Every year, thousands of inmates escape from prisons around the world. Of these, most just walk away from minimum-security corrections facilities, but other inmates implement complex, ingenious, and often violent schemes in order to make their getaway. Whether the work of notorious outlaws, WWII G.I.s, or 18th century writers, the following are the top 10 most incredible prison escapes.
John Gerard was a sixteenth century Jesuit priest who is remembered as one of the only people to ever escape from the notorious Tower of London. Gerard was put in the Tower for carrying out his religious missions during a time when the Catholic Church was under persecution in Elizabethan England. He endured frequent interrogations, and despite never breaking even under torture, he was eventually sentenced to death. Gerard immediately began planning an escape, and was able to communicate with allies on the outside via smuggled notes written in an invisible ink made from orange juice. After one failed attempt, Gerard was able to make his escape when some accomplices rowed a boat into the Tower's moat and managed to get a rope up to him. Gerard almost fell to his death because his hands were so injured from torture, but he managed to climb down to the boat and was smuggled out of England to live out the rest of his life in Rome.
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