HistoryPoints News

Nov 7, 2021

Cross-dressing PoW's last arrest


The First World War was nearly over when a German lieutenant, well known for his convincing female impersonations, handed himself in at Cardiff Central police station. He had once escaped from ...

his Prisoner of War camp by dessing and behaving as a woman. After his third and final escape from the Wakefield camp, in October 1918, it was thought he could be passing himself off as a woman in London. He aroused no suspicions when he checked into a Cardiff hotel as a man, assumed to be just another commercial traveller. But the next morning he surrendered to police at Cathays Park and was soon on his way back to Yorkshire under military escort. For more on this story, use your mobile to scan the HistoryPoints QR codes on the lamp-post outside the Crown Court building (where the police station was located in 1918). Or click here