Arnhem

At her house in Oosterbeek, Marie-Anne had the dismaying experience of seeing large numbers of British soldiers heading her way from the direction of Arnhem. ‘We cannot be certain what they are doing, but we are afraid they are retreating.’ Two asked to come in and went upstairs to set up a look-out post. ‘They remain in Mummy and Daddy’s bedroom. When they come down again, we ask them if they want to wash. They like that, as they are very dirty. We fry some potatoes for them, with apple sauce. They tell us their names are Len and Gerald. Len is thirty and married with two boys. Gerald is twenty-one, married but has no children. Neither of them has had any sleep for three nights.’ The two soldiers passed the word, and soon others came by to refresh themselves. ‘They are very grateful for the opportunity. One of them gives me a dark red scarf. They are all very nice boys.’

At the van Maanens’, the cellar was prepared for the night with mattresses on the floor and a cushion under the window for the dog. ‘We fill the bath, buckets and tins with water. Anything combustible is taken out to the garage.’ Suitcases were stowed under the stairs, along with brother Paul’s accordion, in case a quick getaway was needed. Anje headed outside with more tea for the soldiers in their slit trench. ‘When is Monty coming?’ she asked for the umpteenth time. ‘In a quarter of an hour,’ they say. ‘We stop and strain our ears and imagine we can hear the tanks in the distance, but it is not true and the waiting goes on. I help a soldier with a sprained ankle to walk to the hospital. He has come from Arnhem on this foot and collapsed in front of our house. More and more people are arriving from there. They say corpses are lying everywhere and there is fighting all over the place. The bridge is no-man’s land. It must be like hell.’

That night, the van Maanens and the Aalbers, a dozen of them in all, crammed into the candle-lit cellar. ‘Some of us go to sleep right away, in spite of the stuffiness and the tension. But with such a crowd you cannot expect to be comfortable. Eventually, everyone is settled and sleeps, or at least pretends to. Then, at midnight, we all stir, and some start to toss about. I get up and go upstairs for some fresh air. Outside, I look up at the stars and the scarlet sky. There seems to be fire everywhere around us. Paul and I go to the top of the house and look out hoping to see Monty’s army. There are an awful lot of lights out there. That must be Monty now. We rush downstairs to tell everyone the good news and with a feeling of reassurance we go to sleep again.

‘From time to time I am woken by funny little sharp cracks outside, around the house, as if someone is throwing gravel on the pavement. Most peculiar. Maybe it’s pistol shot. I hear thunder in the distance and shooting. Out there, thousands of men are wide awake, fighting for our freedom …’

Liberation still seemed the likely outcome – the Germans would be forced away again and the Allies would win this battle. After all, even if Monty’s army was more enquired about than actual, some reinforcements had come. The day before, everyone had thrilled to the sight of more British parachutists and gliders arriving in open ground to the west, a bit further out from where the original landings had been. Anje had noted excitedly ‘thousands of aeroplanes filling the sky and all sorts of coloured parachutes dropping – red, blue, white, orange, green, yellow, like a bunch of flowers. We wave and jump around.’ Marie-Anne was excited too, as also were the soldiers in her house. ‘It is a magnificent sight to see those large gliders landing and red, white, blue and green parachutes bringing more munitions and food.’ And men. Surely they would turn the tide back in the Allies’ favour? This second ‘lift’ of parachute and glider troops would make all the difference, wouldn’t it?

It was always part of the Market Garden plan to drop troops into the Netherlands. There was no other choice. The Allies simply did not have enough transport planes and glider tugs to get a total of 34,000 men, 2,000 vehicles, 568 guns and 5,000 tons of equipment behind enemy lines in one go. If Arnhem had been the sole objective of the operation, then a single lift would have been possible, but the Americans also had to be fed into the Eindhoven and Nijmegen areas on day one in order to secure the ‘carpet’ for the land forces to get to Arnhem. This, however, restricted the number of planes available to the British for their initial assault and therefore the number of men they got on the ground in the early stages. It was a crucial compromise that, in the event, jeopardized the entire mission. The second lift should have turned the tide of the battle in favour of the Airborne, but it was in trouble before it even began.