WELL-KNOWN Malton personality and Gazette & Herald contributor Wilf Wise, who has died at the age of 85, was a modest Second World War hero who kept his bravery almost a secret for more than 40 years.

While in Malton, he ran the family corn merchant business of Headley, Wise and Son for many years after earlier being articled as a solicitor to Pearson and Ward in the town.

A flying officer, Mr Wise helped to guide Allied bombers in to destroy a V2 weapons factory hidden near Stalag Luft 3.

He ended up in Stalag Luft 3 in Sagan, Poland, after the Wellington bomber in Squadron 12 that he was navigating was shot down over the Dutch coast.

Mr Wise, one of two survivors of the crash, regained consciousness to find himself in the blazing wreckage and had to crawl along the struts to escape through a crack in the fuselage.

He had been hand-picked by British Intelligence for undercover work in the event of capture because of his knowledge of German, learned at Malton Grammar School.

His son, Anthony, said his family had been told that if his letters from the camp did not contain a tick in the corner they were to be forwarded immediately to an address where his MI6 handlers could decode the innocent-sounding phrases.

Meanwhile, Mr Wise was involved in building a tunnel beneath the camp latrines into a potato field outside the wire.

Months before the mass escape - made famous by the Hollywood film "The Great Escape" - he led a successful breakout on March 6, 1943, disguised as a French workman.

But he found himself in Stalag Luft 3 after being spotted by a Prussian officer. He was interrogated by the SS and Gestapo.

While at Stalag Luft 3, his son revealed: "He had discovered there was a V2 factory in the woods near the camp. He included the key phrase which MI6 would recognise and the factory was later bombed."

After the Great Escape, Mr Wise remained in Stalag Luft 3 until it was liberated by the Russians.

After liberation, he was the senior officer and so led 140 British soldiers out through Poland for which he was awarded a military MBE.

While in the camp in 1943, he was made a Flight Lieutenant.

When he eventually arrived back home in Malton, he weighed just seven-and-a-half stones.

He founded the Malton and Norton Lions Club, set up a service to supply fish and chips to Ryedale pensioners, helped found Croft House to provide disabled people with work and accommodation, and was involved in the production of talking books for the blind.

Mr Wise contributed a number of articles to the Gazette & Herald under the pen name Old Maltonian.

He died in Scarborough Hospital and leaves a widow, Helen, and three children, Richard, Anthony and Kim and three step children, Susy, Sarah and Daniel.

Updated: 08:57 Wednesday, July 24, 2002