africa,

Czechoslovakia, Poland, Lithuania, France, Greece and Argentina, all involved. So there are many stories, but a few we can focus on are, for example, Henry Burland, 26-year-old Canadian Spitfire Pilot. Berlin was an experienced former miner. He became one of the leading... World former minors, though. Now adult. I'm really patting him here.

He was a boy, a little boy for quite a while. Not anymore, though. But then a transitional phase of teenagerhood and then... And now it was 26. Now he used to work in mining. He became one of the leading and most energetic of the 600 officers involved in the tunneling. He was regarded as, quote, the toughest tunler of them all. Wow.

In the escape plan, he was from a group of escapeers who were going to be known as the hard asses. Great. For their plan was to... They're the ones with the trees up there. You need a really hard ass. Their plan was to avoid public transport and travel on foot a considerable distance across the country. So they were just going to bush it. Yep.

Big time. They were going to bush it. Big time. Oh, yeah. That's a hard arse. We can also talk about James Kattanak, an Australian 22-year-old bomber pilot. Born in Melbourne, he reportedly became the youngest squadron leader bomber pilot in the Royal Australian Air Force at the age of just 20. In 1942, he and his crew were shot down over northern Russia.

He avoided ditching in the Arctic waters, saving the lives of his crew, but then they were taken prisoner by the Germans. Katenak was fluent in German and took trouble to learn conversational Norwegian from Scandinavian. prisoners in the camp and he teamed up with Norwegians Heldor Espelid, Nils Jorgon Fugzelang, and New Zealander Arnold George Christensen. You should have started with him. It was of Scandinavian descent. Their aim was to, if they escaped, was to get to Denmark. So they're one little teams.

There's all these little teams within the 200. Do you think about this when you're doing your daily word learning thing, whatever that is, what's it called again? Duolingo. Jewelingo. You're thinking one day, if you're not. I'm ever trapped behind French enemy lines. Yeah.

He's learning French for an app. Oh, dude, I've never thought of you as more of a man than when you just told it, your little word learning thing. I don't think I said it like that, do it? Yeah. Or whatever you call it. Is that what I said? Yes.

No, I just was a con-cum, I could come up with a name. You know, you're probably a vegetarian too. You're bloody soft. Yeah. Look at you. I looked it up. He apparently was a bit of a vegetarian, but the ball, having one ball was probably a myth, but they're not sure.

But the English did sing a song about how Hitler only had one ball. Yeah, it was more of a rhyme. Right. Yeah. More of a rap. It was actually... One of the first rap. English people actually invented rap.

Yeah. With the Hitler only had one ball. His knees weak. Arms were heavy. One ball. Sweaty. Oh my God. I can't help it feel like maybe, and this is rewriting history, but I think probably the Polish guys just dug the hole, and then the English and the Australians just took the credit.

I just jumped in. I reckon that's one up. And they were like, we planned this. We did the work. That feels, that feels properly accurate. Yeah. And then the Americans were like, well, in the movie, we did it. We, yeah.

And, yeah, we've got Steve McQueen playing this. Which brings me to Major Johnny Dodge. Also known as the artful dodger. Brilliant. How'd he come on with that? What's that thing? Nicknamed generator. Oh, that actually works pretty well.

Partly due to his large size, he did not help build the tunnels, too much of a unit. But instead, he helped create diversions such as choir singing to help disguise the noise of the digging. I knew it. I knew it. I knew it. Or he's just not in there. He's not in their digging. He is apparently small enough to get through the tiny tunnel. How convenient. Just too big to dig it. That's exactly what Dard said was going to happen.

No, I'm helping though. We're singing. No, no, no. It's team effort. Team effort. Yeah. Surely being big would help digging. I had to carry 200 kilos of dirt today. Yeah, well, you didn't have to sing for an hour. Yeah. I had to carry Ben and John, who were flat as a task. Oh, my God. You know, it's a good to sing good King Wencesless for an hour straight. Oh, my God.

Jesus. Those boys cannot harmonise. He's a little ways. Yeah, we've all had a rough one. No doubt about that. Say, Ben, see. How do you not know the lyrics to sex on fire? It was huge.

It was another one of the hottest 100 count down one year. So the movie The Great Escape shows a lot of Americans being involved in the escape. But in reality, they were involved in the initial digging. But after this, they were sent to their own part of the camp. So... Oh, that's... rough. So Johnny Dodge was the only American-born person involved in the actual escape on the night,

but he had become a British citizen in 1915. He was also a distant relative of Winston Churchill, his mother married one of Churchill's cousins. Right. We all claim someone famous, brother. Yeah. His mother married one of Churchill's cousins. Yeah. The more exposure you get, the more cousins you find.

I think, I don't know if that works for white fellows as well, but 100%. Every time I'm on TV, I've got a new cousin. now. Cousin, Dane, it's me. You're like, who the hell of you? You're going to a party tonight and it's said very specifically no plus ones for you. Yeah, yeah. And I think this is making sense now.

Don't bring your cousins. Someone's going to rock up and be like, yeah, I'm Dane's cousin. They're like, yeah, join the queue out here. It's 50. There's two lines, one with invites and the other ones, Dane's cousins. Yeah, accurate. If you want to sell beers, invite my cousins. Okay.

Isn't an open bar? If the bars open, the donut bar. You know what? You're right, actually. It's accurate. Yeah. Anyway, we're going to have fun. Cousin Matthew.

Tonight, we're all Danes cousins. A few more of these guys. Sergeant Per Bergseland, a 26-year-old Norwegian fighter pilot who before the war competed in orienteering placing second at the individual Norwegian championships. What a nerd. What a nerd. but navigating on foot through the forest, pretty good skill to possess when you're in escape.

All of a sudden he's cool. Yeah, no, finally. He's like, I love the PRU. Orienteering's like treasure hunt sort of, right? Sort of, yeah. With a compass and a map, yeah. That sounds like, well, that sounds cool, Dane. I don't know.

Do you think we have any skills that would be useful? Oh, wasn't there a podcast in there? Yeah, there was propaganda. They set up a theatre stage. Yeah, love that. Yeah. I think we'd thrive in the prison. I'm talking once we're out of the prison.

Oh, yeah, no, no, no. No, wonder there was people that wanted to stay. I'm staying in there doing the shows. Yeah, yeah. I'm like, you guys go, because that guy keeps getting all the lead roles. Yeah, you're trying to push him down the hole. No, no, no, you should escape, you should escape. Yeah, get out, yeah.

You're pretty fit. Well, I can see. No, I'm not. You got, well, you got leg strength. Yeah. And what will that do? Well, I'd think if, you know, there was like a log over a path, you could kick it out of the way. Mm-hmm.

Yeah. Stuff like that. And they carry you for the rest of the way. Yeah, someone would have to carry me. Just in case a logs ever over the road. We've got to put her on your back. She's deceptively heavy too, so it's really annoying. Then there's Romaldus Markanus, 36-year-old flight lieutenant from Lithuania,

who was player and coach for the Lithuanian national football team. Wow. One of their best players. Player and coach. It sounds like Ronald McDonald trying to have a, secret identity. Are you Ronald McDonald? No.

He sounded like Romuladus, my king. It's kind of sounds like Ronald McDonald in gladiator times. Yes. Enjoy my biggest macamus. Oh, fuck. Maximus, Macomis. Maximus is right there. It was from a film Macomus.

Then it made sense. Yeah. I said, enjoy my biggest. Maximus, you'd be like, okay. It had to be biggest macamus. Okay. Because it's a big Mac. Is that what you were going for?

Yeah, yeah. Then that's the only way the joke worked. But Maximus. Maximus, Macomis. Doesn't that work? Biggermis, Maximus. I think that's better, isn't it? No, I think it needed to be Macamus.

Macamus. Macamus. Okay, I will edit out anything that didn't. I don't want anyone ever think I doubt myself, so I edit out all of that. So as well as being a, professional football player Romulatus, Markinus, his fluent command of several languages, most importantly German, was seen as valuable. His extensive knowledge of Germany's military and transport positions led to his nickname, No It All.

Oh, that's not a nice, yeah, that's a longish one as well. Yeah, it's not a good nickname, just calling by his name. Yeah, he analyzed German news reports, but his most important contribution was his compilation of the German railway schedules, an essential part of the escape plan. All right, this is what would have happened today. Know it all, Noah, Ark, Arkie, Archimedes, Bath Boy, Scrub, Rubber. Rubber Ducky, Rubber Dubb, the W, George W. Bush, Bushboy, hairball, furball, kitten, kitten, kitten caboodle, the boo,

boo bear, fredester, twinkle toes. That's it, twinkle toes. That's killer. Stop me when you're ready. But then they go, hey, where'd you get the nickname from? Well, actually. It's pretty easy. Pretty straightforward, actually.

I 100% know that they went. His name's Rickart, Rickart, Ruk, fucking no at all. Yes. Yes. So according to the plan, no at all, okay, twinkle toes, Mark Hink has needed to be amongst the first 10 escapees. He was selected to lead a group of four prisoners posing his Lithuanian workers traveling back to Lithuania.

The group's prospects hinged on the hope that the Germans and Caled, on the way would not speak or understand Lithuanian as Markinkas was the only member fluent in the language. So he'd do all the talking and the other three would just be like, yeah, you're definitely Lithuanian and hoping that if they speak to someone who knows Lithuanian, they're like, shit. And that is a classic thing, right? Yeah. Rubik, one of us, maybe me, did a topic years ago, the Churchill's Ministry of Ungenerably World Warfare. Yes. You almost got some of those words right. Yeah. I did the report on that. one and that's why I know it so well, yeah.

But I watched the movie recently, and there is that classic scene where they're pretending to be, one of them speaks the language, and they called their bluff and said, no, I want to hear him answer. And it was like, they pretty much had to be like, all right, you got us. Yeah. Wow. That is, that's the nightmare, right? When you're like, please don't ask me anything specific.

Well, I'll just say they're mute. There's a moment in the Great Escape movie, which people debate whether this actually happened where Richard Attenborough has escaped. and they're speaking German as their papers are being inspected as they get on the bus and one of the guards says in English,

good luck, and he returns to him and says, thank you, and then goes, fuck, like I was just spoken English and there's on! And some people were like, did that actually happen? We don't know. What about in the A team

when, have you guys said the new A day with Liam Mason? Not new, but like, not the TV show. There's a scene like that where they're at an airport and one of their guys

and he's like a bit nuts this character, but he's a great pilot. And they're at a, they're trying. That's such a classic. Yeah, he's like the best flyer, but he's insane. Yeah. And they're at an airport and he's in some sort of disguise. And his passport says he's from somewhere in Africa, I think.

And the guy starts talking to him in a different language that he should absolutely know if he's from this country. And there's this moment where they're all like, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck. And then he starts speaking the language and you're like, oh, ha ha, this guy's cool. And crazy. Go ahead. Great fun. Great fun.

Great fun. Great fun. It's similar to the inglorious bastards when he does the three. Yes, yes. Yeah. Oh, that's great. That isn't it? I thought you're going to talk about Brad Pitt's Italian.

Arieverderci. Arieverderci. Purposefully bad, but it's very funny. So, remember, Mark Hinkas, he's Lithuanian. He's going to travel with three people that are going to pretend to be Lithuanian. One of those who didn't speak Lithuanian was Tim Wallen, 28-year-old British bomber pilot, a well-known character in the prison camp,

system for his skillful drawing, he used his artistic ability as head of forgery. He was also known for his enormous handlebar mustache, which had to be shaved off to the, to escape due to its unmistakable RAF style. So he looked like he was in the UK Air Force because he's mustache. He looked like he's out to say, hello, govna. Oh, govna? Yeah. Top of the morning.

But you have. Forgery is going to play well into this. Because I'm thinking back in the day, surely you could forge a plane ticket, Yeah, it's all handwritten, right? Yeah. Yeah, because they're forging. They're all leaving with documents. All of them have to have documents, which I'll go into, and it's like thousands of them.

Crazy. I'm going to keep referencing old episodes, but I did a report about Huey Lewis last year. And he backpacked around and he got his first flight out of America by just forging a plane ticket. Wow. In the 70s or the 60s. Is that Huey Lewis or is that the new? This is why I'm on top, baby. No, it's Huey Lewis.

That's a serious question. Two more of these guys, because they're all going to come up. Yens Muleer, Norwegian pilot, also only 26 years old. Muleer later constructed an air pump for ventilation of the tunnel. And finally, Bram van der Stok. My God. 29-year-old fighter pilot, and not just. Stanley Fadolet, the most decorated

aviator in Dutch history. Whoa. Whoa. Tinsel. Everything. It was crazy. He looks fantastic. It was honestly... It was a sensory overload, but it was beautiful. He couldn't see shit now. He was in the Dutch Air Force, and after the

Netherlands were defeated and occupied by the Nazis, he fled to Scotland as a stowaway on a ship, following a refresher course with the Royal Air Force's number 57 operational training unit, He was posted to its squadron in 1941, flying the submarine. Sorry, super... Flying the submarine.

Bloody hell. That's great. That takes a lot of talent. He gets to Scotland and he's like, in the Netherlands, we do this a little different. The submarine spitfire. God, that's so good. With which he went on to achieve six confirmed kills among Lefawfa aircraft. Does that make him an ace?

Yeah, qualifying him as a flyer. Him is a flying ace. Yeah, it's almost like if you just let Dave finish a fucking sentence. Sorry, Jess. Ace confirmed. Is that five? Five plus one. Five plus one.

Wow. That gets you ace. So he's an ace plus one. Yeah. What a guy. Is that right? Is it five for an ace? Five.

If you shoot down five enemy aircraft, you become a flying ace. Wow. And then what is it? If you get to 10 or I can't remember, or 20 and you're the ace of aces. Right. That's so funny. Which is very rare. Like serial killers who do that don't, they're like, we don't get a cool.

Where's their accolades? Yeah. I reckon in the in the in the serial killer community they're like he's an ace. He's the most decorated serial killer. Other sickos are like that's amazing. Yeah. Well done. Let's um do we breeze over like they ventilated the shaft. Oh yeah. How? Oh, I'm going to talk about that. Well they probably called in a H-FAC team and a yeah. I hope hopefully they're cooling and heating it as well. But airflow is important.

Yeah, of course. You probably want about 20 changes of air per hour. Ventilated the shelf sounds like Isaac Hayes had a stroke. Also, finally on Bram van der Stok, he's not only a flying ace, also before the war he'd studied medicine. So Dr. Dreambird, am I right? After being captured, he worked in the POWs camp medical facility, and the great escape would be his third escape attempt.

So there are a few of the people that are hoping to escape. Let's talk tunnels, aka Tom, Dick and Harry. Tom began in a darkened corner next to a stove chimney in Hut 123 and extended west into the forest. It was found by the Germans and dynamited. Oh, no. That makes it bigger. That's perfect.

Like, holy shit. Thank you so much. It's room to move now. It's so much quicker with dynamite. I was using a bowl. Why don't we think of that? Can we get a little bit over here as well? Yeah, towards the fence, thank you.

No, so they destroyed it, which again, wasn't the worst thing in the world as they hoped that the Germans would assume that they'd found the only tunnel, so not knowing that two others were still going. Yeah, they'd be feeling pretty smart that they'd thwarted a plan. And all the English guys are like, so they were going, oh, no! Hang on ages on that. Yeah. That was my only hope.

This is, the, there's two Harry Potter characters in there. Tom and Harry. There's also a dick, but that, I'm leaving that out. Yeah. The author is. Because Voldemort is Tom. Yes. Oh.

Yeah. Tom River. Where does she get her ideas? From war. Had she had an original fucking thought in her head? From the Nazis. Dix? She uses the own Tom and you're like, oh, you unoriginal bitch.

Has she had a single original fucking thought? This is fiction, mate. It could be anything. And you've gone for Tom? You have for Tom. He's your big bad guy. He's a little names Marvolo. You've led with Tom.

Come on. You are. Fucking believable. I'm sorry. She's a prick. She's a tartless hack. Never had an original thought. Had some pretty crook ones.

Even those are unoriginal. Very old. Bad thoughts. So then we get to Tom. I'm afraid the dream's over. It would be annoying if you're assigned to Tom. You'd be like, well, fuck, my. our one, that's annoying.

Actually, it'd be pretty cool because you're off the hook now. Yeah. Hey, I tried digging. I dumped off. Thanks, guys. See ya. You guys keep going to go out.

I'm joining the choir. Yeah. I'm going to put on a play. Dick's entrance was hidden in a drain sump in the washroom of Hut 122. That was really funny sentence. Just so you know, Dave, that we saw that that was fun. Yeah. Where did you hide you your dick entrance?

It had the most secure trap tour. It was to go in the same direction as Tom, and the prisoners decided that the hut would not be a suspected tunnel site as it was further from the wire than the others. Like, why would you start in the furthest part away from the wall? Yeah. Or the fence. Like, that would be crazy. So they chose that on purpose. The men working on this tunnel, however, watched in dismay as the area where Dick was to exit began being cleared by the Germans as the prison was being expanded.

So the place where it was to pop up was soon to be enclosed. Oh, imagine. So when they'd pop up wouldn't just be a different part of the prison. Oh, dear. So Dick was abandoned. Yeah. Which was just an inappropriate place for a dick to pop up.

Yeah. You know, like the cinema. Supermarket. There's lots of inappropriate places. Podcasts shoot. Yeah. Okay, I won't say it again. So tour out which left good old Harry.

Harry began in Hot 104. like I said earlier, the huts were about two feet off the ground on stilts, kind of like a Queenslander style house. Meaning it was very hard to get a tunnel going from within the huts, but every hut had a stove that was used to boil water and heat the room. This sat on a large bit of concrete that went all the way down to the earth below, and over several months, this concrete was chipped away until they had access to the ground below, but you couldn't see from the outside.

So these, their rooms are kitchenettes? Jeez. So the stove was always super hot So the German guards wouldn't go near it When they were searching or Clever Inspecting And of course they never suspected that every night

Using bits of wood The prisoners were lifting it off Like this red hot stove Yeah And then jumping in the hole And tunneling directly down And they had a lot of digging to do The plan for the tunnel

Was to go under the Volaga Which contained the German administration area The Sikat and the isolation cells To emerge at the woods on the northern edge of the camp and pop up under the cover of the forest. Let to go all the way to the forest. You pop up. They can't even see us in the forest.

Big accent is funny. Big X is like, get me in there. I just want to be as close to the forest as possible. If everyone could let me go first for a three hour or two. And then you send her on up. I'll make sure it's safe out there. I've got the pick of the letter. Why are you going in backwards?

He's going to the tall ass first. That doesn't see like the comfiest right to get through. They had to dig really deep to get through the sandy top layer of soil and avoid the microphones that Germans used to detect tunnels. Harry was nine metres or 30 feet deep. Wow. Like so deep. Yeah, that's crazy.

And they're digging by hand in secret, this massive shaft down. At the base, they dug out a large room used as a workshop. And eventually it housed. an air pump, pushing fresh air along the ducting, invented by squadron leader Bob Nelson of the 37 squadron. The pumps were built of odd items, including pieces from the beds, hockey sticks and knapsacks, as well as a few tins that they had. So it's ingenious. They're just making stuff out of nothing. So, yeah. Okay. And I think it was a hand air pump, like one person would sit there and sort of pump this, this ventilating system and it would just pump air all the way along the tunnel as it got

bigger and bigger and bigger. Crazy. So crazy. Yeah. And there's like a little, like a full bedroom size room at the bottom at the entrance. So basically before they started digging horizontally that they dug out. Right. So they've got like a whole underground cave.

Wow. How long is this taking to do? Yeah. Months and months and months. Yeah. The patience. And then when bits are being discovered, you're just like the amount of hours we put into that. That was so long.

But Cleverly had two decoys, sort of. So nine metres down, they began digging horizontally for 102 meters or 33 feet. That's how long this thing is so long. The tunnel was very small, however, only 0.6 metres square. So it was like 60 centimetres wide, 60 centimetres tall, or about two feet square. And the sandy walls were shawed up with pieces of wood scavenged from all over the camp, much from the prisoner's beds. Of the 20 or so boards originally supporting each mattress,

only about eight were left on each bed, which would be a terrible night's sleep on your back. Yeah, well, they would be... After digging all day. Hope they got to keep their slats to the diggers. They would weigh nothing but this stage too. Yeah, that's true. They'd be fine.

This also meant that... What about when the housekeeping came through to change over the beds in the morning? Yeah. When they noticed... They noticed... Little mint on the pillow. That's nice.

So they had a lot of dirt to dispose of. History.com writes the captives excavated at least 100 tons of sand. Usual method of disposing of sand was similar to what I said before, scattering it discreetly on the surface. Small pouches made of towels or long underpants are attached inside the prisoner's trousers as they walked around and the sand could be scattered.

Sometimes they would dump sand into the small gardens that are allowed to tend. As one prisoner turned to the soil, another would release sand while they both appeared to be in conversation. The prisoners wore great coats to conceal the bulges of the sand and then referred to as penguins because of their supposed resemblance. Is that a penguin in your pants?

I love the source is history.com. They got in early. Yeah. They did well. They got there. Also, everything is history. They could just be reporting the news, realistically. History from five minutes ago.

This is just in. Very recent history.com. So the news site should be called. In sunny months, sand could be carried outside and scattered in blankets used for sunbathing. They just sound like they're having a good time. More than 200 were used to make an estimated 25,000 trips. So they're just carrying little bits of sand here, a little bits of sand there.

Wow. They also started to use the abandoned Dick Tunnel to store dirt and supplies. Oh, clever. Is that the one that's been dynamited? No. That was Tom. Oh, yeah. Dick's the one they abandoned because they went, well, we're going to pop up in the other side of the prison.

Right. Right. So they converted more than 1,400 powdered milk tin. Cans provided by the Red Cross into digging tools, and lamps in which wicks fashioned from pajama cords were burned in mutton fat, skimmed off the greasy soup that were served. Fuck, they're so clever. Eventually, they're hooked into the camp's supply of electricity to hook up a string of light bulbs the whole way along the tunnel.

So, yeah, none of our skills are useful for this at all. Again, I wouldn't be like, oh, we could make a candle out of this. I'd be like, all right, I'll play a character in this little play. And then I'll tend to the tomatoes and just wait to be released once. They hopefully. Hoping. Oh, die here. Could be worse.

Mutton is lamb, yeah? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Because it's not very fatty. Oh. Motton is sheep.

Yeah. It's ex-lam. It's old sheep. Oh, yeah. When you have lamb chops, do you reckon that comes from a kid lamb? Yes. Yeah. That's true, isn't it?

No, I think it's a sheep. I don't think that's right. I think lamb is from baby sheep. And mutton is adult sheep. Well. Well, Matt would... Let's someone here every day. Matt would know he goes on.

Fuck on! Fuck on! Yeah, they're not very fatty, surely. So for them to create... Yeah, they're getting a nut, like a little bit here, a little bit there, and then they make these little candles out of it. Yeah. It's crazy.

Because they're going to make candles for 100 metres. Yeah. So that's insane. Yeah. What are we talking to candle every 10, you reckon? Well, at first, and then eventually they hooked into the electricity and it was a lot easier. But they also constructed an underground tree. trolley system pulled by ropes to transport the sand with switchover junctions,

named after two London landmarks. There was the first Piccadilly Circus and then Lester Square. Wow. The English really took over here, didn't they? Apparently, Dane, it's lamb, is only called lamb if the sheep is under a year old when it's killed. Right. So it is like a baby sheep. So lamb chops.

Yeah. Every single lamb chop comes from. Lamb. A baby sheep. That's why at the restaurant, I always say, say, how old was this lamb? Yeah. How old?

That's mutton, mate. Motton, mate. That's mutton, I don't want mutton chops, mate. I pay for lamb. I want it young. Oh, all right, sir. You've made this weird, honestly, sir. The German guards were referred to by the POWs as goons,

and apparently unaware of the Allied connotation, willingly accepted the nickname after being told it stood for German officer or non-com. Which is so great. German guards were followed everywhere. They went by prisoners who used an elaborate system of signals to warn others of their location. Cucco! Oh, sorry, something in my throat.

Excuse me. What bird was that, Jess? It was beautiful, cool. Yeah, it was a magpie. It was a cuckoo yet to learn. Yeah, it was a cuckoo with an accent. We're in Germany They also use subtle signs

Such as turning a page of a book Or fiddling with a shoelace To raise notice of an approaching guard So you can't actually read the book Oh no If you're enjoying the book Everyone's like freaking out Because there's like 50 guards

Oh my god Don't fumble if you're tying your shoelettes Either otherwise All of a sudden people are standing to attention You gotta like Tie your shoelace and yell at This is real I'm actually

I've got arthritis I'm sorry It takes me longer than normal people of a tire shoelace, I'm sorry. All of a sudden, everyone's digging a hole. No, don't do that. There's a guard right here. Other guards were bribed to smuggle in items or look the other way, often with chocolate

as the prisoners were sent chocolate by the Red Cross, but by this late stage of the war, the Germans were no longer getting any chocolate. They also supplied railway timetables, maps, and many official papers so that they could be forged, some of them for bribery and some because they were like anti-Nazi themselves. Yeah. I'm not happy to be there. I, okay. Here's, this is going to blow your mind.

They could read their mail before it comes in. Yeah. And then just get the chocolate at the source. That's so true. But they're giving them the package. They're being like, oh, no chalkies this week, boys, sorry. We might be Nazis, but we're not cheats. They're not.

It's blowing to me. Yeah, that's so funny. Well, yeah, so many atrocities being committed, but no, no, no, no, we're honest. We don't open other people's mail. Okay, go draw a line somewhere. That's a step too far. That's what we knew on the road cross. Male fraud.

Yeah. I don't do that. So despite all this being said, the guards were still dangerous and the POWs were told many times by the senior people particularly they would be shot if they attempted to escape. So there is a lot at stake. Our prisoners obtained cameras and travel documents that a team of artists used to forge identity cards, passports and travel passes. Wow. They replicated travel stamps by carving patterns in boot heels and using shoe polishes ink. Fuck off.

That's so clever. This is unbelievable, but between 7 and 8,000 forged documents were printed for this escape attempt. That's incredible. Because they're getting bus, like train passes, identity cards, passports, all this stuff to back up who they are. And it just takes one of these Nazi guards that they're trusting to be, you know, dodgy. Yeah. And sell them out. And that's so, poor.

Apparently they'd also often get a guard to, hey, can you help us out with this for a bit of chocolate? And then once they did that, they'd say, all right, mate, you have to keep helping me, or I'll tell your boss what you did for us, and they'd sort of start blackmailing them. Right. Hans, can you get me some paper?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, sure. How much do you need? Just keep it coming. I'll give you a finger of a kit cat. I'll give you a finger. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.

All right. One's kids' cat. Hundreds of makeshift compasses were laid and distributed so they could guide themselves once they're on the run. For the escape and aftermath, they scrowned everything they could. According to German accounts after the escape, the materials missing from the camp included 4,000 bedboards, 1,69 blankets, 161 pillowcases, 34 chairs, 478 spoons, 30 shovels. You'd be like, well, what are they planning? Yeah.

A thousand feet of electric wire, 600 feet of rope, 192 bed covers and almost three and a half thousand towels. So every day, there's three. Housekeeping is so confused. Three of them are so, three for every man are saying, I lost my towel again. Yeah. The German government.

We won't get your deposit back. Yeah. German government invoiced the Australian and the UK government. I want money for 3,000 Sheridan towels. Your people stole from us. Geez, the people, I imagine if when this all went down, the people running the camp would have gotten a bit of stroth. It's like, they must have been like, what the fuck have you been doing? Yeah, yeah, what?

I know, nothing. How did you? Yeah. How did you not notice this? Once, ah. Well, I guess that's an excuse. And it turns out it's one of the escapees pretending. Yeah, doesn't feel.

Even the people are, oh, and they, um. They're like, no, I want this guy to answer. Oh. Is, is they, are they distracted by the war happening? Because this sounds like there's a lot going on under their noses. Apparently they start suspecting that something's going on. And then they find the big tunnel. And they go, all right, we stopped it.

Right. Things start going missing. They keep searching for it. But their tunnels are so well hidden that they look for them, but they literally, it's right under their nose. Sometimes they actually search the room that the tunnel is in, but they just don't check the boiler. Right. Why would it be under there? That's boiling hot.

That's crazy. Yeah. We searched the room. All right, onto the next room. And they're like, keep getting away with it. Of the 200. And even if they checked a boiler, what are the odds that it's the one? Yeah, there's a couple hundred rooms.

Yeah. Of the 200 who were to attempt escape, they were given a number that designated the order of who would go down the tunnel first. The people were the highest chance of success due to fitness, language is spoken, and also who had contributed the most of the attempt were highest up the list. I believe Big X gave himself number three. Yeah, brilliant. That's diplomatic. Yeah. No, you go first.

You go first. You go first. No, but no, just those two. Yeah. I mean, I don't want to be the first one to pop my head out of the hole. I mean, I'm up shocked. Yeah, it does feel like that's the problem. spot really. So, yeah, yeah.

If two get away, you're like, all right, looks like I can get away too. From 1 to 1100, what are you rating your number as? Poor, probably 1,00099. What are you, Jess? Yeah. Jess is 1100. I'm just in front of. I'm behind you.

No, you're in front of me. I don't know if you want to be the ones, any of the ones getting left behind either because they're going to take it out on someone. Yeah, I'm the one left in the camp. No, I'm a good boy. I didn't know. They didn't invite me. I guess this week's play is going to be a solo.

Your dream. Yeah, my dream. Oh, no. Oh, no, a two-hour tap dancing extrav cancer. Oh, I hate it, but the show must go on. That's why they call me twinkletoes. It's actually a very literal nickname. Matt's going first, I reckon.

Yep. You know a few languages? You reckon I did the most? Yeah. And of the fittest. Yep. There you go. What about you, don't do you fancy your chances of getting out?

I don't know. I don't reckon I'm, I don't reckon I'm fitting down the hole. Well, they got that math, that big unit. Yeah. And he got to basically not dig it and then he got through. Yeah. Is that big X? No, that was, um, bushels.

Jeez, what was that big guy's name? Buckley's. Yeah, you want to come in behind the big dog. Actually, do you want to be right behind him? Maybe not. No. That was also, that was the artful Dodger. Yeah.

Major Johnny Dodge. Dodge. The American. Yeah, the American born guy who, basically his job was to sing songs and distract him. Yeah. Yeah, great. I'm unfortunately behind the American.

I'm dodged. I'm picturing like that episode of the Simpsons where homie goes down the slide. You don't want to be coming behind him. Yeah. Get stuck in the water slide. And those kids get mad, nightmares.

The kids' limbs getting squeezing. Yeah, that's fine. So they're filling up the hole in. Oh my God. Yeah. I'm also very aware. Like, I'd be down that hole with Dodge. And then Dodge goes, look,

I'm stuck. suck and I'm like, yeah, no. Like, I wouldn't even be like, what? I'd go, yeah. Yeah, no shit, Josh. Yeah, we both are. Yeah. So the first group of 100 were called serial offenders,

because a lot of them had tried to escape many times. They were guaranteed a place and included 30 who spoke German well or had the history of escapes. And an additional 70 considered to have put in the most work on the tunnel. So that's the first 100. The rest from 100 to 200 was a lottery system. Wow. I like this.

Oh, my God. And they all had elaborate backstories of which they were pretending to be of who they were pretending to be when they escaped and needed papers as well as fake uniforms, clothing and items to assume their identities. Some were like, they're like, I'm a lumber mill worker on leave or I'm a forced labourer who are they're permitted to travel around Germany, but could be from Norway or something. Right. Which explain their accent or why they don't speak German. They speak one of these other European languages. A couple who spoke great German were going to even pretend to be German. Wow.

Gros, like pretend to be full Nazi uniforms and everything. That's like an executable offence if you're caught wearing a German uniform and you're not. So that's pretty risky. There's always going to be one dick, though, is like, no, I'm like the greatest guitarist in the world. Yeah, that's so, this is incredible back story. Yeah, I've got like 50 wives. Yeah. It's awesome.

Like, I'm like the huge rock star. Play it. Well, plays the song. Oh. No. Oh, no. I hurt my fingers. Yeah, calm.

I got sore fingers. I hurt my fingers digging out of the prison. I mean, oh, no. Oh, no. Sing as a song, Dug a hole out of prison. It's a love song, sorry, it's about... Yeah, yeah.

It's all the matter for. It's something I was writing this for me. So, they dug for months, and by February 1944, the tunnel was near in completion, but the German guards, like I said, knew something was going on. they searched and searched, and amazingly,

they didn't find the entrance to Harry even when they searched Room 104. In a desperate attempt to foil a potential escape, they selected 20 men whom they believed to be escape ringleaders and moved them on to another camp. However, they only succeeded in picking out four key workers, and amazingly,

Roger Bushal, aka Big X, was not amongst them, and planning for the escape continued. Because he was really good at pretend, he would still do activities like be in the plays or auditioning. for stuffed and look like that he was, because he used to be a big escapeer so they'd be watching him a lot. It looked like he'd given up on escape.

Do you reckon part of him was like, huh? They didn't even think it could have been me. Hurtful. I've escaped twice before guys. Guys, come on. They didn't even suspect me. Like, that's just offensive. Yeah, that hurts, man. Yeah. With the German sniffing around and closing in, Harry was completed at the end of winter and on the night of March 24, 1944, it was decided it was go time. So they chose that night. Why?

Any... Well, they probably, I think they were Fitzroy supporters. They wanted to get out. They heard the lines were making a charge at the grand final. Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They made the finals.

Yeah, and they're like, geez, we've got to see the Roy boys. They're in for a good chance here. They didn't know at the time, but that was the last time, but that was the last one of the prime ship. So, like, they made the right call. Just just shaking her head

Almost two hours in here Yeah But we're at the escape attempt So they chose that night Because they were worried That any moment The Gestapo were going to turn up And turn the camp upside down

And find the tunnel ruin everything So they went probably a little bit early Than they should have Because it was the end of winter But it was still really cold And it was a freezing moonless night And they'd waited weeks For the night to be moonless

because not lit up, easy, easy to escape under the cover of darkness. Does the cold ground hold together better? No, the winter there is so cold. They had to stop digging for a while because it literally freezes solid. Wow. You can't get through it. So apart from the moonless night, conditions weren't great as six inches of snow cover the ground. This was a double-edged sword as the Germans thought no one would be stupid enough

to attempt and escape in these conditions. Sure, because it's freezing. But then they'd leave tracks, I guess, as well. Yeah, that's another thing. You've got to cover up your tracks. So, um, 1,100 people running through the snow and then covering it up again. Just doing circles. They won't be like, which ones we follow?

There's so many central footprints here. This one got on a jet ski. I mean, a snowmobile. This one flew a submarine. Quick hop on my jet ski. No. That's insane. That's really dumb.

Oh, no, big X is. He's from the Gold Coast It's the only way I know how Do you know how to ride a jet ski I'm from the Gold Coast Yeah

It's in my blood That's how I got to school, okay That's how I got out of the wound So they're like No one would attempt and escape Not knowing that 200 men were preparing To do just that Wow

So the first to go down No women, huh? What is this, a comedy club? 200 men, no women. And none of the men looked around and thought, hmm, this seems a bit off. Classic. Let's invite some women.

No, no. Shut up. Let's invite some women, you know, because we have to. He's 200 on the list. Back of the lawn, mate. Back of the lawn. Like, and here we go. Jesus cross.

The first to go down the long tunnel and pop up the other side was 27-year-old British, Bomber pilot, Leslie George Bull, aka Johnny Bull. Great. Leslie John Bull. Leslie George. For some reason, he's known as Johnny Bull. Johnny Bull is great.

Which is so sick. That's a fantastic name. And he's the first to pop up. They literally haven't even tested the, he's going to go up, like open the roof, I guess, or the exit into the forest, see where he is and then go for it. So they haven't even really like opened the exit. You mean he's going to charge like a, I don't know. Oh, yeah, like a panther or something.

Yeah, they should call him Johnny Panther. That's way cooler. That's actually sick. Johnny Panther. That's amazing. That's pretty cool. So Johnny Panther traversed the tiny 100 meter long tunnel via the wheelie system, which they used for dirt, but then they were on, they were literally like pulling themselves along.

So they're on like a little mining cart type thing, which is really cool. But it's like claustrophobic is all hell in there. Yeah. It would take, and it would take minutes. to get from one side to the other. He popped up the other side, and to his dismay, looked around and found there'd been a miscalculation. The tunnel was a few feet short of the coverage of the forest.

So they're sort of between the fence and the forest, just out of the open. So they're out, but they're not, yeah. Yeah. And they're like, fuck. This meant to get to cover, they had to get up and run to the trees. So what does he do? Does he let the others know? Or is everyone going to discover that one by one?

I'm imagining that, like, there are a few of them are like, I sort of standing there and he's whispering, oh shit, boys! Yeah, send it back down the line. Maybe they have one of those can and string sort of systems. Yeah, they loved a bit of can. Yeah, loved a bit of can. They loved a bit of can.

They loved a bit of can. Yeah, I call myself a bit of a can man. With Johnny Bull? Johnny Panther to you. They call me Hans. I'm a bit of a can man. Honestly, I can't wait for the Patreon section because I think I've thought of the game we're playing.

So they knew. So there's these guard towers everywhere, but they face into the camp to make sure people aren't escaping. Sorry. Right. Just thought of Heinz again. You're very good at it, Matt. That's my skill. I'm there in the camp giving everyone nicknames.

Honestly, when you've got to have like code names, that's actually useful. Otherwise, it's there's two people called Big X. That's confusing. Yeah. Not good. Come on. One could have been Little X at least. Little X.

Oh, absolutely. Yeah. The classic. One's big X, one's capital X. That's good. Options. Grande X. Little Nazex.

There we go. So we could have 200 X's with variations. That's right. It's important. DMX. BMX. Exhibit. Charlie XEX.

Yep. Yeah. Dr. X. Oh. Ex-Avier. Oh. Dr. Xavier So sorry, Davey.

And that's Professor X, I'm actually Professor X. Yeah, you're Robin Him or his qualifications. Mr. X. Mr. X. What I met is he hadn't studied. Triple X. So, the guard towers look in,

but they also, they knew guards patrolled around the perimeter fence. So they had, they had to time their runs around this. So you'd see the guard coming. They go past you like, all right, you won't be back for 10 minutes or so. Right. Let's run, run, right.

A small piece of string coming out of the hole was pulled when the coast was clear. So you're in the tunnel still, the guy before you pulls the string. You go, all right, I'm going to run for it now. And one joke had it tied around his finger, he said, wait for this. Gave way the whole game. In the tunnels, well, no, good. Pump more air. More air, more air!

This is going to be so great. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. It's all men as well There's guys farting into the pub Hey, what's this? What's this? Daryl! To avoid being seen by the centuries,

the escapes were reduced to about 10 per hour rather than one every minute, so 60 per hour that they'd planned for. Wow. Daryl, Summers. Summers, Sum of a man, Tom and should. Should, should have coulda wooder. Wood, tree man.

Logger. A log in. AOL. That's good. They call me AOL. Because I did a fart once. I thought it explains itself, really. You can get a reverse engineer that yourself. I genuinely thought that you were just, you're going to go full circle. Log, summer log, chocolate, Daryl.

And we're here. Yeah, we're calling you Darrell. That's right it is. My name's Gerald, but they call me Darrell. Okay. So the difference. Double R. So they've already sort of slowed down the pace as to what they'd hoped for.

A further delay was accidentally caused by the escapeers' comrades in the RAF. That's the Brits bombing the area, resulting in the electricity being cut in the camp, is something that they did every night, I guess, to turn the lights out so they're not a target. This meant there was no lighting in the tunnel, so they had to wait for the power to resume before more men started going out. So that was an hour-long delay. Wow. Stress. Because they were like, we could risk it and go in the dark, but like one, you bump the wrong bit of the tunnel and it collapses. Right.

So it's, like, let's wait for the power to go back on so we can see what we're doing down there. Yeah. It's the patience. I'd be like, oh, fuck, let's just go for it. Yeah. Yeah. If it is one guy to panic like that. So they're all going to have that poise under pressure. Yeah.

I honestly, even before when he's like, yeah, so they'd just, they'd empty out the sand little bit by little bit. I was like, fuck that. Like, I'm already out. I'm not, I'm just got no patience. You're full of bullets in your back having charged the game. 100%. Like, I'm so impatient and I just don't.

I have no future planning. Like, I just like, oh, fuck it. Who cares? She is like, watch this and you just start to run through the game. And you make it because they haven't put any thought in at the gate at all. Oh shit, she's just gone for it. Wait, she's gone. No one's ever tried the front door before.

Hey, come back. Come back. Come back. She's gone. Hey, hey, at least use the tunnel. Jesus. Has a respect. Come on.

I've got mates that would go down there and they'd be there for like four hours. And then you go, oh, mate, how far did you dig? Nah, but I put some shells in that little, that little waiting area. It's actually really nice. Yeah, it's actually a really nice place to hang out. So I got a bit distracted. It's just a man cave now. I should sit down there now.

It's fox footy, so. Yeah, the boys had a win, so I watched that, obviously. I shaved JF Loves T.C. into the corner. I invented television. Mate, you were just to dig a hole. Oh, that's right. I knew I was getting something. Yes, that's right.

I'll get on that tomorrow. So in total, 76 men, crawled to freedom. 76. And got out, out of the hole, until it all abruptly came to a halt at 4.55 a.m. when one of the prisoners, number 77, was spotted by a German guard. On the way out. On the way out.

Oh, shit. Those already in the trees began running. So they're all like waiting for each other. It's not like... Some of them are. I think the system is you run out and then you're on the string. You help the next guy get out. Yeah.

So it was probably the string guy. I fucked it then. Hey, come out now. Oh, shit. No, no, no. Yeah. Water pool again. How do you take it back?

Yeah. Well, I suppose some of them were sort of going in teams or in groups. Yeah, that's right. You're going to wait for your group. Some people like solo badasses and others are like. But it's not 76 of them waiting in the bushes. No. Yeah.

So those already in the trees at this point began running whilst New Zealand squadron leader Leonard Henry Trent, who was later awarded a Victoria Cross for bravery during the war. So he's a World War badass. He had just reached the tree line and he stood up and surrendered. Because, you know, a German guard spotted him. With a machine. They didn't shoot. Yeah.

He's gone, oh, I think the, I heard somewhere that maybe shot into the air to alert the other German guys. Something's happening over here. So the escape attempt was over, but the Germans still had no idea where the tunnel started. They've just seen this hole in the ground pop out of nowhere. But they would be able to figure it out, right? I reckon I know how they could. They go in that tunnel. Yeah, but wouldn't they just.

Don them on it? Yeah. That's true. But maybe they want to figure it out, right? Yeah. But you get the dynamite along. See what you chucked dynamite in, see where that goes. Wow.

See where it goes. Well, all hell will break loose as there were still men inside the tunnel. They're hearing all the commotion and they're like, back it up, back it up. Retreat, retreat, retreat. And they were still in their costumes and civilian disguises. Oh, they frantically chanced out of them and burned evidence like forged documents and stuff. And like the guy that's in the fake Nazi uniforms. Like, take that off because if you get seen in it, you're going to get shot.

Unless they believe you. I'm actually one of you. Oh, okay. I don't remember seeing you on training day. Great to me. Oh, you knew. Yes. Oh, you knew.

Yes. You would have definitely have gotten away with it. Um, yes. It's all in the lips, German, isn't it? What, um. He does so much lip work when he's German. Oh, yes. I am, I am a Nazi, that is true.

You just blow a lot of kisses. I'm one of you. Yes, I'm one of us. It's like Peppie Lepewere, but German Yeah And one of you So despite So despite searching the huts

Including 104 with dogs The Germans couldn't find the entrance Until one of them Did what you said, Matt They crawled backwards down the hole And started banging on the other side When he got there Until they worked out

Shit, I think he's under the boiler And that's the only way they found the entrance It was so well hidden Wow So he's on the other side banging going, let me out, let me out By this discovery The oven's talking

The oven's knocking on it Am I losing my mind This is the oven's talking to me That's a bloody This is a bloody magic pudding or something Someone's rubbing it Waiting for a Jeannie What's going on here

I want these three wishes First one's going to be A fix these burns And then I've still got two weeks Yeah. So by the discovery, the first escapeers had been on the run for several hours. Wow. So they had a good head start, but unfortunately, it was the coldest march in that area for 30 years.

There was lots of snow and many of the men actually got frostbite. Shit. But let's start with some good news. Remember Sergeant Peter Bergsland, the Norwegian Orienteer champion? Oh, yeah. Well, he was... Money's on him to do well. He was Escapé number 43, so he doesn't...

doesn't have the biggest head start, and among the 76, I should say, who escaped through the tunnel and he teamed up with fellow Norwegian escape number 44, Jens Mueller. According to PBS, Berksland, the Orientee area, was wearing a civilian suit he had made himself from a Royal Marine uniform, with an RAF overcoat, slightly altered with brown leather sewn over the buttons, a black RAF tie and no hat. That's specifically noted that. Very important. If you're going to go through things people aren't wearing.

You beer all day. Yeah. What else isn't he wearing a bowtire? He's not wearing, no scarf. Who beerings? He's not wearing who be earrings. He's not wearing a scrunchy. He's not wearing a slap band, that's for sure.

He's not wearing 15 angles on his left arm. He is not wearing a 90s choker. Okay, yeah, great. But he is sucking on one of those 90s dummies. He's not wearing a hyper-colour t-shirt. I like to think that his friends bald. And he wears a hat. to hide it.

And then when he was given a description, he's like, yes, I was wearing a suit and I had little leathers over the, over the buttons. No hat. No hat, no need. Didn't have to. Didn't have to. No need for it. I still have hair.

Warm and hot there. Nice and toasty up in my head. I was using nature's hat. Yeah. I mean, it's winter, mate. What are you protecting yourself from? The sun's not out. A little bit of sass in there.

That's what it was. He also carried a small suitcase. He was number 44 and I'm 43. Yeah. He carried a small suitcase, which had been sent from Norway. In it were Norwegian toothpaste and soap, sandwiches, 163 Reich marks given to him by the escape committee. So they also had to get a bit of money so they could survive. They were travelling under the guise of Norwegian electricians from a labour camp in Frankfurt and caught the 204 train to Frankfurt.

The journey there was uneventful. According to PBS, they arrived at Frankfurt at 6 in the morning and caught a connecting train to the city of Kirsten at 8am. they had a beer in the station cafe. While they were sipping, the first inspection took place. A wandering German sergeant of the military police approached them. He looked at the cheerful, fresh-faced young man who spoke excellent German with a Norwegian accent, gave their papers a cursory examination,

touched his cap, he was wearing a hat, and departed. Touched his cap was in his pocket. Just making sure it was there, he thought he might have dropped it. Having... That still got it? Wallet keys. Phone. Hat.

Give it a little tap. Tap the hat. Full up. That's just a thing we do. In Norway. So having passed the first test, Bergland and Mueller clinked their beer mugs, smiled and drained up.

That would have felt good. Far out, yeah. They then caught another train to the port city of Stetton and wandered around the city for the day, visiting a cinema and another beer hall. Wow. It really, it feels like life inside the prison is freer than life outside.

You know, they're coming by, Hey, you are allowed to be here? Yeah, I'm just having a fucking beer mate. Yeah, constantly getting checks, especially after the news had come out. Hey, but 200 prisoners tried to escape last night. Be on the lookout. But only 74 made it, so.

Yeah, so chances that it's not you. They then found some Swedish sailors who agreed to smuggle them onto their ship, and they made it to the safety of Gothenburg. There they entered the British consulate who arranged travel by train to Stockholm, where they were flown to Scotland. From there, they were sent by train to London, and shortly afterwards to Little Norway, which is a place in Canada where they were from.

So that's two home runs. Whoa. So they're from Canada. Originally Norwegian. Right. Long way. Long way around. What around the world.

I'm like, they're in Stockholm. Why are they? They're pretty close there. Yeah. Well, then they went back to the UK because they were part of the Air Force, of course. They had to go back to work. Yeah.

That's it. Oh, shit. I can't be late. I've got a night. Sorry, boys, but the boss wants you to. They want you in. So that's two home runs. Unfortunately, of the 76 who got out through the tunnel,

they were two of only three. Oh, geez. He actually got back to Allied territory. The other one, Bram van der Stok. Oh, yeah. Our Dutch flying ace, who also wanted to be a doctor. He had a gift for languages, and due to his aptitude for escaping, he was assigned number 20 to go through the tunnel, and he traveled alone.

He's a lone wolf. I had money on Johnny Bull. Oh, yeah. Oh, sorry, man. The panther. The pants. The pan. The pants man.

Trousel leg. You are actually incredible. The leggy Rhonda Birchmore. Birch. Birch tree. Monkeys in a tree. Chimp. Banana boy.

George of the jungle. George. Oh, damn it. That's my real name. His middle name was George. He was George. Please. I want a nickname. Can I just be like blueie or something? No, no, no, no. Let me work on.

We got to get there. We've got to get there. So he looked. We've arrived. George. So Brian Vrandrstock looked like any other civilian, but he was wearing an Australian Air Force overcoat and a converted naval jacket and trousers, R-AF shoes, and a beret. So he was wearing a hat. It sounds like a real mismatch, mishmatch, mish. What am I trying to say there? You're doing a bit of a mishmash of words there. You're trying to say mismatch and mishmash. Yeah, I was trying to say mishmash.

Yeah. But it was coming out as mitchmatch. Yeah. Mishmatch. He did the mish. He did the mishmash. So, Brian Vandr Schlock made it to the train station and boarded a train seeing eight

other escaped prisoners. But of course, they had to play it cool and pretend he didn't know them. Yeah, there'd be no reason that they were not to. Yeah, they got their own cover stories. Yeah. The escape was soon discovered and his paper were checked four times, but thankfully, the forgeries were really good. Wow.

And his story of being a Dutchman checked out, because of course, he was Dutch. Yes. Great. Yeah, I think the better your language and all those sort of things. So it makes sense that the non-English speakers... It really favoured the Europeans, yeah, for sure. Yeah. He travelled through Germany to the Netherlands where he met up with a man whose name he had

been given as part of the resistance, which, like, that's such a roll of the dices. I'm literally knocking on a door being like, hi, I'm part of the resistance. Yes. Yeah. And the guy actually did take him in. Vanderstock was then given new identity papers, and then he cycled to a Belgian safe house for the Belgian resistance, had to trust another group of people.

Wow. It's also the guy getting the knock on the door, trusting him that he's not. Yeah, exactly. He could be an undercover Nazi for sure. Undercover Nazi coming to Channel 9. That is definitely a Channel 7 show. There's no way following from Border Force or whatever that show is called. So arriving there, he was given the paperwork of a Belgian

and then travelled by train via Brussels and then Paris to Toulouse in France, where the French resistant put him in contact with two American lieutenants, two other RAF pilots, a French officer and a Russian, and he took the group across the Pyrenees to Spain. Walk into a bar. It's such an odd mix, isn't it? He finally reached British Empire Territory once again

by arriving in Gibraltar on the 8th of July 9th, 1944, three months after escaping. He was back in England within a few days, the third to make a home run. And again, sadly, the third and final. Wow. But it's such a journey. And like at any point, he could have been discovered. He changed identity like three times, trusting all these people, this network of resistance.

The war's almost finished, hey? Yeah. We're getting to the end. Getting towards the end. How many more months until it finished? What is it, a bit over a year? So close to like, yeah, so 12 months later, the war ended. And that, yeah, like Dan was saying before, right, they were struggling by the end of it.

It was all falling apart for the Nazis last 12 months, right? So it's going to be interesting to see how they deal with the ones that they catch. Yeah, because this is that, that's the screenboard. Because they might have still, a bunch they might have still made it out alive. Yeah. Didn't one of them he mentioned before got. Who later got a victory cross. Is that, that's, yeah, Purple Hearts one you have to die for, right?

Victoria Cross He made it sound like he lived The Australian version of, isn't it? Yeah, so the Victoria Cross is like for empire forces, the British, etc. Purple Heart, that's America, right? It's the same. It's the same thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I think it's usually Vela under fire, that kind of stuff. Like Bravest of the Brave sort of acts. And it's worth like, like, I think it's priceless, but if you are going to put a money value on, I think that somebody did sell one for like millions, Really? Millions and millions of dollars. So, like...

Yeah, there's that British... So that Aussie billionaire who's bought all of them. Really? And then now they're in the Canberra War Museum. Yeah. I think he paid about two and a half mill. Really? Yeah.

Wild. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's crazy. I don't know if you would sell it. Like, if you earned it. But I meant that or the family. I mean, if your family needs the cash, yeah.

What are you going to do? No, I'm going to... No, I want this. I'm going to struggle. got to put food on the table because I got this sort of piece of metal. But I need to walk down the street on Anzac Day and show it off. But I don't even think that you would take it out for Anzac Day, would you? Like, you'd still...

I don't know, yeah. Maybe. Like, you'd keep it at home. I don't know. It just, it's worth two and a half million dollars, that's all. Yeah, it also seems like the kind of thing, like people who win those aren't usually braggadocious stuff, are they? Yeah.

Or maybe they are. Yeah, typically no. A lot of them are. They also awarded posthumously. Yes. Kerry Stokes is the prominent Australian collector of VCs. I owns Channel 7, right? I used to.

Yeah, he's a guy. He's a guy of the commissioned undercover Nazi. Yeah, seven, mate. I think it's more common that people who know Victoria Cross awardees don't know they have it. Right. Like Jeremy Clarkson's father-in-law has one, and Jeremy Clarkson never knew. Yeah, right. Because he'd never mention it.

You found out before Jeremy Clarkson. Yeah. I found out, and I said, imagine he's funny out now. I tweeted him. I said, hey, Clarko. Big news. Clarko. Yeah, Clarko.

You're, all right, you need to be on the case to give him a new nickname. You're not having Clarko. Clark, Prama. Gumbi, gumbo, gum, gummy, toothless, tooth fairy, fairy boy. Fairy boy. Perfect. No notes. Ugh.

Yeah, it's, what I've got, owing to its status, the VC is always the first decoration worn in a row of medals, and it's the first set of post-nominal letters used to indicate any decoration or order. So you can get any other dedication from the queen or the king, but you'll always be Matt Stewart v.C. Even, but, yeah, before Sir. Yeah, before, I guess Sir comes first. I guess Sir Matt Stewart, comma, VC. I, yeah, I don't have those, as you know, because I knocked them back. Mainly because they didn't offer.

I was getting in first. That's a note from him. Don't call me. Yeah. I'll call you. I wouldn't accept anyway. Have I gone to war? Well, no.

So three made a home. Everyone else, sadly, was recaptured. Some quickly. Others were on the run for a bit and it made it across Germany, like quite a long way. But within two weeks, all 73 others were recaptured. Wow. Let's check in with a few other now. James Katnack, the Australian pilot and his crew of four.

made it to Berlin, before changing trains to Hamburg, which they also reached successfully only to be caught on the next leg of their rail journey from Hamburg to the naval town of Flandsburg on the Danish border. Nearing the border, suspicious policemen insisted on carefully examining their papers, checking their briefcases which contained newspapers and escape rations. Close inspection of their clothing revealed they were wearing altered great coats. Although the four escapeers had split up pretending to be travelling individually, they were all in the same railway carriage and more policemen arrived

and closely examined every passenger soon arresting awful suspects. Damn. The escapeers were taken to Flandsburg prison and then handed over to the Gestapo. Adolf Hitler was told of the escape attempt and was furious, pun intended.

His initial order was that all recaptured 73 escape should be immediately shot, but it was argued to him that this could lead to reprisals for German prisoners of war in British hands and eventually he ordered that 50 of them to be executed. 50. What a weird negotiation.

Yeah. All right. We'll let 21 of them live or whatever. Yeah. Weird. Yeah. Is that what happened? Oh, sorry, the general Arthur Nibor Nebe was given the task of selecting the 50 men at random.

He was a terrible human being involved in the Holocaust. But he himself was executed a year later for his involvement in the plot to assassinate Hitler with a bomb known as Operation Velcro. Cooree. Oh, right. Tom Cruise movie. Yeah. It starts in German, also the cinema, it starts in German and then like a sort of

wash comes over the screen or something and we start hearing it in his American accent. The movie. Yeah, because he obviously wasn't going to do a German accent, I guess. So they're like, they start in German briefly and then it's sort of like, you know, the effect is now you're just hearing it through the some sort of a translator. We'll translate for you. Yeah. You're a better actor than Tom Cruise.

Wow. Yeah, you could say. Oh, you could shine. Do they call that German face? Yeah. Yeah. That's fantastic. You can shade is if you want.

Yes, yes, yes, yes. James Catternack, the Australian of was one of those 50 sadly, I'm really sad to say he was murdered. Wow. This is what happened to all of them. In the movie The Great Escape, they sort of machine gun them all down,

but really what they did is they split them up into groups of one or two, and then the Gestapo often would pull the car over and tell them, this is what happened to James Cattnack, stretch your legs before a big drive or go take a piss in that field and whilst their back was turned, shot them in the back.

Wow. And then cremated them. Jesus. And it was the same for his time. three accomplices and that's the fate of most of the 50. Yeah, is that more humane? I don't know. That's crazy. Because they're obviously trying to sell a story that they tried to escape again. Yeah. That is exactly what they said. They said, these escapers tried to escape. We had no choice,

but just shoot it. And it's like, and this happened exactly 50 times. It's like, come on, come on, guys. Also captured and later murdered were head forger Tim Wallen, Lithuanian footballer Romulatis Markenkis and Canadian Spitfire Pilots slash Hardassar, Henry. Burland. Fuck. The first two had made good ground before being captured by the Gestapo, but Canadian Henry Burland and his group did not make a great distance before the alert was raised and were tracked down quite quickly.

Roger Bushall, aka Big X, also murdered. Wow. Bushels was told. He was warned. He'd already done it. This is strike three. This is a strike three for him. The choir is really struggling now, though, because he had a beautiful baritone.

Yeah. Exactly. He was a beautiful voice. He was still auditioning for staff. Oh, yeah, I'll go choir practice. Well, what would I escape? I love it, dude. I love it. One of the famous scenes from the movie that I think of is,

I think it's Steve McQueen on a motorbike trying to jump a barbed wire fence. Yes, there were no motorbikes involved. Apparently, Steve McQueen insisted on riding a motorbike in the movie. And he's nearly all of it except when he jumps to the barbed wire fence is him. Yeah, right. That's a stunt driver, I believe. And it's actually rated as one of the greatest stunts in Hollywood history. Yeah.

It's amazing scene. So it feels funny for him to insist on it. But it's like, God, he's a great motorcycle rider, apparently. Yeah, and it was a great scene. I don't know. It is a great scene. Don't get me wrong. But I don't know if you're allowed to, like, do a historic movie.

Yeah, yeah. And then just go, yeah, also, I jump it on a motorbike. Totally, yes. Fully agree. It's like, this is already a pretty epic story. Yeah. Nah, nah, nah, nah. I mean, he uses like a modern Yamaha or something.

It's like a... Yeah. That's a Suzuki. It's like on display in a museum somewhere, yeah. Because genuinely that motorbike is iconic to this story. Yeah, you think that's one of the big things, isn't it? Throwing the ball against the wall on the motorbike, probably the two most famous visuals. Yeah.

And you reckon neither of them happened. Definitely not the motorbike. The ball's more believable. Yeah, yeah. Well, they had so many recreational things in the camp. Could have been Hitler's. Could have been softball. Hit the softball.

Could have been Hitler's missing softball. You just, I just, I don't think you're, it's like Oppenheimer and they're, like, oh yeah, so we invented the Adam bomb. But also, I want to ride in on a motorcycle. But also, that big meeting, yeah, I get there by parachute. I come through the ceiling. I let it out and I just go, all right, everyone. I land.

I let the parachute off and I walk straight into the building. Don't break strides. I insist. I want to be at, I want to be in Japan at the time and I put sunglasses on and I walk away from it as it's going on. Yeah. That's right. So, 50 of them were shot.

This was a clear violation of the Geneva Convention, by the way, that states P.O.W should not be shot for attempting to escape. But, you know, by this point of the war, Germany committed so many atrocities. The surviving 23 were held in the custody of the Gestapo before being sent off to other camps. 17 will return to Star-Lug Luft 3. But after this, I believe they were ordered not to try and escape anymore

because it's like, well, you tried 50 of our... our best guys just got shot. Osar ordered from the inside. From the inside. Not the Germans. The Nazis are going, all right. Now, we should have said this. I really have put my foot down.

Probably should have said this first time around, but yes. Okay. Absolutely not on anymore. Sorry. Absolutely not on. It is, I'm sorry, but I have to put my foot down. That's the German defense. The German defense.

You killed. you murdered 50 of our people. We done a lot worse stuff than that. I'm sorry. That's minimal to what we did. You're saying we as the Nazis. Yeah, like the Nazis. So you see that as a way.

Interesting. Like, I feel like that they can't, that's not a defence. You can't go, nah, I've done worse shit than that. Yeah. That's not a good thing to say. Jane, you robbed a bank.

I've murdered people. Yeah, I've shot people in the back. That's nothing. If you knew the other stuff, would you like a list? It doesn't make sense. What do you reckon about that, though? Would you prefer, if you're caught, would you prefer to be lined up against the wall knowing you're about to be executed?

Or would you prefer to be like, hey, you can stop here, have a piss? Yeah, I'd prefer to not know. To not know, yeah. I don't know. I don't want to get shot. Yeah. Is that an option? Oh, yeah.

Oh, sorry, we haven't let me finish. Third option. Ah, they'd just send you back first class. Yeah, I'd probably do the third option. Yeah. Wait, I'm going to wait. see if there's a fourth option because we've learnt the hard way. Is it?

Fourth option, yeah, there is. You stay in the camp. But once I say it, you can't take one of the first three options. Okay, yeah, that's fine. Fourth option is you're shot in the back in first class. Do I get a meal and can I eat first and watch a movie and like try to lie down bed? Yeah, yeah. There's a fifth option.

Yeah. You have to stay in the camp. Yeah. And you get lead in the play. Oh, okay. So I'm alive and I'm alive. and I'm the lead. That's not really a choice, is it?

And then they shoot you well just before you go on touch it. Before the second encore. So you fully believe all the way up until dying that you're a star. Oh yeah, I'd take that. Starlight, 13 or whatever. Is that what it's called? Starlight. No.

So you're looking at option five. So 23. Those are just waiting basically. I guess so option five? Fuck, no. I'm trying to get this fish. Two and a half hours. 23 survived, 17 were returned to Starlug Luke 3.

Four were sent to Saxonhausen concentration camp and two to Coltitz Castle that we've reported on before. I'm pleased to report that many of them lived very long lives after the war. Jack Harrison, one of the 200 men, died in 2010 at the age of 97. Jack Lion, number 79, on the roster, so he didn't quite get out, which is one of the reasons that he may have survived. He celebrated his 100th birthday in 2017. In New Zealand? Is that what we said he was from?

I'm not sure where Jack Lyons from. But let's say, New Zealand. Paul Royal also lived to 101. Dick Churchill was the last surviving of the 76 escapees before his death in 2019, age 99. He was discovered after hiding in a hayloft. And in a 2014 interview at the age of 94, he said he was fairly certain he had been spared execution

because his captors thought he might be related to British Prime Minister. Winston Churchill, which he was not. But one of the other survivors, remember, was a very distant relative of Winston Churchill. That was Major Johnny Dodge, the artful dodger. The big boy. He was Churchill's distant cousin. He escaped, but was recaptured that same day

and was sent, he was one of the guys sent to Saxon-Hausen concentration camp. Awful place to go. With three other great escapeers, including Flat Lieutenant, Sydney Douse and Bertram, Arthur, Jimmy James. An awful place to be sent. They were housed with other political prisoners, including previous report topic, mad Jack Churchill. Whoa. Who's the guy that fought with bagpipes and a sword.

Great. Douse and James almost immediately began another tunnel, which was kept secret from all and non-British personnel. This was completed and used on the night of the 23rd of September 1944 when Dodge, James, Day Douse and Jack Churchill escaped. Dodge, who traveled alone, was on the run for over a month, and after receiving help from some French slave labourers, was arrested by a German farmer and sadly returned to Saxonhausen.

He with the other four who had been recaptured were placed in solitary confinement and chained to the floor in what were called the death cells at the camp. Wow. Things were looking pretty grim for him until February 1945. He was released from solitary and taken to Berlin, where he was asked by two German officials to act as a peace envoy to the British government with an offer of Germany surrendered to the Western Allies of the British and Americans. basically at this point

all the Germans knew it was lost so a few of the senior people were like Hitler was never going to give up or quietly being like hey maybe we could get someone else to give up on our behalf Dodge was asked to undertake this because of his distant relationship to British Prime Minister Winston Churchill

he returned to Britain via Dresden surviving the horrific firebombing of the city there so this guy's got nine lives he actually met Prime Minister Churchill and the US ambassador to Britain John Gilbert one aunt on the 6th of May 1945 Dodge explained his adventures and the German peace proposal

and history records the offer was not accepted. The first thing he said to Churchill was, how'd the Royboys do? Let me know. And did Winston say they got the job done? They're going to do it many more times in the next decades. I've got a good feeling. I think they're about to start a dynasty.

So the artful Dodger made at home. Wow. Partly because, you know, of this distant relationship to Winston Churchill, but he escaped so many times. Yeah. I will be Albanese's cousin, 100%. 100%. Yeah.

Yeah, I know that guy. I know him personally. Family guy, he used to sit at Christmas all the time. Have you got his number in your phone? Huh? Let me think. 04. Soon after the war, when Germany lost.

You didn't know. British Royal Air Force Service police detective, Wilfrid, Bale. or bows, headed a 15-person task force charged with finding those in the Gestapo responsible for the murders of the 50 escaped guys. They found some of the men had already died, but several former Gestapo and military personnel were convicted of war crimes. Wow.

So some of them did face justice. Good. Just finally, the Great Escape was first immortalised by Australian writer and journalist Paul Brickle, who was at Starlog Luft 3. Initially, he'd been high up the list to escape when he first went down to help with digging, he suffered from claustrophobia and he was ruled out. They were like, sorry, mate, you're fit and able and everything, but if you have a panic attack on the night, yeah, mess it up for everyone else, we can't take that risk. He probably would have had to

accept that. Yeah. But he did help with the planning and he wrote a book called The Great Escape in 1950. It was a bestseller and like we said, was adapted for the 1963 film, The Great Escape starring Steve McQueen, James Garner and Richard Attenborough as Big X. You know, here's the thing. If I, if that happened to me, right, and I'm writing the tale about what happened, I would be putting in my muscles were too big. Yeah, not claustrophobia. I'm not claustrophobic.

They said I was just too much of a big unit. Your shoulders are so huge bar. You can't fit down the hole probably. Too much drag. Yeah. You know, I'm on my stomach, you know what I mean? When I'm, and also, you, when you shirt's off, you put us to shame. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah, morale was down. Moral was down. So, yeah, that's what I'm put forward. Like, it's not fair. Like, you're the size of two of these normal guys, so it's not fair for you to take two spots. I had to wear really big oversized t-shirts.

The boys didn't know how fucking ripped I was under these. Made it feel really bad. Well, they couldn't think of a cover story that would work for me. They're like, Germans are never that ripped, you know what I'm right? I was going to say I'm an Olympic swimmer. But, yeah. But, yeah. Too buff.

I thought I just stay behind and take some notes, write a book, you know? Yeah. Get the story out there. Like a real hero. Yeah, you're right. Yeah. I think that's very brave of him to say. To admit, yeah, I got down there and for the first time of my life had claustrophobia.

Yeah. At the worst time. Or is he actually giving a more heroic story than what the truth was. He's a humble man. The real thing was way worse. It was actually. I had really bad dad. I kept farting up the tent.

The boys were like, you fucking rape. No one's going after you. No one likes you. You stink. Yeah, so I stayed back. Yeah, because that claustrophobia, yeah. No one called me stinky mxting boy. That was, yeah, I don't even know why you would have thought that.

No. That was a me. I didn't hear that. No, no. No, no, no. Nope, nope, nope, nope. So the 1963 film in particular has gone down as a pop culture classic and is frequently referenced by other bits of media including The Simpsons,

Reservoir Dogs, Chicken Run, Charlie's Angels, Seinfeld, Reddwarf, Get Smart, Monty Python, to name just a few. So one of the reasons it lives on is it's just referenced all the time. And I reckon scenes that didn't actually happen. Because I reckon the motorbikes thing would be so referenced. Yes. And Bart, doing the ball for sure, is one of the Simpsons ones, I reckon. Yeah.

Yeah. And also Maggie, when she's trying to break out. Oh, yes. The pacifiers. Yes, that's right. When she's at the iron around school for tops. That's right. I definitely knew that song away before I ever saw the movie. I'm going to watch it.

You will have to set aside nearly three hours. I'm not going to watch it. Is that with ads? Even more with ads. I was going to watch it again because I was like, I want to do the research first so I don't get clouded by that, but then I spent too long on it. But I'm going to watch it probably again this weekend. You can watch a YouTube recap.

Yeah. We could do it as a movie club episode. Not three hours. No. I do that. Who would listen to some? something for three hours. So we are clocking in.

Nearly it goes for two hours, 50 something, and this is two hours 49. We are actually really close to the road. If you turn down the volume on the movie and just listen to us, it actually sinks up. That's it. Yeah. And the Wizard of Oz and the Dark Southern movie. So, that's it. That's the story of the real great escape.

Wow. That was a great story. It's an epic one. Mm. Twists, turns, drama, intrigue. Farts. Farts. Romance.

German accents. Sausy. Well, accents. I don't know if Germans would claim that. Vaguely European accent. Vaguely European accent. Some pretest-sport-orne accents. It's not offensive if you do them all at once.

No. No, I, uh, hmm. I, I couldn't you want to me. The little lip thing is starting to make me feel weird. This is a more accurate... Is it too late to ask AJ our editor to write down all the time codes and we get a super cut in video form of Matt's greatest journey hits? I don't think we can afford to pay for that because it's...

On sausage. Now he's winking. Stop it. Venish neutral? Oh, venish natural. Stop winking. or Bradford We're going to have to get a PO box

Because now Matt's going to be getting a lot of love mail Yeah From the show And we loved your accent Yeah That's exactly what they're going to say We found your accent Very accurate and very sexy

Very sexy Very sexy indeed And Well We might just fade down his microphone as we say, Dane Simpson, thank you so much for joining us on this episode. Thank you for having me.

This is cool. An absolute epic. A true, true pleasure. And I imagine some of your mad yarns might be going for nearly three hours. Is that true? On your new pod, any three-hour episodes coming up? We do half an hour episode. Honestly, perfect.

That's smart. That's pretty smart, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yep. We're no Joe Rogan. Unfortunately, we are. Yeah.

A terrible comparison to be mad. But yeah, so that's out now. First couple episodes of Mad Yarns. You and Isaac, any other gigs or anything coming up you want to tell people about? No, just look me up. Go to, there's this website I invented called Google. Really? Just type in Dane Simpson.

It's full of everything that I've ever done. Whoa. It's the internet. It is a modern marvel. If you want to see Dane in video form, VIP Chunky's Bauer style, check out the episode. I've do go on the quiz show that's on stupid old channel right now. You can watch him and Marcel go head to head in a battle of the elements.

And that's fun. It was cool. Yeah, it was a great time. I'm pulling up your website now. Interesting stuff for you. We usually do a live Google of the guests at the end. What a review from Matt's Julia. Okay.

We did get the Kylan show, Dan Simpson Live Friday the 11th of July. That's already in the past when this comes out. Don't worry about that one. Um, yeah, Edinburgh fringe. My, my special. You're going to be in Edinburgh Fringe?

No, I'm not going to have it. You've probably got to have a look at your link tree. Well, you're about to say, do you have specials that people can watch? Yeah, you can go on Iview.

You can check it out. It's called Didgeridoozy. Oh, awesome. It's part of the, the, live at the Malt House, I think it's cool. Yeah, great.

A little serious. Yeah. Go on watch that if you like. Be a classic stand-up. Check it out, everyone. Yeah. But, Dane, thank you so much. Thanks.

Thanks for having. This is cool. Well, that brings us to everyone's favorite section of the show where we thank some of our fantastic Patreon support. If you want to be one of these, go to patreon.com slash do you go on pod. I should say, we've just said goodbye to Dane. We all gave him a hug.

Yep. And it was a beautiful moment. Anybody else giving him a kiss? Was that just me? Oh, no. Did I miss my opportunity? We've been waiting so patiently. But, yes, Dane did say that he'd be up for hanging around for this section

and we said, mate, you've just given us what? We said, please. Three weeks I have along that one. Four hundred years. Just go.

We said, save yourself. The Great Escape was actually pretty recent news when I started that one. It was a new movie. But yes. So, Dave,

you want to explain how this section of the show works? We take a bit of time here to support, I'll say thank you to the people who support the show,

I should say, at Patreon, and as well as getting some shoutouts and things that are about to give them. They also get access to ad-free episodes. They get four bonus episodes a month. We've got our D&D campaign going on there. New seasons just launched mini reports, quizzes,

all sorts of fun stuff there, and you get access to 250 bonus episodes in the back catalog as as soon as you sign up on that level. You get to be part of the Facebook group, which is a lovely corner of the internet, hear about live shows before anyone else. Get discounted tickets. And just get to know that you're making this show possible. Which is important. You're doing important work. That's right. Some would call it charity.

And we thank those charitable people. Thank you so much. Now, the first thing we do in this section of the show is for people on the Sydney Schoenberg level or above. We do a section called the fact quote or question section, which actually has a jingle, I think, goes something like this. Fact quote or question. He always remembers the ding.

And she always remembers the sing. And in this part of the show, we read out two, three, for sometimes. This week, just the two facts, quotes or questions or brags or suggestions or really whatever people want to write. And the first one this week comes from Jason Wesner, aka, get to give yourself a title as well, aka official panicker. And Jason is offering us and asking us a question. I was hoping they were offering a panic. Okay. Well, maybe this question will lead to a panic. The question is, are there any genres that you traditionally don't like, but have one or two exceptions for? And always say, please answer the question if you can. And Jason does that saying

an example, I tend to find horror movies unappealing, but the original Halloween is one of my favorite movies. Oh, wow. That's interesting, isn't it? Yeah. I would instantly jump in and think of musicals. Oh, yeah. Not a big fan, but I've seen Hamilton twice and enjoyed both. For those experiences. Annie? Annie, you love Danny? And I watched Annie the movie. Yep.

End of sentence. I watched it. Yeah, you watched it. It was recently on Do Go on the Movie Club, which is a monthly thing we do on the Patreon, where we pick a film and then talk about it. And it was Matt's choice that month, a couple months ago. And he chose Annie and, you know, Daddy Warbox is a bit of fun. Why do I smell what dog?

I mean, I watched the film on double speed, of course, but I slowed it down for that bit out of respect. Why I smell black dog? So, yeah, but I really enjoy those live experiences. So that's, I'd say, a real exception for me. I'm not a horror fan at all, but I have seen and very much enjoyed Get Out. Oh, yeah. But then I was like, all right, well, I've watched a horror movie. Yeah, I don't want to venture back in.

Right. I think, yeah, I used to be like that. Now I really like horror. Yeah. Oh, I'm also not into it. I don't think I just didn't know how broad horror was. Totally. I thought, I'm like, oh, like,

I like scream and I like get out and I was talking to a horror friend. And they're like, well, yeah, you like. You like horror movies. Yeah. And we sort of figure out I don't really like slasher ones where there's, it's just like an indestructible bad guy. You know, like sequels to Halloween, sequels to Friday the 13th, stuff like that. As far as I know, I haven't, I've only seen a couple of them. But, yeah, I like, yeah.

So that's maybe a good example. It's funny how we can't think outside. The thing he said, because as I was reading, I like genres music, but it was movies. Any, what about music genres? Oh, yeah. I used to not really be in the country, but now I'm quite like a country a fair bit more. Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson, Lee Kernigan, Kergs, of course, Dolly Parton. Of course.

Of course. Bloody course. Bloody course. Yeah, and same, yeah, I don't know. I think that was, get out, came to mind immediately. But it is good to sort of like, yeah, it's always good to like try something a bit new, especially if it comes quite well-rated or people whose opinion you trust recommend it. You go, okay, I'll give that a go.

Worst case than I, you don't particularly like it. It's all right. It's not life-threatening. Yeah. And you can always bail. Yeah, you can. If you're going to halfway through, like, no. I was right.

I'm normally, I used to be a person who was like, well, if I started reading the book, I have to finish this book. And recently I was like, I'm 10 chapters in and I hate this. I'm going to stop. Yeah. But just it only had 11 chapters. I've never found out. What happened?

Yeah, three pages to go. It all came together at the end. I said, I'm done. I'm done with this. Yeah. Yeah. I think I don't really like wheat beers, if that's a genre of beer. A genre, yes.

But I did have one of that, like I nearly never enjoy it, but I did have one recently that I kind of enjoyed. I can't remember what it was. But generally speaking, it's just that sort of, that banana-y, whatever that flavor is in a wheat beer that I find unappealing. Binarie. But I like banana. I don't like beer.

that I like that one we had in Brisbane one time. Yeah, the, it was like a passion for a goza or ghosts or gosa. Thank you so much for the question. Oh, sorry. Oh, that's not important. My horror one is, I don't really like horror, but I really like the alien movies. Oh, I haven't seen those. So I don't know why that is, but yeah, a lot of them, I guess it's, like you're saying, horror has so many subgenres.

I just don't like ones where it's like torture born and it makes you feel a bit sick to watch. I watched The Heretic last week. I enjoyed it a bit. You know, no movie's perfect. I would have done it a little bit better, but I enjoyed a quote. Here's how I would have done. And I was fun. There was a, in the middle, he's telling a real brief version of my Monopoly episode.

I'm like, I wonder if the movie writer was a listener. Like I discovered the story. But it's still pretty good if he'd stopped him. I was actually listening to a podcast last night, just for a bit of padding. in the movie. Yeah, yeah. Thanks so much Jason.

Jason actually... Jason... What's his name? Vorhees. Forhees. More he's. More like it. What does that mean?

But Jason, I got him in the hat swap. And those hat... Those packages over there. Yeah. I haven't opened them yet. Exciting. Can't wait to do what you got. Yeah.

I sent Jason a hat. I won't say what, but he sent me too. So I'm feeling like I've been... Yeah, anyway. Maybe I'll think of a second one to send you, Jason. The next one comes from Charlie Heybear or Heybert, aka amateur etymologist. If I'm remembering right, I think Charlie was a Chicagoan improviser that I met when I was

over there. And Charlie has a fact writing, the turkey, the bird, is named after Turkey, the country, but in Turkish, it's called a Hindi. In Hindi, it's called a Peru. Arabic calls it Greek chicken, Greece calls it a French chicken, France calls it an Indian chicken, and in Malay it's a Dutch chicken. None of these places are where the wild turkey is from, which is North America. What's going on? Well, the main theory is that the English speakers were introduced to the Turkey via merchants in the Ottoman Empire and thus called it the Turkey hen

or Turkey fowl. Other languages may have similarly named it after the people who were importing and selling the bird being unaware of its true origin. Huh. The many names calling it Indian are likely due to the early misconception that the new world was actually just India as Columbus himself died believing. How tragic that the poor turkey is forever fated to bear the name of a nation that they do not call home. That is wild. I knew the turkey bit, but I didn't know.

That's amazing how many places call it different things. Yeah, that's, I didn't know that. That's a fun fact, dare I say. Wow. Yeah. I don't give those out too often anymore. No, you don't. That was awesome.

That list of things that it's known as around the world. Yeah. I'm here for that. Just keep going on. This is a great fact. Thank you so much, Charlie. And thank you so much, Jason. And the next thing we like to do is shout out to a few of our great supporters.

Jess, you normally come up with a game for this? What are you thinking? I think you've been on a red hot streak of coming up with nicknames or code names here. I was going to pull up a code name generator, but I don't think we need one. I think Dave and I could read the name. and you could just smash them out. Okay, we'll go with the manual method. I think so, yeah, old school.

Yeah. Because if you're all happy to, because... Yeah, I say we're in a war prison. Yes. And... Sometimes it feels like prison. The Wi-Fi's out. Yes.

And we can't access... What? Even at the library? Yeah. Apparently it's just down and they don't know why they're working on it and they're really... They're very sorry. My vote is sorry.

The internet is done. The Vafat. I'll have we get extra dessert later as a compensation. Or, yes. Yes, there will be extra servants of porting. Porting. Poutine? Poutine.

Poutine. Yes, poutine. Dessertine. What's protein again? Chips. Desert, protein. Gravy and cheese. Yeah.

Instead of gravy, it's chocolate. Instead of cheese, it's ice cream. That's awesome. Instead of chips. It's wifers. It's vifers. What's delicious. Does that puntin?

I'm pointing? I think I did enough to say that right. You want me to read out some names here? Yeah, let's get it started. All right, Matt, clear your mind, clear the mine palace. Okay, from Strath Downey in Victoria, thank you so much to Jamie McKinnon. Jamie McKinnon, McKinnon Hotel, Bed, Bedding,

ding, Bell, Bell ringer, ringing, ringing, ringing years, tinnitus, tinny, tin man. Tin man. Tin man. That sounds good. You got to stop me. Yeah, sorry. You just keep going. We'll stop me. You'll stop me whenever. You're ready. Jamie Tin Man McKinnon. Thank you so much.

Tin man McKinnon. That just works. That's incredible. So next up from address unknowns, we can only assume deep within the fortress of the moles. Okay. Thank you to Abby. Abby. Nunnery. None. Nothing. Zipo. Lighter. Fire. Flamey. Flame.

trees tree is pecta truce wood woodie toy story buzz light year buzz uh to infinity and beyond beyond yon yon tripod

stop tripod Abby aka tripod is a sweet name it's pretty good to infinity and beyond yon that's great

and yon's name is Simon for I mean imagine happy Simon. I'd like to thank now from Farum in Great Britain. Big shout out to average student.

Average student, teacher, professor. Professor. Oh, the professor. That's good. Professors are fantastic. I love the proff. Yeah. Prof professors.

The proff, yeah, so good. The proff. Average student, okay, the prof. It's really good. It's important to show. Next up from Bradford, also in the UK. Carrie L. Kerry L. M.N. O.

urine, rhine, rhino, rhinoceros, Rus, Russell Crow, Rusty. Rusty.

Rusty. When you, I thought you were going to just go through the alphabet. M-N-O-P-Q you, urine.

I was like, okay, we're out. He got out. Oh, Kerry, Rusty, Al. What's good stuff. I'd like to thank now

from Mount Nasura in Western Australia. It's Anthony or Anthony probably Anthony Sims. Sims, Sims City. City, Godzilla in the Simps City, Zilla, Stephen Zilla, Saints, St. Kilda, Kilda, Kilda, Kilda Man, murderer, mass murderer, mass, church, priest, Priestley, Jason Priestley, 90210, Beverly Hills, Hills, Hills, Hills have eyes, piercing Cyclops.

Cyclops! Actually, I wasn't looking at you, Matt, I was looking at Dave, and we yelled at the same time. Yeah, it's great. Cyclops is really good. Because the priest, I was like, that's good, but then you went chasing. Priestley, nine or two, and okay, we're back on here. Yeah. We're still on the cycle.

Cyclops. Very good. That is great stuff. Anthony Cyclops Sims. Next up from Rochester and New York in the US. It is a big thank you to Emma Pratt. Emma Pratt, Dill. Dill Pickle.

Pickle. Pick me. Mean girls. Girls, girly, girl, lady. Lady in the Tramp, Tramp, uh, Chaplin, Chap. That's pretty good. Chappie, uh, chapstick, lips, dried lips, dry desert, sand, sandy, uh, June's, June, July, August, September, Burr, Bill, passing legislation, slation, slate, clean slate, the cleaner.

Yep, cleaner. Jesus Christ. The cleaner, that's great. That was incredible to watch. Passing legislation. Emma the cleaner Pratt. That's so great. Man, that's good.

I like to think from Somerville in Victoria. Thank you to Dean Williams. Dean Williams. Williams. Prince Harry, Harry Houdini, Deany, a dinosaur, soaring through the skies, the jet star, the star, shooting star, gun, machine gun, the, machine. Oh, stop. The machine's pretty good.

Dean the Machine Williams. Oh, I know me. Yeah, that's very good. I was about to go to the printing press. I think, I think maybe we sucked it at a good time. Your nickname is the printing press. That's great. Penultimate is from Brisbane in Queensland.

Ashley Hall. Ashley Hall, long, narrow, row, roer, awesome, fawsome. some a few few good men truth handle the truth handle door knob the knob stop no oh come on

Ashley the knob hole I'm trying to get door knob but the knob the knobbler the cobbler shoemake the cobblah the cobblah you don't want the knobler Ashley

the cobbler hole that's great that's good that's great actually I tried to get is this a muscle that the more you use it, the better it gets? It's like, is it used it or lose it,

or you're ringing out as much as you can? I think you lost it and we're making the most of it. Yeah, yeah. It's great. It's great. And finally, I'd like to thank location unknown to us, probably within the fortune of the miles. Thank you to T-I-F-TIF.

Tiff. Spat, fight. Spats, spats, shoes, shooy, skull, bones, bone yard yard glass glassy eyed eyeball ball only one ball Hitler

smash hit smash overhead smash Grand Slam slammer Wham bam bam thank you ma'am Madam Dam Dam Van Van Wien Wheels Driving

driven golf club one wood wood it all comes back to wood one top of the pops popper big popper big uh big bear

big popper bear that's really good bear with me we're trying with with nail and I the nail hammer the hammer we both agreed

it's tip the hammer okay last don't possibly start to the wire look at your email want to know that it's definitely you tiff you can now call yourself the hammer that was beautiful when you word is all back to wood everything goes back to wood so thank you again to tiff ashley dean emma anthony kerry average student abby and jamie you can you can call me big x everything comes back to wood uh and that means the last thing we got to do is welcome some people

know the triptitch club now this week have actually got four inductees dave don't explain how this all works while I let my brain rest for a second. Yeah, absolutely. This is our Theatre of the Mind, clubhouse sort of hangout zone slash hall of fame where people have been supporting the show on the shoutout level or above for three consecutive years. They've been true to us. We've already given them a shout out of some description, but they've stayed on. And now to thank them and in trying them, we welcome them into the Trip Ditch Club, which is a bar slash hangout space in your mind where people can come in, have a drink, have an eat, have a fun time, hang out with like-minded people. Yeah. And once you're in, you can never leave.

But why would you want to? Because we've got some of the best in the business and some of the best entertainment in the business. I'm floating around, of course. I'm always here if you need a nickname. Come find me. I'm happy to help. All right.

So we got four to read out. But before we get to that, Jess, you're behind the bar. What is the Great Escape Cocktail this week? You always have a theme cocktail. Gin. It's just gin. But this is now, this is my opportunity to just say, I have received your.

complaints. There have been a lot of them. I did a few of them. About the quality and temperature of the food. So I hear you. I didn't like what I heard, but I hear you. You've reflected on it. I've reflected on it and I'm trying to grow as a person. So what I've done is I have brought in an external catering company this time, a lovely German man who has quite a lot of experience catering to large groups. Okay. So yeah, I mean, would you like to like to? to introduce yourself? And they am a man of few words, but yes, I run a tight kitchen. And what do you want me to say?

I've got the gin. I've got a soup, which I've got on this war-ehrer stove, that I was able to get from a good price, from Stalight 13. Unfortunately, it is very hot. Oh, okay. Okay. That might not quell some of the complaints that have been made then. Oh, no.

I'm famous, the hot soup man. Ah, I should have done a bit more research. Oh, no. So we do have soup and we do have gin. Yes. Yeah. Cold gin? Oh, what a job?

He didn't do you're judging. All right. So we have four names right out. Who's the after party, Dave? Entertainment. You're never going to believe it. What? They're actually cheering Australia next month.

I can see here, but before that they are doing a warm-up show for us. It is back together, the Dillinger escape plan. Whoa. Can you believe it? Huge. We've done John Dillinger and we've done the Great Escape. Is that true? We've done John Dillinger?

Have we not done John Dillinger? Yeah, we did. I think Jess did. I think Desk did the report. That's right. There's something wrong with my brain. John. Episode 275, subtitled Public Enemy Number 1.

I did do it, yeah. It's in my... It's in my Google Drive there. I'm going to read that. That sounds interesting. I love to know about that. It's a good thing. You don't waste any brain space on stuff you don't need to know.

Why would you need to know about that? I don't waste any brain space on anything. It's empty up there. So, hang around for Dillinger Escape Plan at the after party. Four names to read out. Dave is up on stage, hyping everyone up. He's the MC. And Jess is there giving Dave a bit of support.

Because in this character that Dave plays, this character version of Dave, of Dave. He is lower on self-esteem, but that is the real Dave, of course, has it coming up, the wazoo and out of it as well. That's right. Great actor over here. So, as I've said about three times, four names. Are we ready? Yes. All right. First up from Rotherham, Rotterham. Was it Rotherham? Rotherham? My God. In Great Britain, welcome in Sam. Thank you, Sam. Never botherum when you're in Rotherham. Oh, fantastic. Next up from address unknown.

Can only shoot him from Deep within the Fortress of the Moles. Please and thank you and welcome Beyond the Cartoons. Beyond the Cartoons, I'm fond of the cartoons when beyond the cartoons. Honestly, what can I do with that? Yeah, no, you're not wrong. Woo! Yeah, yeah, I get animated when you're around or something like that. That's actually really great, great.

I'd love to network with you, Cartoon Network. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. From Flagstaff in Arizona, welcome Justice Roberson. Well, I wish it was just us tonight, but there's a few other people here. Just Us Robertson. It is spelled Just Us as well, by the way. You saw this, it really works for it. It makes a lot of sense.

Well, yeah, I mean, it means you did less work on it, so I'd say don't let people know that. Okay, don't. No one look up the spelling. And finally, from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, go Penguins. Welcome and thank you and please. Rachel Lynn. More like Rachel win, win, win. Ooh.

Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. Welcome in Rachel, Justice, Beyond and Sam. Make yourselves at home. Hey, grab some gin, grab some soup. And hang around for Dillinger escape plan. We're going to rock on tonight. Pop, anything we need to tell people before we go? Just that we're proud of them.

We're not disappointed. We're just angry. We're furious. Honestly, you've got to pull up those socks. To your room. Thank you for listening. If you want to suggest the topic, you can do that. There's a link in the show notes.

We believe in you. You can find links in the show notes as well to our other podcasts that we do. And our website and TikTok and Instagram, check those out. Please, Dave Boot this baby home. Thank you so much once again from me personally. And don't forget coming up soon, July 26th, it's a Saturday. And what a day, because Matt and my stand-up specials are premiering on the Humdinger YouTube channel. Wow.

You can watch them back to back. or back to front, whichever way you like to do that. But please put in the calendar. That's right. And yeah, that reminds that I'm touring Australia in August and the UK in September. I can find out about that at Mattstchutcom. And maybe on do go on pod.com if I figure out how to use that website. I will show you.

Thank you again for listening. Until next time, goodbye. Later. Bye. Don't forget to sign up to our tour mailing list so we know where in the world you are and we can come and tell you when we're coming there. Wherever we go, we always hear six months later, oh, you should come to Manchester. We were just in Manchester.

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