@gregjlewis.bsky.social
Author ‘Defying Hitler: The Germans Who Resisted Nazi Rule’ #Aberfan #ShadowWarriors. TV producer #truecrime #ColdCaseForensics #SteeltownMurders #PembrokeshireMurders. Loves cinema. Rep: Andrew Lownie
Bringing a true story to life
When RAF airman and evader John Evans told me that one of his helpers had been saved on the ‘Ghost Train’ he set me off on the trail of a fascinating story. I finished writing John’s story and began to read and research about this new one. This presented a new set of…
‘On account of sabotage… we were liberated.’
Confused, I asked John what Florent meant. How could ‘sabotage’ save what Florent claimed was 1,500 lives?
‘Ah, that was le train fantôme,’ John said. ‘The ghost train…’
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How a book journey began greglewisinfo.com/2026/03/07/h...
How a book journey began
This is the man who first roused my interest in the story that would become my new book, ‘The Nazi Ghost Train’. His name was John Evans, and he was a wonderfully kind and brave man with a remarkable story of his own. A Halifax bomber pilot, he was shot down in May 1944…
The Nazi Ghost Train up and running on Amazon.
An epic tale of action & adventure, uncovering a story of airmen on the run and resistance heroes carrying out espionage & sabotage.
Betrayed, they all face the same fate: a concentration camp.
#publicationday
@TheMirrorBooks
Thanks, Anders. I know, a very powerful letter. He was only 20!
The Nazi Ghost Train is part of the display at the London Book Fair.
On the Mirror Books stand close to Terry Venables and Helen Flanagan.
It's out TODAY!
#lbf #LondonBookFair2026 #writers #readers #books
Lancaster pilot Kevin McSweeney was only 20 when he wrote this to his family back home in Bomaderry, New South Wales.
'We are the premium that has to be paid to insure freedom for the future.'
It was his last letter home before found himself shot down... and on the run.
#theNaziGhostTrain #books
Missing in action... two airmen from 'The Nazi Ghost Train'.
Halifax pilot Stuart Leslie, of the RCAF, and Flying Fortress top turret gunner Bill Muse, from North Carolina.
While their families worry, their future lies on the 'ghost train'.
...His wife Erika was arrested & their daughters Uta (13) & Adelheid (5) were put in a children's home.
Thankfully, they escaped prolonged punishment & were reunited with their mother.
Tresckow's sons, Rudiger &Mark, were allowed to stay in the army.
Mark died in 1945, aged 17.
German officer Henning von Tresckow & his family.
Having served with distinction in Poland & France, Tresckow become disillusioned with the Nazis and began to plot to assassinate Hitler.
He killed himself after the failure of Operation Valkyrie.
But what of his family...?
Thank you Mirror Books for promoting 'The Nazi Ghost Train' in newspapers across the UK this weekend.
And thanks to my friend Lawrence for collecting the cuttings.
(PS Did you know that with a library card you can read newspapers on Press Reader?)
How my friendship with a wonderful man named John Evans, an RAF pilot and evader, led to my new book, ‘The Nazi Ghost Train’.
(I'll try to tell you John's own story some time this week.)
#WW2 #book
greglewisinfo.com/2026/03/07/h...
How a book journey began
This is the man who first roused my interest in the story that would become my new book, ‘The Nazi Ghost Train’. His name was John Evans, and he was a wonderfully kind and brave man with a remarkable story of his own. A Halifax bomber pilot, he was shot down in May 1944…
Odette Sansom said goodbye to her three young daughters and volunteered to become an SOE agent in Occupied France.
Captured, tortured, and imprisoned in a solitary cell in Ravensbruck, she managed to return to her family.
In August 1946, she was awarded the George Cross.
Yvonne Cormeau, who survived for more than a year as an #SOE wireless operator in Occupied France. Incredibly important and dangerous work.
She also paid this tribute to the ordinary French folk who helped her - risking their lives to allow her to transmit from their home.
#WW2
One week to go!
It's very disappointing World Book Day couldn't be arranged to coincide with the publication of my new book. It's NEXT Thursday everybody! Filled with real life heroes: courageous UK, US, and Canadian airmen; amazing men and women of the Resistance and evasion lines; and SOE…
It's very disappointing World Book Day couldn't be arranged to coincide with the publication of my new book. It's NEXT Thursday everybody.
Filled with real life heroes: airmen; Resistance men & women; and SOE saboteurs.
And, an horrific traitor. Pretty much worse than anyone you could make up.
WW2 heroes.
Courier Andrée Borrel arrived in France in 1942 to work for SOE circuit leader, Francis Suttill.
Posing as a brother & sister, they recruited new agents, organised air drops, & carried out sabotage.
Betrayed, she was executed in Natzweiler-Struthof concentration camp.
Tragedies of war
War is often treated as an adventure or an exciting news story but the things people see in war often affect them for life. This is a glimpse into one man's horror. It took place in April 1942 when two RAF Squadrons headed for besieged Malta on the US aircraft carrier Wasp. The…
Dignity and courage: the face of Violette Szabo on the wonderful memorial on London’s Albert Embankment which pays tribute to all #SOE agents as well as the Maquis and the heroes of Telemark. #WW2
An exceptional agent and his mysterious death
Just over a week after the end of the war in Europe a car driven by a German soldier who had worked at Flossenbürg concentration camp was involved in a car accident. In the other vehicle was a Welsh-born officer named Major Jacques de Guélis. A…
The B-17 saved by a “miracle”
It's six years since I first posted this incredible story, so I wanted to share it with you again. In the summer of 1978 two former members of a B-17 crew met to discuss their escape from death in a raid on Kassel in Germany in 1943. Sitting on a porch in Tarrytown,…
Some film #books on the shelf. Two actor-producers.
Also stars of two of the greatest war films - Zulu and The Train.
Some film #books on the shelf. Four actors I always enjoy watching.
Some film #books on the shelf. Stories of cinema...
(PS the George MacDonald Fraser is wonderful entertaining.)
(PPS Its title has nothing to do with cinema.)
WW2 heroes.
Born into a life of privilege in Minnesota, Betty Pack's marriage to a British diplomatic took her to Spain & Poland, where she was recruited by the British secret service. While working for OSS in the US she carried out an audacious “black bag” op to steal codes from a foreign embassy.
Some film #books on the shelf. Leading men...
One of the finest #WW2 agents against the Nazis: Baltimore-born Virginia Hall was trapped in Paris in 1939. Fleeing to London she joined SOE (& later OSS).
Despite having lost her left leg from the knee down, she became one of the Gestapo’s most-wanted enemy agents.
One of the finest #WW2 agents against the Nazis: Baltimore-born Virginia Hall was trapped in Paris in 1939. Fleeing to London she joined SOE (and later OSS).
Despite having lost her left leg from the knee down, she became one of the Gestapo’s most-wanted enemy agents.
Andrée Borrel, a working class French woman, arrived in France in 1942 to work for SOE's Francis Suttill.
Posing as a brother & sister selling farm products, they recruited agents, organised air drops & carried out sabotage.
Betrayed, she was executed in Natzweiler-Struthof concentration camp.