Alfred John Evans MC & Bar (1 May 1889 – 18 September 1960) was an English amateur cricketer, soldier and aviator.
After crash landing behind enemy lines on the Western Front, Evans was made a prisoner of war by Germany.
After an unsuccessful escape attempt, Evans succeeded for the second time when he bribed an Ottoman doctor to declare him sick and eligible for a prisoner swap.
Evans was born at Highclere in Hampshire in May 1889; his father, Alfred, had been a master at Winchester College and had founded Horris Hill School in 1888.
[5] He was replaced as Oxford captain during his final year in 1912 by Richard Twining, with Evans making a further five appearances for the university,[5] and having considerable success.
[5] Having graduated with a Second Class degree in history, he was offered a teaching position at Eton College on the condition that he first spend a year in Germany.
There, he became fluent in German during his year in the country,[1] but only taught at Eton for one year before leaving to begin a business career in industry with Edward Lloyd & Co.[6] Though he did not feature in first-class cricket in 1913, Evans made two appearances in 1914, for the MCC against Oxford University and for the Free Foresters against Cambridge University.
[14] Wisden remarked that the occasion of Test was "perhaps rather too big for him",[15][13] whilst other reports suggested that he was "so nervous that his knees were knocking together... his nerve had gone and the first straight ball did for him".
[1] Despite having led Kent a respectable fourth-place in the County Championship, he resigned the captaincy at the end of the season and was succeeded by Geoffrey Legge.
[23] At the outbreak of the First World War Evans was approached to join the newly founded Intelligence Corps, having been identified as a good candidate as a result of his year spent in Germany after graduating from Oxford.
[1] He initially joined the mounted section of the Corps, but was injured in a motorcycle accident in France in September 1914, returning to England after to recuperate.
The squadron was the first to use aerial photography to record details of enemy positions with observers, such as Evans, taking images at low altitudes, often whilst under fire.
In September 1915 he was awarded the Military Cross for continuing to observe whilst his aircraft was under attack from an enemy plane and was also Mentioned in Dispatches.
[1] In early 1916 he became a pilot and was active spotting German artillery positions during the Battle of the Somme flying a Morane Parasol.
[1] After being transported to Germany, was made a prisoner of war (POW), initially at Gütersloh,[24] before being moved to Clausthal three weeks later along with other captured airmen.
[26] Following his recapture he spent two weeks in solitary confinement, he was sent to Ingolstadt in Bavaria, where other officers who had made unsuccessful escapes were interned.
[13] They donned disguises to make them blend in with the local population,[29] and then spent the next 18 nights walking toward the Swiss frontier,[1] arriving near Lake Constance.
[37] Upon being transferred to Amman, Evans learnt that he was to be sent to the German Luftstreitkräfte airfield at El Afule, which would bring him to within 40 miles (64 km) of friendly lines during part of the journey.
[13] After nearly 60 hours without food and drenched from heavy rainfall, he sought shelter and sustenance in a Jewish household, agreeing with that they could hand him over to the Ottomans the next morning if they allowed him to stay.
[22] With conventional escape proving difficult, Evans instead decided to bribe a doctor to have himself declared sick in order to be included in an exchange of officers between Turkish and British troops.
[6] Following the war, he was transferred to the unemployed list in February 1919,[22] and in December of the same year he was awarded a bar to his MC for his many escape attempts.
[1] Having been commissioned into the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve in January 1940 as a pilot officer,[43] he ended the war as a wing commander and was awarded the American Bronze Star Medal.