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A Bridge Too Far

Discussion in 'Western Europe 1943 - 1945' started by Ron, Oct 30, 2000.

  1. Erich

    Erich Alte Hase

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    Brian, guess I am a little confused. Did think as your unit was engaged against German Fallschirmtruppen that at least on two occassions you pushed them back into Germany in 45 ?

    ~Ercih
     
  2. sapper

    sapper British Normandy Veteran, Royal Engineers

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    He Erich.
    After Market Garden, we were at MOOK, then we were sent South East down to the battles for Overloon and Venraij in the Limburg area. A battle with no give on either side, For me, the worst bit of Fighting since Sword Beach.

    Incidently, where my war finished. Pure hell fighting amongst the sand and mud, and through the conifer woods. Overloon was swept away under drenching fire from both sides, Not a tree left standing, just shredded stumps. and many friends left behind, Then, to have to tackle the infamous Molen Beek, where even under the water was mined and booby trapped.
    Brian
     
  3. Martin Bull

    Martin Bull Acting Wg. Cdr

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    Fallschirmjager units took part in much of the fighting for Overloon and Venray. Many of the troops had been hastily transferred from elsewhere ( eg flak, Luftwaffe ) but felt great pride at being part of the elite paratroops and fought fiercely.

    This whole area of the war is detailed in the book entitled ( appropriately ) ' The Forgotten Battle - Overloon & The Maas Salient 1944-45 ' by Altes & in't Veld ( Spellmount 1995 ).
     
  4. Stevin

    Stevin Ace

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    I recently read this book. I was amazed at the ferocity of the fighting in Southeast Holland in 1944/45. The winter war of 1944/45 was not as static as the frontlines might indicate. The fighting for the Venlo saillant was very fierce indeed. It was true attrition warfare, which was seen so often on the British/Candadian fronts.

    BTW, the FSJ had a good few divisions in Holland. Also because of (the never launched) Fall Braun, in support of Wacht Am Rhein. Many of these paratroopers were also young, raw recruits. Without any experience and lack of proper training but who gave the Allies a very rough time indeed.
     
  5. Popski

    Popski Member

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    G'day

    Me again saying that Overloon is just around the corner(it is). The Molen beek is now still called Bloedbeek= Blood beek. My past away friend with some friends donated a monument at the bridge of Bloodbeek several years ago and I had the honour of sounding the Last Post there. It is indeed a forgotten battle with one of the larger tank battles in the NW Europe theatre. Also one of the few VC's was won there. A very good book Martin.

    Cheers Popski
     
  6. sapper

    sapper British Normandy Veteran, Royal Engineers

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    Having taken part in the battle for Overloon, the Molen Beek, and then Venraij, it is something that I will not forget in a hurry, The ferocity of the battle with no quarter asked or given was murderous.

    But there is something odd that I will also never forget...being the road was cut behind us, we had to live on on German rations.......YUK The Dutch people at the time of the Molen Beek called it "The Royal Engineers tragedy" I do not know if the name stuck or not?
    We also ran out of cigarettes and used German Cigars. YUK, a cigar leaf wrapped round dried cabbages.....
    I always thought that there should be a medal struck for those that fought at Overloon and Venraij, for it was a murderous battle in amongst the sand and mud of the Conifer woods

    Anyone wishes to talk about that battle? do it now for this old man is getting on in years, That also reminds me, I never did get the award I was promised by my Platoon officer while at the wooden hutted Dutch Youth SS camp, North of Venraij.
    Brian
     
  7. C.Evans

    C.Evans Expert

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    Brian, can I ask of you what all medals were/are you eligable for? Also, I hope I don't sound nosey but, did they ever give you your awards? If not, I know a few collectors that I can get something from that I woulkd like to send to you if possible--as a gift.

    Please let me know--Carl.
     
  8. Popski

    Popski Member

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    G'day

    Brian, I or may I say we can never get enough of the story's veterans can tell us. Your generation can tell it as it was in your point of view. Books can bring you knowledge of the whole picture but the men on the line seldom tell you in books what was the story. For example the little tale of using German cigarettes what must have been ghastly. I live in Helmond what was the big rest centre in the area in the south-east of Holland and are very interested in the local war-history. In the book Martin mentioned it says the battle lasted for about 150 days of fighting in wintertime. Also the frontline changed a lot and villages changed hands several times.
    BTW what was the village called of the SSyouth north of Venraij? I know of a village near Grienstveen but that is south of Venraij in the Peel moor.

    Cheers Popski

    [ 23. November 2003, 04:08 AM: Message edited by: Popski ]
     
  9. sapper

    sapper British Normandy Veteran, Royal Engineers

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    Hi Carl.
    Field Marshal Monty thought that there were not enough awards for good service, and so he then had his own, They were called "The C in Cs commendation", given for the above average service. Mine was promised at that camp, and while we were using that camp as a base to go out on 2 or 3 day and night fighting patrols on the wet lands near the Maas. They can find no trace of that "Monty's Certificate" as they were called

    Popski.
    Hi Mate. You will of course know that it is a very long time ago, surprisingly I can recall a great deal of what happened and "clearly"

    The SS Dutch Youth camp was built in the conifer woods and not near a village as far as I can recall. It was a wooden hutted camp, typical of a military establishment, while we were there, it was badly knocked about but we could get some cover over us when we returned from the patrols out on the deserted villages around the Maas.

    It was the last place that I was at when I was wounded for the second, and last time. I know that the company invited some entertainers to give a concert in that camp, against the rules! for it was in the front line, and no concert folk should have been there,

    After the concert they asked what were the explosions they heard all the time? When told they were German shelling they then had to tell the truth! that they had been into the front line. At that time the company borrowed a piano from a local Dutch family.
    Anything else I can help with?
    Brian
     
  10. Popski

    Popski Member

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    Yes Brian

    Ever been to Helmond in those day's.And if you did what do you remember? As I mentioned it was a sort of rest area, it had a railway a canal and had an airfield built in 1944 with bricks. Maybe you remember the organhall where the dancing was??

    Cheers Pop
     
  11. sapper

    sapper British Normandy Veteran, Royal Engineers

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    Oh dear no...I have been to Helmond. but it was in the middle of a savage war. When I was wounded between Overloon and Venraij, I was taken back to Helmond on an army stretcher, dumped on top of a table or desk with a window looking down on to the backs of some buildings, Quite a large window with a view of the "Backs" of houses. There I was treated by an English nurse. I was severely wounded with spinal fracture, legs smashed, and many bones broken. Left my knee in Holland!

    In those days it would be difficult, if not impossible to imagine what it was like then. The war was taking a terrible toll of our young men, and an even worse one for the German men.

    from there I was taken in an army ambulance back to Eindhoven, on that journey several men were in that ambulance by the time we got to near Eindhoven I was the only one left alive. Then I was taken into..Well, let me try to describe what it was like; here is real war! not the comfy imaginations of heroic deeds, This is what war is really like. Murderous!

    What followed next can only be described as a living nightmare, a nightmare of sheer agony. Put into an army ambulance with other wounded in racks on each side and in a very confined space, the inside had been blacked out so that we had to lay there on our stretchers in pitch black darkness.

    The Journey in this square steel box of an ambulance took us over the uneven and cobbled roads all the way to Eindhoven in the South of Holland. This journey was the nearest thing to hell on earth that it is possible to imagine, with my broken bones grating and the indescribable pain of my back injuries.

    In the beginning, I had been determined not to join in the moaning and groaning with pain, but it was not long before I was crying out in pain just like the other wounded, so much pain that it was not possible to talk to the other men. Hell and back is not an exaggeration. Nor is the term Nightmare, I still find it very difficult to convey just how ghastly that journey was.

    I never knew who the other wounded were, and I do not think it was possible for the others to have survived the journey. As we drove on, the groans had became fainter and fainter and eventually stopped. Yet, still this square steel box of an ambulance, trundled along over the broken and cobbled war time roads with its precious load of three dead men and one nearly dead.

    This is the other side of war, being badly wounded, a side that nobody wants to know about. Arriving at what I think was Eindhoven? I was put into a little cupboard full of cardboard boxes with my stretcher balanced precariously on top of them, with just enough room inside the cupboard, still lying on the same stretcher that I had been on for many hours, during the journey the blood had soaked through everything, even under my back and into the stretcher. So bad, that thick congealed blood stuck me to the stretcher.

    By now the pain had become unbearable, given morphine, the pain would still not subside and a nurse told me, "you must not have more, you will become an addict". Transferred later to a small ward with beds crammed all round the room, several other wounded were there. Trying to get to sleep was impossible, the pain being bad enough, some of the other men kept waking up, screaming.

    Picture this scene, if you can! A small dark, square shaped ward, with all the curtains drawn, dimly lit from a small red light in the centre of the ceilin.

    The overpowering, sickly warm stench of human blood pervaded everything, with beds crammed in and almost touching, men with terrible wounds and with limbs missing. Some men, motionless, wide eyed, still, silently staring at the ceiling. God knows! what thoughts held them in this silent manacled iron grip.

    Blood stains everywhere, some men had thrown the covers off the beds in their agony, some sitting up leaning on an elbow silently gazing into space, the low moaning of men in great pain, your own continuous and unremitting pain of back, leg, and knee injuries.

    Some men talked in their sleep, often in a conversational tone, ending with a scream or a loud shout of pain, or despair. Sleep, because of pain, was only possible for very short periods when exhaustion overtook us, then! To be wakened by the blood curdling screams and shouts of men who had suffered the agony, not only of body, but also of mind.

    Men, who had seen the worst of the hell of war. Dante’s Inferno had nothing on this. For here, was a glimpse into what lay beyond the ‘Gates of Hell’ For me, there is no escape from that vision, for many years I dreamed about, and relived the memory of that dimly lit ward, that ward that still exists in my mind, still there on the pathway that leads to the ’ Gates of Hell’

    Even today, some 59 years on, that ward still remains with me, every detail, sharp and clearly defined. It was a place that any sane person would run screaming from, saying “For Gods sake! don’t make me go back in there”

    Now Popski mate, tell what you think, and how you would react under these circumstances?
    Brian
     
  12. Erich

    Erich Alte Hase

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    Brian......all I can say is........well nothing

    Gripping and that is not even the word I want to use. maybe hellish is termable here as you have said.

    no comment further from me

    ~E
     
  13. C.Evans

    C.Evans Expert

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    Hi Sapper, I agree with Erich, your stories do relate how horrible that war was and I think you for the enlightenment.

    Also, I am sorry about not even getting a Certificate from Monty's HQ. I take it though that you at least got some Battle Stars? and things like that?

    Take care sir--Carl.
     
  14. sapper

    sapper British Normandy Veteran, Royal Engineers

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    Hi Folks.
    Thank you for your views.
    War is pretty drastic, What I have written is a fair description of what it was like to be wounded.

    The Medals? You do not get many of them in the British army. all that I was due, I have. plus others given in recent years as a "Thank you" for the Veterans. But the one I waited patiently for while lying in a hospital bed, never arrived.

    I have tried to find some trace of that but it is 59 years ago. Dead as a dodo now.

    But there are so many things that I have never found out, events and people I helped in Normandy, and never found out what happened to them, or the result of my help.

    Now, if I am honest, I never shall, for I am near 79 and I was one of the youngest. most of the others will be any age from 79 to about 95, there is no way back through the the last 59 years.
    Brian
     
  15. Popski

    Popski Member

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    We'll Brian

    Thank's for your post. War is hell, and your story proofs it. But indeed the smell and suffering is something I hope I'll never see. It is hard imagining how war was. Most veterans will only tell the nice things they went though I think to avoid thinking of what suffering they went through, and about the friends they lost. Being badly wounded you'll have to think of it every day I think. But if it helps you a bit, thanks to you and your mates I am a free man and I thank YOU for it. Maybe this is better than a medal on your chest? ;)

    Thanks Sapper [​IMG] [​IMG] [​IMG] [​IMG]
     
  16. sapper

    sapper British Normandy Veteran, Royal Engineers

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    Hi.#
    IT does not worry me at all to talk about the war in Holland, or anywhere else come to that. I have a friend that says; we have a duty to pass on what it was like so that the younger generation will be aware of the sacrifices made by our young generation.

    I have a very good memory, like most old people I can remember what happened 60 years ago but cannot recall what I had for lunch yesterday.
    Brian
     
  17. C.Evans

    C.Evans Expert

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    Hi Sir, I can easily say that you matter to all of us here.

    Just today, Bish, who if you have not met him here before, is serving in the Royal Army and just got back safely from Iraq.

    I had a frustrating time with our Customs service in that I sent him two packages with some goodies in them only for them to be held up for some months, not forwarded to Bish, then finally sent back to me. I sure hope sending mail in ww2 was not as hard as it is now.

    Take care sir--Carl.
     
  18. BratwurstDimSum

    BratwurstDimSum Member

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    Brian,

    I read your post about the field hospital and the ambo ride. All I can say is I've got misty eyes mate, I knew to disregard movies and pictures that have passed the censor but our post war and gen-X minds still cannot form the images that you put before us. There is simply no equal (nor will there be) for most of us to the hell you went through.

    Can I ask one thing, you mentioned the suffering of the Germans briefly. (Now I must preface this by saying that my posting in the Orador-Sur-Glane thread was taken completely the wrong way and I have since replied to it! :eek: ) but, I am interested to know from a British Vet, how were you treated by the Germans in your experiences? - if you ever came that close.

    I am having a rolling discussion with some collegues of mine about the mutual "respect" between the Germans and the British, that obviously started in the first world war. I belived there was some there but am keen to hear views from someone who was there rather than listen to folklore.

    Also, did this exist between the Americans and the Germans? Again according to propaganda and folklore I believe there was less, your comments again are appreciated Brian. [​IMG]
     
  19. sapper

    sapper British Normandy Veteran, Royal Engineers

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    What took place between the Germans and the British? surprisingly when captured we got on well with the Enemy...Better than with the French, daft is it not. It is fair to say that there was a good deal of respect for the fighting qualities of these two old enemies.

    Of course when you captured a young German you were faced with just another young man not much different from yourself.

    A lot depended on how bitter the battle leading up to their capture.. Often after the battle you would find a German on one end of the stretcher and a Britisher on the other as they collected up their wounded..

    The SS were a different kettle of fish, Where I would light a cigarette, stick it in the Germans mouth..Always grateful! place his hands on his head and send him back on his own..Happy to be out of it.

    NOt so with the SS, They were an entirely different and ugly group, one word out of place from them, and look out. Why? well for no other reason than they shot our men in cold blood. That is Murder. NO British troops would ever forget that. But in the main, we treated them pretty much as we would our own.

    WE had a German Para Doctor that stayed with us for a considerable time treating the wounded from both sides, that was near VIRE.

    There was one thing that made the British more severe than they needed to be..The Hitler edict that "all Commandos captured be shot in the field" Summary execution... Any one on our side (Like me)armed with a commando knife got rid of it, if there was any danger of capture.

    God knows I capture enough of them. many of them in a pretty bad state. Give the poor bastard a fag! and a swig from the water bottle.
    Brian
     
  20. sapper

    sapper British Normandy Veteran, Royal Engineers

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    What took place between the Germans and the British? surprisingly when captured we got on well with the Enemy...Better than with the French, daft is it not. It is fair to say that there was a good deal of respect for the fighting qualities of these two old enemies.

    Of course when you captured a young German you were faced with just another young man not much different from yourself.

    A lot depended on how bitter the battle leading up to their capture.. Often after the battle you would find a German on one end of the stretcher and a Britisher on the other as they collected up their wounded..

    The SS were a different kettle of fish, Where I would light a cigarette, stick it in the Germans mouth..Always grateful! place his hands on his head and send him back on his own..Happy to be out of it.

    NOt so with the SS, They were an entirely different and ugly group, one word out of place from them, and look out. Why? well for no other reason than they shot our men in cold blood. That is Murder. NO British troops would ever forget that. But in the main, we treated them pretty much as we would our own.

    WE had a German Para Doctor that stayed with us for a considerable time treating the wounded from both sides, that was near VIRE.

    There was one thing that made the British more severe than they needed to be..The Hitler edict that "all Commandos captured be shot in the field" Summary execution... Any one on our side (Like me)armed with a commando knife got rid of it, if there was any danger of capture.

    God knows I capture enough of them. many of them in a pretty bad state. Give the poor bastard a fag! and a swig from the water bottle.
    Brian
     

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