9H1 were visited by Alex Franks, a 93 year old war veteran, as part of their English studies based on ‘The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas’.
Alex had been a British prisoner of war during WW2 and recounted many of his experiences.
Alex enlisted in the army at the age of 20 and was part of the Eighth Army ‘Desert Rats'. He was stationed in North Africa as an Ambulance Driver and was later captured by Germans in 1942.
He spent the rest of the war in Prisoner of War Camps in Italy and Germany; surviving poor conditions and starvation. Alex retold many anecdotes of his brushes with death.
Alex informed students of a time in which he found himself surrounded by five unexploded bombs that later exploded when they were removed by Australian soldiers.