A Bridge Too Far: The Classic History of the Greatest Battle of World War II by Ryan Cornelius

Author:Ryan, Cornelius [Ryan, Cornelius]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History
ISBN: 9780684803302
Barnesnoble:
Goodreads: 670322
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Published: 1974-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

A Bridge Too Far

Part Five DER HEXENKESSEL [The Witches’ Cauldron]

“Monty’s tanks are on the way!” All along the shrunken Oosterbeek perimeter—from slit trenches, houses now turned into strong points, crossroads positions, and in woods and fields—grimy, ashen-faced men cheered and passed the news along. To them, it seemed the long, isolated ordeal was coming to its end. General Urquhart’s Rhine bridgehead had become a fingertip-shaped spot on the map. Now in an area barely two miles long, one and a half miles wide at its center, and one mile along its base on the Rhine, the Red Devils were surrounded and were being attacked and slowly annihilated from three sides. Water, medical supplies, food and ammunition were lacking or dwindling away. As a division the British 1/ Airborne had virtually ceased to exist. Now men were once again heartened by the hope of relief. Now, too, a storm of fire roared overhead as British medium and heavy guns eleven miles south across the Rhine lashed the Germans only a few hundred yards from Urquhart’s front lines.

By signal, General Browning had promised Urquhart that the batteries of XXX Corps’s 64th Medium Regiment would be in range by Thursday and regiment artillery officers had asked for targets in order of priority.

Without regard for their own safety, Urquhart’s steely veterans had

quickly complied. In good radio contact for the first time, via the

64th’s communications net, the Red Devils savagely called down

artillery fire almost on top of their own positions. The accuracy of

the fire was heartening, its effect on the Germans unnerving. Again

and again British guns

broke up heavy tank attacks that threatened to swamp the bearded, tattered paratroopers.

Even with this welcome relief, Urquhart knew that a massed coordinated German attack could wipe out his minuscule force. Yet now the men believed there was a modicum of hope—a chance to snatch victory at the eleventh hour. On this Thursday, the outlook was slightly brighter. Urquhart had limited communications and a link by way of the 64th’s artillery support. The Nijmegen bridge was safe and open; the tanks of the Guards Armored were on the way; and, if the weather held, 1,500 fresh paratroopers of General Sosabowski’s Polish 1/ Brigade would land by late afternoon. If the Poles could be ferried quickly across the Rhine between Driel and Heveadorp, the bleak picture could well change.

Yet, if Urquhart was to hold, supplies were as urgent as the arrival of Sosabowski’s men. On the previous day, out of a total of 300 tons, R.a.f. bombers had delivered only 41 to the Hartenstein zone. Until antitank guns and artillery arrived in number, close-in air support was critically important. Lacking ground-to-air communications—the special American ultra-high-frequency equipment, rushed to the British only hours before takeoff on D Day, the seventeenth, had been set to the wrong wavelength and was useless—division officers were forced to acknowledge that the R.a.f. seemed unprepared to abandon caution and make the kind of daring forays the airborne men knew to be essential and were prepared to risk.

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