However, they managed to reach the West in their second try, making it out of the country in a highly dramatic feat just before the East German police caught up with them. The two families were ...

When the train reached the Soviet sector check point of Schoenfeld in Berlin, East German police swarmed everywhere in and alongside the train. They pulled six teen-agers and an elderly woman off ...

We were suspended, with no power source, in total darkness. After a long wait with tension mounting, East German police, aggressively armed, boarded the lifeless train and began checking ...