Arnhem

by William F Buckingham

  As the house was tumbling he came on the air and, in a clear and controlled Scots voice, went through the proper procedure for closing down control and passing those duties to an out-station. What he did was straight out of Signals Training – All Arms, and this while the building was literally coming down around him.71

  The fight for 2 Battery’s position also saw the destruction of the sole Tiger II lost in the Oosterbeek fighting by schwere Panzer Abteilung 506, at the hands of two men from C Troop. A Tiger and Sturmgeschütze attached to Kampfgruppe von Allwörden approached the east of 2 Battery’s position from the direction of the Weverstraat near the junction with the Benedendorpsweg and brought C Troop’s gun pits and Command Post under intense machine-gun fire at around 11:00. The latter consisted of a slit trench with overhead cover, occupied by Gun Position Officer Lieutenant Adrian Donaldson with Lance-Bombardier Percy Parkes and Gunner Christie manning the Troop wireless sets. Lieutenant Donaldson left the trench and collecting Lance-Bombardier James Dickson en route, crawled 100 yards under intense machine-gun fire to a 6-Pounder gun with a dead crew. The pair brought the gun back into action. After firing eight or nine rounds the gun was demolished by a direct hit that rendered Donaldson unconscious, although Dickson was able to move him into cover. When Donaldson recovered his senses the two men crawled back across the bullet-swept ground to one of C Troop’s 75mm Pack Howitzers, also with a dead crew, where Dickson fired the four armour-piercing rounds there and then continued to bore-sight, load and fire the gun’s supply of HE ammunition at the Tiger single-handedly, while Donaldson collected three more armour-piercing rounds from another gun pit. Dickson fired off two of these rounds, one of which blew off the tank’s right track, before the gun jammed; he then collected a PIAT from C Troop’s vehicle park and attacked the Tiger again, reportedly without success. The source of the damage is unclear, but the immobilised vehicle also sustained damage to the muzzle brake of its 88mm gun and caught fire at some point. The two Gunners eventually withdrew to 3 Battery’s location as German infantry overran 2 Battery’s gun pits, although Donaldson returned later in the day to ensure no wounded had been left behind and removed the sights and breech blocks from the abandoned guns. Lieutenant Donaldson was awarded the Distinguished Service Order for his part in the incident and Lance-Bombardier Dickson the Military Medal.72

  The survivors of 2 Battery withdrew into the nearby woods and the attackers then pushed south across 1 Battery’s location to surround the adjacent Regimental HQ, obliging the HQ personnel to withdraw to 3 Battery’s Command Post after destroying their equipment.73 The fighting pushed deeper into LONSDALE Force’s positions as the day progressed, drawing in the Parachute Battalion contingents straddling the Benedendorpsweg and the South Staffords dug in south of the road by the early afternoon. The Airborne soldiers appear to have been equal to the task of dealing with their opposite numbers as noted by the 11th Parachute Battalion, which reported that it had ‘engaged the [German] infantry with bren [sic] and rifles, and handled them severely’.74 The real problem was the tanks and assault guns that accompanied them as pointed out in the 2nd South Staffords War Diary: ‘our PIAT amn was completely exhausted – and all but one of the ATk guns were out of action, so that further prolonged defence particularly against enemy armour was out of the question.’75 In the event the day was saved by the 5.5-inch guns of 64 Medium Regiment RA and possibly other artillery units from 30 Corps. It is unclear precisely who called in the guns, although the 64 Medium Regiment War Diary and Urquhart’s biography suggests it was the 1st Airborne’s CRA, Lieutenant-Colonel Robert Loder-Symons.76 Whoever was responsible, the Medium Regiment began its involvement in the fight by shelling a point south of the Benedendorpsweg 300 yards east of the Oosterbeek Old Church at 13:35, followed ten minutes later by shelling the junction of the Benedendorpsweg and Kneppelhoutweg 400 yards north-west of the Old Church, reportedly in response to a ‘Main attack developing’. A target dubbed MZ39, presumably in the vicinity of the Old Church, was engaged at 14:50 and again at 15:15, on the latter occasion ‘repeated with everything available [as] requested by 1 A/B Div. Situation quite serious’. This was presumably the point where Lieutenant Donaldson and Lance-Bombardier Dickson had gone after the Tiger, after which the German assault appears to have ebbed. Lieutenant-Colonel Loder-Symons’ station informed 64 Regiment that the attack had ‘more or less died down’ and that a Tiger tank had been disabled at 15:56. The hiatus appears to have been temporary, however, given that MZ39 was hit once more at 16:55 and 17:11 in response to ‘1 Tiger tank re-attacking’ and again at 17:34, 18:35 and 19:30 in response to German attacks.77

  The general consensus on the Airborne side was that 30 Corps’ artillery had saved the day: ‘The position was becoming desperate when a stonk from 30 Corps artillery came down exactly in the right place, on whose orders I don’t know.’78 However, the close-quarter nature of the fighting also made the artillery assistance a double-edged sword. The 1st Parachute Battalion reported that the enemy mortar and artillery fire ‘was made more unpleasant because many British shells from south of the river were landing in our area, but these did providentially quieten the tanks’.79 The 2nd South Staffords War Diary was more direct: ‘Things looked rather serious until 25 pdrs and medium guns from south of the river laid down a barrage in front of the forward troops. It was in fact uncomfortably close and we suffered some casualties from our own shell fire but the Germans had got pretty close too and the barrage completely broke up their attack.’80 This was not quite the end of the matter for the South Staffords however, as some of the retreating enemy infantry occupied a partially demolished house around fifteen yards from the Glider Soldiers forward post, provoking a sharp but inconclusive exchange of hand-grenades. When this failed to dislodge the interlopers one of the South Staffords’ officers persuaded a functioning and still manned 75mm Pack Howitzer, possibly from 3 Battery, to put a HE round into the building at a range of seventy yards. The house promptly collapsed in a shower of dust and sparks with only one of the occupants being seen to escape. The Gunners then employed their 75mm guns, presumably from the Airlanding Light Regiment’s 3 Battery given that the other two Batteries had been overrun, to drive off some tanks that began firing into the rear of the South Staffords’ positions; the departure of the vehicles was seen as the ‘final crisis’. The dead from the fight included Major John Simonds, OC of HQ Company, who commanded the contingent of South Staffords dug in south of the Old Church.81

  While the tenacity of the Airborne troops and the efficiency and accuracy of the Gunners played a key role in holding the German attack on the south-eastern aspect of the Oosterbeek perimeter on 25 September, it is important to acknowledge an additional factor. The fight at Oosterbeek was existential for the 1st Airborne Division ‒ but this was not the case for their opponents. Once II SS Panzerkorps had blocked and secured the approaches to the Arnhem road bridge and Heeresgruppe B had implemented measures to seal off the Airborne corridor south of the Lower Rhine it became a matter of secondary importance, and the German units involved were left largely to their own devices. The elements of 9 SS Panzer Division were badly understrength from the outset, and while the patchwork of Heer, Kriegsmarine, Luftwaffe and SS units drafted in during the first two or three days of the battle were largely up to strength, the majority lacked infantry experience and their numbers were rapidly whittled down when they came into contact with the aggressive and more tactically adept Airborne troops. Thereafter there was little significant reinforcement, which consisted primarily of armour from Sturmgeschütze Brigade 280 and Panzer Kompanie 224, which arrived on 19 and 20 September respectively and schwere Panzer Abteilung 506, which arrived on the 24th; foot reinforcements included the Luftwaffe Bataillon Worrowski and the amalgamated Pionier Lehr Bataillon z.b.V. and Pionier Bataillon 26 arriving on 21 and 22 September.82 As a result 9 SS Panzer Division and Kampfgruppe von Tettau had sufficient armour and infantry strength to make inroads into the Airborne perimeter but lacked su
fficient manpower to properly exploit or indeed hold onto any gains made. This explains the German pattern of fighting during the hours of daylight and then withdrawing with the onset of darkness, which repeatedly allowed the Airborne troops a breathing space to rest and reorganise in readiness for the next assault the following day. The pattern continued almost up to the end of the battle for Oosterbeek, although it shifted slowly as attrition and compression of the Airborne perimeter began to tilt the odds toward the attackers, and there was a switch to night attacks just as the remnants of the 1st Airborne Division executed its withdrawal across the Lower Rhine. This in no way devalues the skill, tenacity or courage of the Airborne soldiers who had achieved more than ought to have been militarily or humanly possible in their defence of the Oosterbeek perimeter, but it does explain why they were able to hold out as long as they did in the face of seemingly overwhelming German strength.

  The 1st Airborne Division had pretty much reached the end by this point and its ability to withstand more attacks on the scale of Monday’s assault was doubtful; indeed, Urquhart had already furnished 1st Airlanding Brigade HQ ‘with a warning of what action was to be taken in the event of the Div being overrun’ the previous day.83 It was therefore not before time when Operation BERLIN was scheduled to take place that night.

  ***

  On the south bank of the Lower Rhine Lieutenant-General Horrocks’ intentions for 25 September remained largely the same as they had been since 30 Corps had established the bridgehead north of the River Waal six days earlier. The Guards Armoured Division, with 69 Brigade still under command, was tasked to capture Bemmel and ‘continue to operate northeast to push the enemy out of range of [the] Nijmegen bridge’ in order to permit reinforcements and supply transport to make full and unfettered use of the crossing. The 43rd Division was tasked to ‘complete the capture of Elst’, conduct the evacuation of the 1st Airborne Division and 4th Dorsets across the Lower Rhine including a deception operation, to ‘reconnoitre and plan’ for a possible crossing on the stretch of the Lower Rhine between Renkum and Wageningen, six miles west of Oosterbeek, and to hold a brigade in reserve.84 As the link-up of 214 and 69 Brigades to the south of Elst effectively pinched 129 Brigade out of line, Major-General Thomas elected to withdraw 129 to form the reserve as instructed, but not before the 4th Wiltshire ascertained that the Germans had abandoned their positions blocking the way to Bemmel, which they had occupied since 21 September.85 214 Brigade secured Elst with the support of the 4th/7th Dragoon Guards’ Sherman tanks in the course of a day of ‘protracted and bitter’ fighting, during which two Tiger tanks and six Panthers were reportedly knocked out. The vehicles were presumably from schwere Panzer Kompanie Hummel and SS Panzer Regiment 10.86 The town was finally secured by the 1st Worcesters, with their opponents withdrawing north toward Arnhem; 214 Brigade then pushed out patrols to around a mile east of the Arnhem‒Nijmegen railway line.87 The latter was also the scene of a potentially fatal miscalculation during the afternoon by D Company, 5th DCLI. Suspicious of a number of rail freight carriages abandoned on the line outside Elst, D Company brought them under fire with an anti-tank gun. It transpired that the stationmaster in Elst had placed the carriages outside the town because they were loaded with German ammunition. The subsequent explosion destroyed the carriages, flattened a stretch of the railway embankment and demolished several nearby houses in which British troops were sheltering from the rain; it is unclear if the incident caused any friendly casualties.88

  In Driel, Major Tonn’s 1st Battalion and the contingent from the 3rd Battalion rejoined the Polish Brigade after their planned crossing in the wake of the 4th Dorsets was cancelled at 04:00, with Brigade HQ issuing instructions as to the positions the newcomers were to occupy an hour later; the newcomers passed cigarettes and ammunition to their predecessors.89 In the event the aborted crossing with the 4th Dorsets proved to be the final direct Polish involvement in MARKET GARDEN, for at midday a Warning Order from Airborne Corps HQ put the Brigade on stand-by for a move to an unspecified new location for an unspecified task at 09:00 the following day; it also announced the intention to evacuate the north bank of the Lower Rhine, with further details following at 17:30. Major-General Sosabowski was shocked at the imminent unexplained redeployment of his Brigade as he had expected to be involved in a further crossing attempt, but he nonetheless disseminated the Warning Order to his Battalion heads at a Commander’s Conference at 18:00, which was confirmed by 43 Division an hour later.90 There was no let-up in the heavy German mortar and artillery bombardment of Driel however, which caused the Polish paratroopers ‘heavy casualties’. One shell scored a direct hit on the building occupied by the Brigade Staff but there were no casualties as an earlier near miss had prompted the occupants to withdraw to the cellar. The exception was Major-General Sosabowski who was asleep in an upstairs room: the shell actually detonated in the room but the Polish commander somehow escaped unscathed.91

  To the west of Driel 130 Brigade remained in place around Brigade HQ at Homoet making fruitless attempts to contact the 4th Dorsets on the north bank. A Major Eyre assumed command of the bulk of 4th Dorsets Battalion south of the river in Lieutenant-Colonel Tilley’s absence, and he gave an overall briefing on the upcoming evacuation at 15:00. A Captain Hall was to be despatched to the north bank to co-ordinate with the contingent there, who were to be ferried back to a sorting area set up in an orchard near the riverbank from where wounded personnel were to be evacuated for treatment, while the able-bodied moved to the Company locations occupied before the crossing effort. The route from the sorting area was marked with white tape with each Company supplying guides to attend the sorting area and during the afternoon the Battalion Intelligence Section took over an observation post on the riverside overlooking the planned crossing point.92 130 Brigade’s left flank was secured by 43 Reconnaissance Regiment with the 12th King’s Royal Rifle Corps from the 8th Independent Armoured Brigade Group under command, and the newly withdrawn 129 Brigade also appears to have been located in the same vicinity. According to the British official record and the 43rd Division account Lieutenant-Colonel W.G. Roberts’ 5th Wiltshire was assigned overall responsibility for the deception operation, although a more recent source refers to it being carried out under the auspices of 43 Reconnaissance Regiment.93 Whoever was in charge, the deception involved gathering a collection of mortar and medium machine-gun platoons carried on Bren Carriers accompanied by several empty DUKWs and a number of vehicles from an unidentified bridging train carrying pontoons and other bridging equipment. The column openly approached the Lower Rhine at the village of Heteren, three miles west of Driel, as dusk fell and then spent an hour firing mortars and assorted machine-guns across the river to create the impression that another crossing was being mounted.94 The effect upon the Germans on the north bank is unknown, but the idea and execution certainly impressed the instigators. The 43rd Division’s semi-official account claimed: ‘The deception undoubtedly gave the impression that the crossing attempted the previous night was being repeated further west and thus contributed to the success of the withdrawal.’95

  Preparations to receive the Airborne evacuees once they reached the south bank of the Lower Rhine were underway. At 09:00 the commander of the 1st Airborne Division’s 1,000-vehicle Seaborne Echelon, Major R. D. Sellon, was summoned to a conference at 1st Airborne Corps HQ at Nijmegen.96 The plan was to set up a transit area at a barn on the southern outskirts of Driel close to a Casualty Clearing Post (CCP) manned by 130 Field Ambulance, where the evacuees would be provided with blankets and hot food before being transported to a larger reception centre in Nijmegen.97 Major Sellon was placed in charge of organising the reception centre and was instructed to set up and staff it sufficient to clothe, feed and accommodate 2,000 men.98 Two adjacent buildings, either schools or hostels depending on the source, were commandeered in the eastern outskirts of Nijmegen for the purpose. One of the buildings was capable of accommodating 1,200 men and the other, dubbed the ‘Pagoda’
due to the shape of its roof, had a capacity of 800. Major J. A. Jessop and Major J. C. H. Eyles, Adjutant of the 1st Parachute Brigade and the Deputy Assistant Adjutant & Quartermaster General (DAA&QMG) of the 4th Parachute Brigade respectively, were assigned responsibility for the larger building while Major W. A. Balmer, DAA&QMG to the 1st Airlanding Brigade, was allotted the smaller.99 By 15:00 blankets, clothing, rations, GS rum and stretchers, the latter presumably for use as makeshift beds, had been delivered to the reception centre from 30 Corps stocks while the transit area was visited an hour later by Major Henry Richard, the commander of the RAMC detachment from 1st Airborne Division HQ’s Seaborne Echelon.100 All preparations were complete by 22:00, including arrangements at the reception centre for ‘preliminary documentation to find out the names and units of survivors’.101