Oflag XVII - A Oflag XVII - A , was a German Army World War II prisoner - of - war camp for officer s ( " Offizierlager " ) located between the villages Edelsbach and Döllersheim , in the district of Zwettl in the Waldviertel region of north - eastern Austria . Camp history . The camp was originally built as barracks for troops taking part in military exercises in " Truppenübungsplatz Döllersheim " , which with an area of , was the largest military training area in central Europe . It had been created by the German Army in 1938 , and some 7 , 000 inhabitants of 45 villages were removed and resettled . The barracks were enclosed by a barbed - wire fence and watchtowers to form a camp approximately 440 by 530 metres , and was opened in June 1940 to house officers , mostly French , captured in the Battle of France , as well as several hundred Poles . Approximately 6 , 000 officers and orderlies were in the camp . The guards were mainly Austrian army veterans and conditions in the camp were better than in many other POW camps in Germany . The POWs lived in barrack huts that were divided into two dormitories each housing around 100 men , with a small kitchen and a washroom between them . There was a separate shower block , and prisoners were allowed two showers a month . Part of one barrack was set aside for use as a chapel . POW activities . The prisoners were encouraged to occupy their time productively . They formed a choir and a theatre group , and built their own sports ground , the " Stade Pétain " . One of the most popular activities were the lectures at the " Université en Captivité " , headed by Lieutenant Jean Leray , formerly a mathematics professor at the Université de Nancy . The University awarded almost 500 degrees , all of which were officially confirmed after the war . Leray lectured mainly on calculus and topology , concealing his expertise in fluid dynamics and mechanics , fearing being forced to work on German military projects . He also studied algebraic topology , publishing several papers after the war on spectral sequence s and sheaf theory . Other notable figures of the University were the embryologist Étienne Wolff , and the geologist François Ellenberger . The syllabus also included such subjects as law , biology , psychology , Arabic , music , moral theology , and astronomy . The prisoners produced a weekly newspaper , " Le Canard en KG " . " KG " is the German abbreviation for " Kriegsgefangener " ( " Prisoner of War " ) , and in French this was pronounced as " Le canard encagé " ( " The Caged Duck " ) , a reference to the popular satirical journal " Le Canard enchaîné " . A more clandestine production was the 30 - minute film entitled " Sous Le Manteau " ( " Under The Cloak " ) , directed by Marcel Corre . It was shot on 14 reels of 8 mm film on a camera hidden inside a hollowed - out dictionary , and recorded scenes of daily life in the camp , including prisoners at work on one of the 32 tunnels , totalling over in length , that were dug during the camp ' s lifetime . The Great Escape . The prisoners established an open - air theatre , the " Théâtre de la Verdure " and were allowed to decorate it with branches and greenery , partially obscuring the view of the guards . After protests by the International Red Cross that the camp lacked protection against air raids , the prisoners were given shovels and wheelbarrows to dig slit trench es , and in one by the theatre they started a tunnel which eventually stretched for out and under the wire . On the night of 17 September 1943 a large group of prisoners escaped . Most posed as French civilian workers , of whom there were many in Germany at the time . Their disappearance went unnoticed the next day , so the next night another group escaped , a total of 132 men altogether . Some of the first escapees were recaptured and returned to the camp before the escape had even been discovered by the camp authorities . Only two of the escapees managed to return to France . Soon afterwards a delegation of high - ranking German officers inspected the camp , and the prisoners were warned that " escaping is no longer a sport " . Six months later , after 76 Allied airmen escaped from Stalag Luft III , 50 were summarily executed . Liberation . On 17 April 1945 , the camp was evacuated in the face of the approaching Red Army . The prisoners were marched towards Linz , some to the west . The column generally covered less than a day , and steadily diminished in size as prisoners took advantage of the dense forests to slip away . By May 10 , when news of the German surrender reached them , half the POWs had vanished . The camp was liberated by the Russians on 9 May 1945 . Post - war . In the immediate post - war period the camp was used by the Soviets to hold German Army prisoners . From early 1946 the Soviets began to use the military training area themselves , and at its peak there were up to 60 , 000 Russian soldiers stationed there . Following the end of the Allied occupation in 1955 the area was taken over by the Austrian Army , and in 1957 around was returned to civilian ownership , while the remainder remains under military control as " Truppenübungsplatz - Allentsteig " .