Before Seibert (escape #7) or Beese (escape #8) had been captured, yet another prisoner made a "delivery" for freedom. At the 6 o'clock PM roll call on Saturday, October 11, officers discovered a prisoner was missing. Col. Penrose immediately instituted an inquiry as to who was missing and his whereabouts. Before the next morning, camp administration had learned which prisoner had escaped and had prepared a description for nationwide release. 

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This time, in what would become the last War Prison Barracks No. 2 escape, it was a German named Jack Schmidth. It was said he could speak English perfectly and went by the surname of Smith. Schmidth disappeared from the camp between 2-6pm the day before, Friday, October 10. He was 27 years old and a construction worker. Penrose said he had been at the prison camp a year and a half and during this had no record of any trouble. He evidently was the well-behaved type who observed every detail and stored the information away for just the right time. Guards were completely puzzled as to how the prisoner got away. A check was made of the stockade fence, but no breach was found. In essence, he just vanished. 

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In the late morning of the next day, a machine (automobile) pulled up to the Fort Oglethorpe post administration building (which was the wrong place to go because the War Prison Barracks administration building was on the site of the stockade a half mile further north). Turns out Schmidth was being driven back to prison by a man named C. P. Bradley, resident of Summerville, GA. Bradley had first grown suspicious of Schmidth in a diner in Summerville, and then followed the man after he left the restaurant and began walking down the railroad tracks. Bradley confronted the man on the tracks, who initially denied that he was an escaped prisoner until Bradley showed him his newspaper picture. At the sight of this, the man confessed that he was the escaped prisoner. 

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During the hour or more drive from Summerville to Fort Oglethorpe, Schmidth told Bradley that he had hid in a mattress that was being carried out of the stockade. Bradley said he asked Schmidth why he escaped, to which Schmidth replied that he had been "mistreated" by one of the guards. He went on to say that he had been trained by his country for spy work in Japan. Schmidth also said he had authored and translated to English a book titled "The Man Behind the Gun." (Note: a search of WorldCat found no such title attributed to this prisoner's name.) Schmidth also admitted that he had been arrested in New York City but had escaped and made it to Austin, TX, where he was arrested again before being sent to the prison barracks at Fort Oglethorpe. Bradley said he did not tell him why he was arrested. (Schmidth's enemy alien index card was located in the National Archives. Not only does it show a different spelling than the original press release, which is not uncommon, but it shows his residence as "W. TEX." and "ALIEN ENEMY, detained E. WISC.") Just before reaching the fort, Bradley said the prisoner asked him not to tell anyone about what he had told him. Clearly, we would not have the details of the conversation in the car ride if Bradley had not told a reporter, or more likely Col. Penrose's staff during any questioning, and who then told the reporter. ​

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