Franz Freiherr von Werra was born on 13 July 1914, to impoverished
Swiss parents in
Leuk, a town in the
Swiss canton of
Valais. The title of
Freiherr (equal to Baron) came from his biological father,
Leo Freiherr von Werra, who after bankruptcy, faced deep economic hardship. Because his relatives were legally obliged to look after the Baron's wife and six children, his cousin
Rosalie von Werra persuaded her childless friend
Louise Carl von Haber to permit the Baron's youngest, Franz and his sister, to enjoy the benefits of wealth and education. The von Habers did not tell the children their true origin. Werra joined the
Luftwaffe in 1936 and was commissioned a
Leutnant in 1938. At the beginning of the Second World War he was serving with
Jagdgeschwader 3 in the
Battle of France. He became adjutant of II Gruppe, JG 3 and was described as engaging in boisterous 'playboy' behavior. He was once pictured in the press with his pet lion Simba, which he kept at the aerodrome as the unit mascot. Werra scored his first four victories in May 1940, during the Battle of France. Downing a
Hawker Hurricane on 20 May, two days later he claimed two
Breguet 690 bombers and a
Potez 630 near
Cambrai. In a sortie on 25 August during the
Battle of Britain, he claimed a
Spitfire west of
Rochester, and three Hurricanes, as well as five destroyed on the ground for a total of nine
RAF planes eliminated. The details of the actions are unknown, as the incident has not been found in British records.
Capture and escapes On 5 September 1940, Werra's
Bf 109E-4 (
W.Nr. 1480) was shot down over Winchet Hill, Kent. It is unclear who was responsible for this victory, which was originally credited to
Pilot Officer Gerald "Stapme" Stapleton of
603 Squadron. The Australian ace
Flight Lieutenant Paterson Hughes (
234 Squadron) was
posthumously given half of the credit, in
The London Gazette 22 October 1940 citation awarding him a
bar to his
DFC. Some sources suggest that P/O
George Bennions of
41 Squadron may have damaged Werra's fighter before Hughes and Stapleton also scored hits on it. Other sources suggest F/L John Terence Webster of 41 Squadron was the victor. Werra crash-landed in a field on Loves Farm and was captured by the unarmed cook of a nearby army unit. He was initially held in
Maidstone barracks by the
Queen's Own Royal West Kent Regiment, from which he attempted his first escape. He was digging with a pick axe while guarded by
Military Police Private Denis Rickwood, who was armed only with a small truncheon. There is no mention of this escape attempt in the book
The One that Got Away. He was interrogated for 18 days at the London District Prisoner of War "cage"
Trent Park, a
country house in
Hertfordshire which before the war had been the seat of
Sir Philip Sassoon. Eventually, Werra was sent to POW Camp No. 1, at
Grizedale Hall in the
Furness Fells area of
Lancashire, between
Windermere and
Coniston Water. , pictured at
Marden, Kent On 7 October he tried to escape for a second time, during a daytime walk outside the camp. At a regular stop, while a fruit cart provided a lucky diversion and other German prisoners covered for him, Werra slipped over a
dry-stone wall into a field. The guards alerted the local farmers and the
Home Guard. On the evening of 10 October at around 11:00 p.m., two Home Guards found him sheltering from the rain in a hoggarth (a type of small stone hut used for storing sheep fodder that is common in the area). On being removed from the hut he knocked the lamp to the ground, extinguishing the light, then he quickly escaped and disappeared into the night. On 12 October, he was spotted climbing a fell. The area was surrounded, and Werra was eventually found, almost immersed in a muddy depression in the ground. He was sentenced to 21 days of
solitary confinement and on 3 November was transferred to Camp No. 13 in
Swanwick,
Derbyshire, also known as the Hayes camp. In Camp No. 13, Werra joined a group calling itself A.G. (Swanwick Excavations, Ltd.), which was digging an escape tunnel. The tunnel can still be seen at the
Hayes Conference Centre. On 17 December 1940, after a month's digging, it was complete. The camp had forgers who equipped the escape group with money and fake identity papers. On 20 December, Werra and four others slipped out of the tunnel under the cover of anti-aircraft fire and the singing of the camp choir. The others were recaptured quickly, leaving Werra to proceed alone. He had taken along his flying suit and decided to masquerade as Captain van Lott, a Dutch
Royal Netherlands Air Force pilot. He told a friendly locomotive driver that he was a downed bomber pilot trying to reach his unit, and asked to be taken to the nearest RAF base. At
Codnor Park railway station, a local clerk became suspicious but eventually agreed to arrange his transportation to the aerodrome at
RAF Hucknall, near
Nottingham. The police also questioned him but von Werra convinced them he was harmless. At Hucknall, a
Squadron Leader Boniface asked for his credentials and von Werra claimed to be based at
Dyce near
Aberdeen. While Boniface went to check this story, von Werra excused himself and ran to the nearest hangar, trying to tell a mechanic that he was cleared for a test flight. Boniface arrived in time to arrest him at gunpoint, as he sat in the cockpit, trying to learn the controls. Von Werra was sent back to the Hayes camp under armed guard. In January 1941, von Werra was sent with many other German prisoners to
Canada on the , in a convoy departing Greenock on 10 January 1941, guarded by among others. His group was to be taken to a camp on the north shore of
Lake Superior,
Ontario, so Werra began to plan his escape to the
United States, which was still neutral. On 21 January, while on a prison train that had departed
Montreal, he jumped out of a window, again with the help of other prisoners and ended up near
Smiths Falls, Ontario, 30 miles from the
St. Lawrence River. Seven other prisoners tried to escape from the same train but were soon recaptured. Werra's absence was not noticed until the next afternoon. After crossing the frozen St. Lawrence River, von Werra made his way to
Ogdensburg,
New York, arriving several months before the US entered the war and turned himself over to the police. The immigration authorities charged him with entering the country illegally and Werra contacted the local German consul, who paid his bail. He came to the attention of the press and told them a very embellished version of his story. While the U.S. and Canadian authorities were negotiating his extradition, the German vice-consul helped him over the border to
Mexico. Werra proceeded in stages to
Rio de Janeiro, (
Brazil),
Barcelona, (
Spain) and
Rome, (
Italy). He finally reached Nazi Germany on 18 April 1941.
Return and death On his return to Nazi Germany, von Werra became a hero.
Adolf Hitler awarded him the
Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross (). Werra was assigned the task of improving German techniques for interrogating captured pilots, based on his experiences with the British system. Werra reported to the German High Command on how he had been treated as a POW, and this caused an improvement in the treatment of Allied POWs in Germany. He wrote a book about his experiences titled '''' (My Escape from England), although it remained unpublished. On 22 June 1941, German forces launched
Operation Barbarossa, the invasion of the Soviet Union. Two days later,
Oberleutnant Wilfried Balfanz, the commander of I.
Gruppe of
Jagdgeschwader 53 (JG 53—53rd Fighter Wing), was
killed in action. In consequence,
Oberleutnant Ignaz Prestele briefly commanded the
Gruppe until von Werra was appointed the (group commander) on 1 July. At the time, I.
Gruppe was based at
Hostynne. In early August 1941, I.
Gruppe withdrew to Germany to re-equip with the new Bf 109 F-4 at
Mannheim-Sandhofen Airfield. On 20 September, the
Gruppe relocated to the Netherlands where they were based at airfields at
Katwijk, specifically , and
Haamstede where they were tasked with patrolling the Dutch airspace. On 25 October 1941, Werra took off in Bf 109 F-4/Z,
Werknummer (factory number) 7285, on a practice flight. His aircraft suffered engine failure and crashed into the sea near Katwijk. von Werra was presumed killed, though his body was never found.
Hauptmann Herbert Kaminski succeeded him as commander of I.
Gruppe. ==Film==