Transvestia

that the bare stage itself was built on top of a closet underneath a closet in which several of the women put their coats while they were visiting the camp. Apparent- ly the women came down Saturday morning to visit and talk with the soldiers, many of them from different camps in the area, and then left Saturday evening. Some of the girls were regular repeaters but every group included some women or groups of women whom I had not seen be- fore.

After thinking over things, I went to the escape Officer and outlined my plans for escape. I told him what I had seen, that it was possible to break through the ceiling into the closet underneath, and that this was a risky escape but one that would be repeated several times if we were successful. When I finished telling him, he appeared somewhat blank, and when I saw his look, I said "the point is Sir, that all we have to do to escape is to disguise ourselves as women". Each Saturday two or three of us can join the busload of women, and leave the place. The Germans would never think of ex- amining women to find an escaped prisoner, especially if they took care with their disguise. In effect all we had to do to get a nearly foolproof escape scheme was to learn to be girls. The escape Officer said it seemed a rather impossible task, but to go to it. First I cut a hole through into the closet below, carefully concealing the results of my work, and then I began the most diffi- cult part, that of passing myself off as a girl.

I discussed my plans with George. We also let the director of our local amateur theatricals into our plot and he cooperated by casting each of us in female parts in the upcoming play. The first problem was to get a costume. The hair part was not too difficult. My hair was already quite long, as was that of most of the other prisoners; George and I proceeded to let it grow out fur- ther, developing a sort of page boy style which had been popular with the girls before we were captured. The costume people set about making costumes for each of

us.

The play was designed to include a part in which a contemporary costume would be suitable for each of us. Luckily one of our fellow prisoners had been a de- signer before the war, and he designed a rather smart suit for each of us to wear out of surplus uniforms. The Ger-

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