You are now listening to World War 2 Stories. I'm your host Steve Matthews. Today, I'm going to tell you about one of the most extraordinary battles of World War II - a battle so unusual, so contrary to everything we understand about that conflict, that it sounds like Hollywood fiction. Yet it happened.

In the final days of the war in Europe, American soldiers fought alongside former German Wehrmacht enemies to protect French VIP prisoners from fanatical SS troops. It was the only time during the war when Americans and Germans served as allies on the battlefield - a remarkable footnote to history that deserves far greater recognition.

This is the Battle of Castle Itter - a medieval fortress in the Austrian Alps that became the setting for an unlikely last stand as the Third Reich crumbled around it.