Patrick has 150 articles published.
Immediately after the landings at Wolfheze, the British troops were confronted with a problem that they had to deal with for days: poor communication via the radios. Two things are often mentioned as the main reason for the poorly functioning radios: the radios were equipped with the wrong crystals and the wooded area of Arnhem…
In essence, the plans for Operation Market Garden boiled down to the idea of dropping more than 10,000 soldiers 70 miles behind the front line and race towards them as quick as possible with tanks in two days. As it turned out, Market Garden was far too ambitious. The resistance of the German troops turned…
“Thank God Operation Comet was called off. It would have been a disaster.” British General Shan Hackett’s assessment of Operation Comet is clear. Hackett and Polish General Stanislav Sosabowski strongly opposed the plan underlying Operation Market Garden. ‘Operation Comet’ is the name of a plan that British General Bernard Montgomery came up with on September…
While plans for Market Garden were being drawn up in England, the German army leadership had its own thoughts about how the Allies would like to advance in early September. Field Marshal Walter Model, the German commander-in-chief in the area, was firmly convinced that the Allies would attempt to break through the Siegfried Line east…
The air raid siren in Arnhem had already gone off several times in the morning of Sunday, September 17, but each time it had been a false alarm. But from a quarter to eleven it was a hit. Dozens of military targets in Arnhem and the surrounding area were hit by Allied bombers until approximately…
An underexposed aspect of the Battle of Arnhem is the impossible task that the 1st British Airborne Division faced on the first day of the landings. In the first version of the plans for Operation Market Garden, all British paratroopers would land in the operations area near Arnhem on the first day of the operation.…
More than 12,000 British and Polish airborne troops whose aim was to capture the Rhine Bridge near Arnhem in one day. That is pretty much the image that many people have about the purpose of the British airborne landings near Arnhem on September 17, 1944. That is incorrect. Because there were insufficient aircraft available, only…
In addition to John Frost’s battalion, there was another British unit that managed to reach the Rhine Bridge on Sunday, September 17, albeit badly damaged. Those were the men in the jeeps of the 1st Airborne Reconnaissance Squadron. The 1st Airborne Reconnaissance Squadron was known within the British airborne forces as the ‘Freddie Gough Squadron’,…
On Sunday, September 17, the first day of Operation Market Garden, a total of 3 battalions of the 1st Parachute Brigade advanced to Arnhem. Only the 2nd Battalion led by John Frost reached the bridge in Arnhem that evening. The 3rd battalion stopped at the Hartenstein hotel in Oosterbeek. The 1st Battalion fought the heaviest…
Around 8 p.m. on Sunday, September 17, 1944, the first British soldiers reached the Rhine Bridge near Arnhem. To their surprise, the British discovered that the bridge was not defended by German soldiers. In the confusion after the airborne landings, the German army leadership had forgotten to send soldiers to the Rhine Bridge. After several…