Colditz is a small town, c. 36 km SE of Leipzig.  The castle (a ruin in 1430 - 70, but rebuilt) is within the town and was used as a lunatic asylum before and after WWII and an internment camp 1933 - 35, A PoW camp for escapee officers 1939 - 45, called oflag IVC.  The hospital finally moved out in 1996 and most of the 400 rooms are now empty but some contain museum displays and some are to be converted to a restaurant.  The building is now looking for a viable economic future.

We were shown various mostly unsuccessful escape tunnels dug by the French and others. At the liberation in 1945 the Americans and the Russians occupied the two halves of the town, west and east of the river and as a result of the Potsdam Conference, the American / Russian border was moved further to the west, so Colditz subsequently fell entirely within the DDR.

During WWII MI9,  (which was responsible for assisting PoW escapes) discovered detailed plans of the Castle in the British Museum, copies of which were smuggled into the inmates to assist them!