The Strange but True Case of Private Wayne E. Powers

摘要

On 22 March 1958, French police discovered a man concealed under the stairs in a home in Mont d'Origny, France. The man was soon revealed to be Private (PVT) Wayne E. Powers, an American Soldier who had deserted from his unit in mid-December 1944. Since that time, Powers had been hiding out in France and, over the next thirteen years, had fathered five children with the French owner of the home in which he had been caught. What follows is the story of PVT Powers's 1958 trial by court-martial for desertion and its rather surprising aftermath.