List of prisoners of war

This is a list of famous prisoners of war (POWs) whose imprisonment attracted media attention, or who became well known afterwards.

Senior officers held captive in Oflag IV-C in Colditz Castle, including Admiral Józef Unrug and General Tadeusz Piskor.

Winston Churchill in Durban after escaping from captivity in 1899. He had written the Boer Secretary of War a polite departure note, "I have the honour to inform you that as I do not consider that your Government has any right to detain me as a military prisoner, I have decided to escape from your custody..."[1]

A

• Ron Arad — Israeli fighter pilot, shot down over Lebanon in 1986. He has not been seen or heard from since 1988 and is widely presumed to be dead.
• Everett Alvarez, Jr. Navy Commander who endured one of the longest periods as a prisoner of war (POW) in American history. Alvarez was the first American pilot to be shot down and held as a POW in North Vietnam. He spent over 8 years in captivity, making him the second longest-held POW in American history.

B

• Douglas Bader — British fighter pilot, Wing commander in Battle of Britain
• Leonard Birchall — The "Saviour of Ceylon"
• Fernand Braudel — the famous historian, was a POW in World War II.
• Frank Buckles — the last American veteran of World War I, was imprisoned by the Japanese during World War II, as a civilian.
• Peter Butterworth: Actor, Fleet Air Arm officer, shot down 1940, imprisoned in Stalag Luft III.

C

• Alexandra Cabot Forbes: Worked for various Intelligence Agencies, captured in 2007. Imprisoned by the Taliban, rescued the following year.
• Anthony Chenevix-Trench; future headmaster of Eton, artillery officer, prisoner 1942-45 at Changi Prison and on the Burma Railway.
• Winston Churchill — during the Second Boer War; escaped
• James Clavell — prisoner in Singapore, based his novel King Rat on his experiences during World War II
• George Thomas Coker — U.S. Navy aviator, POW in North Vietnam, noted resistor of his captors
• John Cordwell — forged documents to help fellow English soldiers get out of Germany as part of the Great Escape

D

• Rupert Davies; Actor, Fleet Air Arm observer, interned in Stalag Luft III 1940-45.
• Charles de Gaulle — French general and political leader, captured at Verdun, POW 1916-1918
• Dieter Dengler — a United States Navy pilot who escaped a Pathet Lao prison camp in Laos
• Jeremiah Denton — Awarded the Navy Cross for resistance in captivity during the Vietnam War
• Roy Dotrice — British actor
• John A. Dramesi — U.S.A.F. Colonel. Vietnam. POW. Lead the only organized escape from the Hanoi Hilton with Edwin Atterberry. Last living multiple recipient of the Air Force Cross.
• Werner Drechsler — killed by fellow German POWs during World War II for informing on other prisoners
• Sir Edward "Weary" Dunlop — an Australian surgeon and legend among prisoners of the Thai Burma Railway in World War II
• Clive Dunn — British Dad's Army actor, captured following the Battle of Greece in 1941 and held in German captivity until the end of World War II
• Yakov Dzhugashvili — Joseph Stalin's first son, was captured by Germans early in World War II. lived in Sachsenhausen concentration camp in 1943.

E

• Denholm Elliott — British actor

G

• Henri Giraud — French general, escaped German captivity in both World War I and World War II
• Ernest Gordon — Japanese POW in World War II, author of "To End All Wars" and former Presbyterian Dean of Princeton University chapel

H

• James Hargest — Brigadier in World War II. Highly decorated New Zealand politician in World War I and World War II. Escaped from captivity into Switzerland.
• Heinrich Harrer — Austrian mountaineer, sportsman and author, detained in British India during World War II until he escaped in 1944, as related in his autobiography Seven Years in Tibet.
• Erich Hartmann — "The Blond Knight of Germany". Number one air ace of all air forces in World War II.
• Jack Hawkins (U.S. Marine Corps officer)
• Rudolf Hess; Deputy Führer of Germany, prisoner-of-war in England 1941-45, before his trial for war crimes.
• Bob Hoover — American World War II pilot, test pilot and airshow performer; captured in 1944 and escaped from Stalag Luft I
• Brian Horrocks; British WW2 general. Prisoner in Germany 1914-1918, Russia 1920.
• Wilm Hosenfeld — Soviet prisoner in World War II, most remembered for saving Polish pianist and composer Władysław Szpilman from death in the ruins of Warsaw.

J

• Andrew Jackson — Seventh President of the United States, captured in the American Revolutionary War as a thirteen-year-old courier.
• Charles R. Jackson — captured in Battle of Corregidor and notable for memoir I Am Alive: A United States Marine's Story of Survival in a World War II Japanese POW Camp.
• Stanley D. Jaworski — Polish POW freed by American soldiers.
• Harold K. Johnson — U.S. Army Chief of Staff 1964; captured at Bataan (1942–1945).

K

• Bert Kaempfert — German Orchestra conductor in World War II at a Danish prisoner of war camp.
• George Kenner — German artist interned as a civilian POW in Great Britain and the Isle of Man during World War I. Documented his experience in 110 paintings and drawings.
• Tikka Khan — Japanese POW during World War II, Chief of Army Staff of the Pakistani Army.
• Wajid Khan Canadian politician — former Pakistan-India War 1971 fighter pilot.
• Yahya Khan — German POW during World War II, last president of a united Pakistan.
• Tadeusz Bór-Komorowski — Commander of the Polish Home Army in the Warsaw Uprising.
• Gustav Krist — Adventurer and traveler, Austrian soldier in World War I, captured by Russians in 1914. Interned in Russian Turkestan.
• Sam Kydd — British actor.

L

• George Lascelles, 7th Earl of Harewood; Captured in Italy 1944, one of the Prominente (celebrity inmates) at Colditz.
• Desmond Llewelyn — went on to a notable acting career, most famously as Q in the James Bond film series.
• Jessica Lynch — American servicewoman during the Iraq war.

M

• Keith Matthew Maupin — captured on April 9, 2004. Date of murder unknown. Remains found March 30, 2008.
• Charles Cardwell McCabe — a prisoner and chaplain at Libby Prison during the American Civil War.
• John McCain — American political leader and Republican nominee for president in 2008, prisoner for over five years in Vietnam.
• Olivier Messiaen — French composer.
• George Millar — Journalist, British soldier, SOE agent, writer.
• Dusty Miller — Executed for his faith during internment under the Japanese in Thailand in 1945.[2]
• François Mitterrand — French president, captured during World War II in 1940, escaped 6 times before arriving home in Dec. 1941.
• W. H. Murray — German POW during World War II, Scottish mountaineer.

N

• Airey Neave — British politician made the first British home run from Colditz on 5 January 1942.
• A. A. K. Niazi — commander of Pakistan Army in East Pakistan who surrendered along with nearly 93,000 prisoners.

O

• Richard O'Connor; British General who commanded the Western Desert Force 1940-41.

P

• Friedrich Paulus — German field marshal, surrendered Stalingrad to the Soviets in 1943
• Donald Pleasence — English film and stage actor. Was shot down while serving in the RAF during World War II, taken prisoner, and placed in a German prisoner-of-war camp. He later acted in the film The Great Escape.

R

• Pat Reid — non-fiction/historical author.
• James Robinson Risner — USAF Brigadier General. First living recipient of the Air Force Cross.
• Yevgeny Rodionov — Russian soldier captured by rebel forces in Chechnya and beheaded for refusing to convert to Islam.
• Giles Romilly; Nephew of Winston Churchill, war correspondent, celebrity prisoner-of-war (Prominente) in Germany 1940-45.
• James N. Rowe — Colonel, U.S. Army Special Forces, held by the Viet Cong from October 1963 until December 1968. One of only thirty-four U.S. soldiers to escape captivity in Vietnam. Author of Five Years to Freedom. Assassinated by the New People's Army in the Philippines on April 21, 1989.

S

• Jean-Paul Sartre — French philosopher and writer, POW 1940-1941.
• Kazuo Sakamaki — First POW captured by U.S. forces in World War II.
• Ronald Searle — English cartoonist.
• Léopold Senghor — Senegalize writer and political leader, captured 1940 in France.
• Gilad Shalit — Israeli soldier captured in 2006 by Hamas. He was released in a prisoner exchange on October 18, 2011.
• Vladek Spiegelman — Polish private captured by Germany on September 1, 1939, father of Art Spiegelman
• William Stacy — lieutenant colonel of the Continental Army, captured during the Cherry Valley massacre; General George Washington attempted to orchestrate a prisoner exchange for Lt. Col. Stacy but was unsuccessful.[3]
• James Stockdale — candidate for Vice President in 1992; decorated member of the U.S. Navy; POW in Vietnam.
• E W Swanton — captured by Japanese in Singapore; after war, was renowned BBC sports commentator.

T

• Floyd James Thompson — America's longest-held POW; he spent 9 years in POW camps in Vietnam (1964 — 1973).
• Josip Broz Tito — president of Yugoslavia, Austrian soldier in World War I, captured by Russians in 1915.
• András Toma – Last known WWII POW. A Hungarian soldier, he lived in a psychiatric asylum in Russia for 55 years after being captured. He was identified and returned home in 2000.
• Jakow Trachtenberg — A Russian Jewish mathematician who developed the mental calculation techniques called the Trachtenberg system.
• Mikhail Tukhachevsky — Soviet military leader and theorist, captured by Germans in World War I.

U

• Charles Upham — Most decorated Commonwealth soldier of World War II. Awarded the Victoria Cross twice.

V

• Laurens van der Post — South African writer and war hero, captured by Japanese forces in 1942.
• Wing Commander Abhinandan Varthaman- Indian Air Force Pilot captured by Pakistan Army during Indo - Pak standoff in Feb 2019, his aircraft mig 21 was shot down by Pakistan Air Force after he shot down a pakistani f16 which was a much better plane then his in aerial dogfight, was held captive in Pakistan for 60 hours later released at wagha border after warnings from India and the chief of army staff of United States of America.
• Dietrich von Choltitz; German general, military governor of Paris. Prisoner-of-war in England 1944-45, then in American custody till 1947.
• Walther von Seydlitz-Kurzbach — German general captured at Stalingrad.
• Kurt Vonnegut — American writer; captured in the Battle of the Bulge and witnessed the Bombing of Dresden in World War II.

W

• Jonathan Wainwright — Commanding General U.S. forces in Philippines; captured at Bataan (1942–1945).
• George Washington — first U.S. President, captured in 1754 by the French during the French and Indian War.
• D. C. Wimberly — POW in World War II from Springhill, Louisiana; educator and a past commander of American Ex-Prisoners of War.

Z

• Louis Zamperini — American athlete, member of Olympic team, captured by Japanese forces in 1943.[4]

References

1. Sir Winston S. Churchill (10 December 1899), The Boer War: London to Ladysmith via Pretoria and Ian Hamilton's March, Bloomsbury, p. 70, ISBN 9781472520838
2. Gordon, Ernest. (2005). Miracle on the River Kwai. Royal National Institute of the Blind. p. 173. OCLC 939628465.
3. Sparks, Jared: The Writings of George Washington, Vol VII, Harper and Brothers, New York (1847) p. 211.
4. Hillenbrand, Laura (2010). Unbroken: A World War II story of survival, resilience, and redemption. New York, NY: Random House. ISBN 978-0-81297-449-2.