6 Clever Escapes

People frequently find themselves in situations that, well, they'd prefer not to be in. Here are six clever escapes throughout history. 

 

The Tower of London served as a notorious jail throughout a sizable portion of England's history. John Gerard, a troublesome Jesuit priest, was one among those imprisoned and he bravely escaped in 1597. Gerard discreetly slipped past the guards in the hallway and began chiselling away at the stones around his cell door. He then went to a wall that overlooked the moat. A boat that had been arranged by a sympathetic prison officer was waiting below. Gerard was given a rope by the boatmen, which he fastened to a cannon before sliding down it and across the moat to safety. 

 

The term "shipping out" refers to Henry ("Box") Brown, an American slave who mailed himself free from servitude. Brown made the decision to make his own escape after learning that his wife and kids had been sold to a slave owner in another state. In order to convey himself by rail from Virginia to the Pennsylvania Anti-Slavery Society in Philadelphia, Brown had two friends help him build a wooden box that was three feet long by two feet broad with an airhole. Brown arrived in Philadelphia a free man despite spending a portion of the arduous 27-hour voyage upside down. 

 

As part of its efforts to exert more control over the area, which it saw as a territory, China made an attempt to assassinate the 14th Dalai Lama, who was at the time Tibet's ruler and spiritual leader. The 23-year-old holy man hid himself as a soldier out of fear for his life and vanished among the masses that had assembled to guard him. The Dalai Lama and his tiny group eventually made it from Tibet to safety in India by only travelling at night. 

 

Alcatraz Island was regarded as impenetrable during its many years of operation as a federal prison. Even if a prisoner managed to sneak past the strongly fortified guard towers and barbed wire fences, he would still have to cross the chilly, turbulent San Francisco Bay without a boat. Nevertheless, countless convicts over the years made the decision to try their luck, and the majority of them either perished or were recaptured as a result. 

 

But in 1962, during one of Alcatraz's most memorable episodes, inmates Frank Morris, Clarence Anglin, and John Anglin managed to escape. To get access to an unguarded utility corridor, the trio spent months stealthily chipping away at the concrete surrounding the air shafts in their cells. To conceal their labor, they filled the holes they dug with a paste formed from wet paper. After extensive preparation, the men finally made their move on June 11. 

 

Morris and the Anglin brothers escaped through the ventilation system to the roof, where they down the bakery smokestack and hopped a fence using painted plaster busts to mislead the night guards into believing they were sleeping in their bunks. On a raft constructed from rubber raincoats and other items, they attempted to traverse the San Francisco Bay beyond the prison gates. It seems they were unable to make it to land, though. Authorities now think that the guys drowned, despite the fact that their remains were never found. 

 

For nearly three decades, the Berlin Wall divided Berlin into East and West. Desperate families were forced to devise creative escape routes because border guards in East Berlin were under orders to shoot anyone attempting to flee to the West. Tunneling was a popular technique, with one tunnel noteworthy for starting in an East Berlin cemetery. A hot air balloon built from of raincoats, sheets, and other materials and propelled by a gas burner, however, may have been the most audacious escape. Two families utilized the enormous balloon to fly high over the Berlin Wall into West Germany on the morning of September 16, 1979. Since then, several films based on their narrative have been produced.

 

One of the most infamous drug lords in Mexico, Joaqun ("El Chapo") Guzmán, was sought after by law enforcement on both sides of the border between Mexico and the United States. Guzmán was finally apprehended after 13 years of evading authorities, and he was given a prison sentence in Mexico. Guzmán shocked the world on July 11, 2015, when he escaped from his cell through a complex mile-long tunnel that connected to a structure outside the prison. Despite a protracted manhunt, Guzmán evaded capture for six months until being apprehended once more. He was later sent to the United States and given a life sentence.