Adam Hart - Operation Pimento

On 14 August 1943, Frank Griffiths took off in a Halifax bomber from RAF Tempsford, the SOEs Special Duty airbase in Bedfordshire.

Frank and his crew were on a daring midnight mission codenamed Operation Pimento, and he had an awful sense of foreboding.

Five hours later, the plane was shot down near Annecy in south-east France.

Five civilians were killed on the ground and six crew died.

Only Frank survived.Wind forward 80 years and Franks great-grandson, Adam Hart, has pieced together what happened that fateful night and in the months afterwards.

For despite being seriously injured, Frank was determined to return to England to continue the fight against the Nazis.

He duly embarked on a perilous, 108-day journey across Europe, hiding in the attic of a brothel, a Frenchwomans chimney and a Spanish prison cell.In Operation Pimento, Hart retraces Franks emotional steps back to the UK, encountering descendants of those whod risked their lives to help his great-grandfather.

While Franks journey was heroic, my journey taught me the ordinary civilians in France and Spain were the true heroes, Hart says.

They risked torture and execution at the hands of the Nazis to help Frank.

When I met the descendants of these people, they shook my hand and even cried in front of me.