Prisoner Regimes and a Transnational History from Below

Enemy combatants captured in wartime are both a potential resource for their captors and logistical security nightmare. This has long been reflected treatment. Over the centuries, enemy have sold as slaves (or simply used slave labour), forced to switch sides, ransomed money, swapped other prisoners, physically maimed ensure they could no longer fight, starved death, imprisoned under abysmal conditions, or outright massacred. And yet, surprisingly, at times (including period covered by this book), most prisoners of war – though not, Morieux shows, all not only had protected status but, especially case officers, allowed degree freedom movement that seems extraordinary modern-day standards.