The Battle of Itter Castle - the strangest battle of World War II (9 photos)
In the final days of World War II, five days after Hitler shot himself in the forehead in his bunker, one of the strangest and yet most heroic battles unfolded in the Austrian Alps. 
Itter Castle, a picturesque hilltop fortress, was used by the Nazis as a prison for high-value French prisoners of war. But when the guards fled in panic, these seasoned politicians refused to surrender. 
They took up arms and stood shoulder to shoulder with the Americans. And the German Wehrmacht. Against the SS. Yes, they fought on the same side, and it all ended with an unexpected tennis serve. 
Paul Reynaud
After Nazi Germany annexed Austria in 1938, Schloss Itter was confiscated from its owner. On Himmler's personal orders, it was converted into a luxurious prison for high-ranking prisoners. 
Édouard Daladier
Former French prime ministers Paul Reynaud and Édouard Daladier (the same one who signed the Munich Agreement), legendary generals Maxime Weygand and Maurice Gamelin, and tennis star Jean Borotra languished here. 
Josef Gangl, a Wehrmacht major, died shielding former French Prime Minister Paul Reynaud.
It all began on May 4, 1945, when three Sherman tanks belonging to Lieutenant John Lee rolled up to the castle. At that very moment, Wehrmacht Major Josef Gangl, who had defected and was aiding the Austrian Resistance, made contact with the Americans, waving a white flag. They had the same plan: to save the French. 
When the SS guards, learning of the approaching US army, fled in panic, the French prisoners armed themselves with abandoned rifles and met the American tanks in the driveway. 
Jean Borotra
At dawn on May 5, the Nazis returned to seize the castle and execute the hostages. A combined force of Lee, Gangl's anti-Nazi soldiers, and armed French politicians engaged the elite SS units. 
This was the only battle in world history where Americans, French, and Germans fought side by side against a common enemy. Incidentally, it was tennis player Borotra, disguised as a peasant and jumping over the fortress wall, who brought in reinforcements. 
