Prisoner-of-war camp

A prisoner-of-war camp is a site for the containment of enemy combatants captured by a belligerent power in time of war. It is similar to an internment camp which is used for civilians. Purpose built prisoner-of-war camps appeared at Norman Cross in England in 1797 and HM Prison Dartmoor, both constructed during the Napoleonic Wars and they have been in use in all the main conflicts of the last 200 years. The main camps are used for soldiers, sailors, marines, coast guards, and more recently, airmen of an enemy power who have been captured by a belligerent power during or immediately after an armed conflict. In addition, non-combatants, such as merchant mariners and civilian aircrews, have been imprisoned in some conflicts. With the adoption of the Geneva Convention on the Prisoners of War in 1929 and later superseded by the Third Geneva Convention, prisoner of war camps have been required to be open to inspection by authorized representatives of a neutral power. Not all belligerents have consistently applied the convention in all conflicts.

Prisoner of war

A prisoner of war (POW, PoW, PW, P/W, WP, PsW, enemy prisoner of war (EPW) or "missing-captured") is a person, whether combatant or non-combatant, who is held in custody by a belligerent power during or immediately after an armed conflict. The earliest recorded usage of the phrase "prisoner of war" dates to 1660.

Belligerents hold prisoners of war in custody for a range of legitimate and illegitimate reasons, such as isolating them from enemy combatants still in the field (releasing and repatriating them in an orderly manner after hostilities), demonstrating military victory, punishing them, prosecuting them for war crimes, exploiting them for their labor, recruiting or even conscripting them as their own combatants, collecting military and political intelligence from them, or indoctrinating them in new political or religious beliefs.

Ancient times

For most of human history, depending on the culture of the victors, enemy combatants on the losing side in a battle who had surrendered and been taken as a prisoner of war could expect to be either slaughtered or enslaved. The first Roman gladiators were prisoners of war and were named according to their ethnic roots such as Samnite, Thracian, and the Gaul (Gallus). Homer's Iliad describes Greek and Trojan soldiers offering rewards of wealth to opposing forces who have defeated them on the battlefield in exchange for mercy, but their offers are not always accepted; see Lycaon for example.

Camp Concordia

Camp Concordia was a prisoner-of-war camp that operated from 1943-1945. Its location is two miles north and one mile east of Concordia, Kansas. The camp was used primarily for German Army prisoners during World War II who were captured in battles that took place in Africa.

Camp Concordia was the largest POW camp in Kansas, holding over 4,000 prisoners (some sources cite as high as 8,000 prisoners). The camp consisted of a complex of 300 buildings and was staffed by 800 United States soldiers.

Daily life

The prisoners arrived at Camp Concordia by train. Authorities believed the soldiers could provide useful labor for agriculture, and, almost immediately, the Germans started working with local farmers.

Interactions between prisoners

At least two reported cases of executions are recorded, both were made by prisoners on fellow prisoners (some of whom were Gestapo agents. When conclusive evidence arose, the offenders were tried and sentenced to the federal penitentiary at Leavenworth.

X Company (TV series)

X Company is a Canadian/Hungarian spy thriller television series created by Flashpoint's Mark Ellis and Stephanie Morgenstern which premiered on February 18, 2015, on CBC Television. The series takes place during World War II, and follows five recruits as they are trained as secret agents at a Canadian training facility near Lake Ontario and then sent out into the field. On March 4, 2015, CBC renewed the series for a second season with ten episodes, two more than the first season of eight.

Cast

Production

X Company had been an idea being considered for over a dozen years by creators Mark Ellis and Stephanie Morgenstern. They made a short film entitled Remembrance which did well enough on the festival circuit to encourage them to develop a feature script which eventually became X Company. Originally titled Camp X, the series was filmed in Budapest, Hungary, from August to October 2014, and is a Canadian-Hungarian co-production. X Company is inspired by the real spy training facility, Camp X, which was located between Whitby and Oshawa, Ontario, Canada.

World War II

World War II (WWII or WW2), also known as the Second World War, was a global war that lasted from 1939 to 1945, although related conflicts began earlier. It involved the vast majority of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis. It was the most widespread war in history, and directly involved more than 100 million people from over 30 countries. In a state of "total war", the major participants threw their entire economic, industrial, and scientific capabilities behind the war effort, erasing the distinction between civilian and military resources. Marked by mass deaths of civilians, including the Holocaust (in which approximately 11 million people were killed) and the strategic bombing of industrial and population centres (in which approximately one million were killed, and which included the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki), it resulted in an estimated 50 million to 85 million fatalities. These made World War II the deadliest conflict in human history.