The Password Is Courage (Ballantine Books)

by John Castle

Book Overview

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• Format: Mass Market Paperback
• ISBN: B00BAHNGTE
• Release Date: January 1955
• Publisher: Ballantine Books
• Weight: 0.95 lbs.

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I read this book as a boy and re-read it as an adult

The Password is Courage is a great book. It is written in the style of the 1950's which means that the violence that Sgt. Major "Charlie" Coward must have seen is more hinted at than harped on as it would be in a modern rendition. That provides the service of allowing youngsters to read this book. Even so, as a kid I remember being scared by the story that I read. I cannot imagine having to live the story as Coward, in fact, did. Having just re-read the book, it is interesting to see a different reaction. I am mesmerized by the chances that this man took and the dangers he exposed himself to. I guess I did not understand them as a kid when they seemed more cartoonish. The story of Auschwitz is better known to me now so that wasn't really a surprise but the almost casual violence of everyone in the book (including Coward himself at times) is more shocking. All told, I recommend this book to anyone over the age of ten. It seems to me that while we know more about the Holocaust in this day and age, we appreciate it less. This book brings it to a personal level by telling the story of someone who sneaked into Auschwitz looking to bring out a fellow countryman. Instead he brought out an unbiased eyewitness account for future generations. It is a shame that Hollywood hasn't rediscovered this story.

True story of the man who broke into Auschwitz

If I understand you correctly Jesuil,then you are mistaken. The book was written by John Castle about British Army Sgt Major Charles Coward an Englishman from the East End of London. There is a blue plaque outside his house in London. He died I believe in 1976. It tells the story of how Sgt Major Coward was captured by the Germans during WW2 and how he engaged in a series of escape attempts and sabotage. He helped many Jewish prisoners escape from Auschwitz concentration camp and even broke into the camp to search for an English doctor who had been encarcerated there. If you did not know this story is true you would find it difficult to believe. What a hero!

This is a great book, a real page turner.

Sgt. Major Coward's adventures are amazing. Some were depicted in a movie of the same name, but the book reveals much more. While Coward's life in the POW camps was not unlike that described in other books on the subject, his description of life in the POW camp next door to Auschwitz is really incredible. I've never read anything about the Holocaust as evocative as his description of sneaking into the death camp itself for one night. It was almost unbelievable, even to him, as he sat in the dark of the barracks crammed in with the soon to die prisoners. You won't forget this chapter after you've read it. Coward's other escapades are more in the vein of other POW books, with the exception that he succeeded in far more sabotaage than I've read about elsewhere. He not only escaped and was recaptured many times, but while in captivity he had a knack for comitting acts of sabotage that could not be traced back to an individual. Stuff like loosening nuts so rail cars would fall apart AFTER they left the camp. An inspiring story, and try to catch the movie too. Dirk Bogarde does a fine job of recreating the indominitable spirit of Coward. You will want to learn more about Coward after reading this book. I know I do.

Did he really accomplish all this?

...Coward wasa witness in the Holocaust denial case of Canadian Nazi Ernst Zundel.It might serve as a point of reference today in the dispute about thestatus of detainees in Guantanamo's Camp X-Ray.A Google search for Coward brought up only a few mentions, one forthe Zundel testimony and one for a review of this book. The otherswere in other languages.Briefly, Coward was a British army regimental sergeant major who wastaken prisoner by the Germans in 1940. By insisting that the Germanstreat him in accordance with the Hague and Geneva conventions, he wonfavorable treatment as a senior non-commissioned officer and as atrusty. He constantly escaped, citing his rights under the conventionfor the right of escape and pointing out that the conventions limitpunishment to a month of solitary confinement.He took it upon himself to assert the rights and privileges of hismen to the Germans.Held first at a Stalag at Lamsdorf, he was, at last, assigned to Auschwitz.During his frequent walks into town under supervision of a GermanNCO, he managed to buy guns and explosives which were intended forthe Polish resistance but which Coward decided to hand over to theJews in Birkenau. (Coward's account of these trips to town completelybaffled the unbelieving German defense lawyers at a later war-crimestrial.)He also worked out a scheme whereby he would buy Jewish corpses fromthe Germans which he used to help an equal number of live Jews toescape. The currency for all this was coffee, cigarettes, and otherthings that he persuaded his British comrades to give up for a goodcause.He complained through his chain of command about IG Farben'smistreatment of Jewish slave laborers and later testified at thewar-crimes trial of the Farben criminals against Dr. Duerrfeld (whowas acquitted because he knew nothing about gas chambers,extermination, slave labor, or anything else).Apparently, although this is not clear in Castle's book, he waselected to Parliament after the war and was also named a RighteousGentile by Yad Vashem.According to Castle, Coward drew much satisfaction in the nickname hewas given in Auschwitz, the "Count of Auschwitz."I am mystified by a few things in the book, chiefly a run by Americanbombers that dropped leaflets on Auschwitz warning the inmates thatthey were about to be bombed. (One wonders what they were supposed to do, dig air-raid shelters?) And tales of the actual bombing ofAuschwitz made me wonder about Coward's accuracy.Finally, I was surprised by Coward's successful entry into theextermination camp at Birkenau for a day while he searchedunsuccessfully for a British naval surgeon who was supposedly heldthere. I had only heard previously of Jews who had smuggledthemselves into Auschwitz to confirm its horror. (I have writtenabout that in "Mala's Last Words," which is available from me.)But above all, I was taken aback by German observance of the treatiesconcerning the treatment of POWs, although Castle does describe thespecial harassment of Canadian