Virgil Hilts in 1944.
Virgil Hilts (born in 1911) was an officer of the U.S Army Air Force and prisoner at Stalag Luft III.
Biography[]
Virgil Hilts was born in Oregon in 1911. He played baseball and rode motorcycles when he was at the University. He joined the US Army in 1928. Hilts was a captain when the United States joined World War II.
In 1943 during an incursion in German territory. Hilts was captured and sent to Stalag Luft III as a POW. One of three Americans in the camp, Hilts irritated guards with frequent escape attempts and an irreverent attitude, to the point that he was regularly confined in isolation in the cooler. He had a habit of bouncing a baseball against the cooler cell wall to entertain himself, as he planned an escape attempt. He was liberated in 1945 by the US Army forces.