Great Escape Forger - The Work of Carl Holmstrom POW #221 An Artist in
Stalag Luft III written by Susan Holmstrom Kohnowich and published by
Pen & Sword Books - £25 - Hardback - Pages 168
As one of many artists confined in Stalag Luft III, Carl Holmstrom’s superb artwork depicts life as a
Kriegie created with the perspective only a prisoner of war could draw upon as an eyewitness to
history. He spent the majority of his captivity in that camp made famous by The Great Escape, later
made into an award-winning film.
While a POW, he sketched his fellow prisoners and encouraged others to take up drawing as hobby, thus breaking the boredom of camp life. But his artistic ability proved to be even more important. Carl forged invaluable official German documents for escape purposes for other prisoners—work that was tedious and painstaking. Remarkably, he saved over 200 examples of his work by carrying them on the appallingly-arduous 1945 winter march through Germany when the camp was evacuated as the Russians closed in from the east
Post-war, Carl Holmstrom said, ‘The drawings were made during imprisonment and represent a sincere effort to portray to the American people and especially to the relatives of the prisoners, intimate glimpses of Kriegie life.’ His words proved to be prophetic.
His daughter, Susan Holmstrom Kohnowich, spent five years working on an expansion of Carl’s earlier self-published Kriegie Life book. Extensive research went into the write-ups under the drawings and the biographies of the men in the portraits. This superb book honours Carl’s exceptional artistic gift. Indeed, it has a strong claim to contain the finest collection of POW art to emerge from Nazi-occupied Europe.
I found this book the Great Escape Forger, to be stunning both in history and the huge amount of information to learn and the fantastic artwork throughout the book. Carl Holmstrom was a prisoner of war at Stalag Luft III which would later be made famous by the film the Great Escape. What the book does is take you through the everyday life of living in a POW camp from washing, cleaning, eating, social clubs and also the planning of an escape and all that would involve. People would need to do various jobs in order to support an escape attempt and Carl was responsible for forging German documents like passports, identity cards & papers.
Susan Holmstrom Kohnowich has done her father proud with this book as it is put together well, and what we learn is closely partnered with some great artwork all drawn by her father. As someone who is an avid reader of history, I have learnt so much about life in a POW camp from this book. I would highly recommend this book for sure as POW camps are an interest of mine. This book has also made me want to find out more about the art of Carl Holmstrom, the pictures of the prisoners and camp staff at the back of the book are just brilliant.
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