Masters of the Air: what happened to Buck after he was shot down

He vanishes on a mission, no parachutes are spotted, and his squadron mourns him as killed in action. The good news, if surviving a Nazi prison camp counts as good news: he made it. Here's what happened to Buck after he was shot down.

Did Buck Cleven die?

No. The series briefly lets you believe Buck (Austin Butler) was killed over Bremen — the men of the 100th see no chutes and assume the worst — but he survived. Buck and Captain Bernard DeMarco bailed out of their stricken B-17 and came down in occupied Germany. The real Gale Cleven was shot down on 8 October 1943, on his 22nd mission, and the show tracks his story closely.

Captured and sent to Stalag Luft III

After landing — reportedly at a farmhouse, where a furious farmer pinned him with a pitchfork — Buck was captured, interrogated near Frankfurt, and held in solitary confinement before being shipped to Stalag Luft III, a Luftwaffe-run prison camp at Sagan (now Żagań in Poland). His timeline from there:

• 8 October 1943 — shot down over Bremen and captured.
• 23 October 1943 — transferred to Stalag Luft III.
• Days later — reunited with his best friend, John "Bucky" Egan.
• January 1945 — force-marched west through the snow as the Soviets advanced.
• February 1945 — escaped during the chaos and walked back to Allied lines.

The reunion with Bucky

The emotional core of the show is Buck's friendship with Bucky Egan (Callum Turner). After Buck went down, Egan led the vengeful raid on Münster two days later — and was shot down himself, arriving at Stalag Luft III only days after his friend. Buck greeted him with a line lifted straight from history:

"What the hell took you so long?" — Gale Cleven to John Egan, 1943

To pass the endless months, Buck — a maths prodigy in civilian life — taught advanced calculus to his fellow prisoners.

How Buck got home

In January 1945, with the Red Army closing in, the Germans evacuated Stalag Luft III and force-marched the POWs across Germany in brutal winter conditions. In the confusion, Buck and two other airmen slipped away. Twelve days later he reached Allied lines and made it back to the base at Thorpe Abbotts, after roughly 18 months as a prisoner. He had to leave Egan behind — though Bucky survived too.

For the record: the real Gale Cleven went home, married his sweetheart in 1945, flew in Korea and Vietnam, earned a Harvard MBA and a doctorate, and lived to 87, dying in 2006.

The "invincible" reputation his squadron gave him turned out to be earned.