num_pages: 272
description: Tall young pilot Geoffrey Rothwell flew Wellingtons and Short Stirlings in WWII; and anyone who knows anything about that task will understand the significance of the fact that he completed more than 60 bombing missions. But the story doesn't end there: as a Flight Commander on No. 138 (Special Duties) Squadron Geoff dropped agents and supplies into enemy-occupied Europe. On his 71st mission he crashed in Holland and became a guest of the Third Reich in the freezing Stalag Luft 1 on the Baltic coast. He starved, but survived until the moment a drunken Russian officer on a white horse arrived to invite the prisoners to a night of revelry in the local village. As a member of Bomber Command, Geoffrey is one of the last of the many; as an SOE pilot he is the last of a very few. This is his amazing story.
title: Last Man Standing: Geoffrey Rothwell: Survivor of 71 Bombing Missions, POW and the Only Surviving SOE Pilot
publisher: Amberley Publishing