General ‘Boy': The Life of Lieutenant General Sir Frederick Browning

by Richard Mead

  With neither Boy nor Walch sharing his concerns, Urquhart commissioned a low-level RAF photo-reconnaissance mission in the Arnhem area which showed tanks and other armoured vehicles within striking distance of the drop and landing zones. He rushed to Boy with these but was fobbed off with a comment that the vehicles were probably not serviceable. Not long afterwards Brigadier Eagger, the DDMS, sent him off on sick leave on the grounds that he was suffering from nervous exhaustion. Before Urquhart left, however, he had conveyed the information to others. On 12 September, in the course of a conference at Moor Park, Urquhart had an opportunity to show the photos to the division’s brigade majors during their intelligence briefing, telling them that there was evidence from Dutch Resistance that the two SS divisions were located between Arnhem and Zutphen but that Boy had dismissed it. A flavour of this emerged in 1 Parachute Brigade’s intelligence briefing on 13 September, which read: ‘A reported concentration of 10,000 troops SW of ZWOLLE on 1 Sep may represent a battle scarred Pz Div or two reforming, or alternatively the result of emptying in ARNHEM and EDE barracks to make room for fighting troops.’ Zwolle, whilst much further away than Zutphen, was still too close to Arnhem for comfort.

  Urquhart was not the only one to be worried. The intelligence about the panzer divisions had been picked up at SHAEF by Major General Kenneth Strong’s G2 (Intelligence) Division, appearing in its weekly summary on 16 September: ‘9 SS Panzer Division, and with it presumably 10, has been reported as withdrawing altogether to the ARNHEM area of HOLLAND: there they will probably collect some new tanks from the depot reported in the area of CLEVES.’ Approaching Eisenhower, Strong was instructed to fly immediately to 21st Army Group’s HQ with Bedell Smith. Smith saw Montgomery alone and suggested that the airborne drop should be strengthened, but at this late stage the C-in-C was not prepared to change the plan. Wing Commander Asher Lee, a senior air intelligence officer at FAAA, also became aware of the presence of German armour through other channels. With Brereton’s knowledge he went to Brussels, but was unable to get any sufficiently senior officer at 21st Army Group to give him time and returned disappointed. There was, nonetheless, concern among Montgomery’s staff, where Belchem pointed out the dangers and de Guingand even rang his chief from England to ask him to reconsider. Montgomery, however, was by now completely set on the operation and would allow no dissent. As far as outsiders were concerned, the staff followed his line.

  The die was now cast. The plan, risky though it appeared to many, was set in concrete. Even some of the critics, like Shan Hackett, were keen to be in action as soon as possible rather than have another cancellation, as morale among the troops had risen again at the prospect. Boy himself, even if he harboured doubts about the plan, was totally committed. He genuinely felt that he would be participating in an operation which could end the war and that the chances of success were good. His last engagements before setting out for the airfield were a briefing for Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands and a cheerful lunch with Brereton.17

  Map 2. Nijmegen and Groesbeek

  Chapter 18

  Market (17–20 September 1944)

  On 14 September the Advance HQ of I Airborne Corps moved to Harwell, where the gliders were loaded. Boy himself arrived there early on the morning of 17 September, a few hours before take-off. He was carrying kid gloves and a swagger stick and wearing his airborne beret with general’s badge and a double-breasted uniform tunic of his own design, made up for him specially by a firm of tailors in London and based on that of a German Uhlan of the Great War.1 He was in very high spirits, in spite of the fact that he was nursing a heavy cold, which he thought he had picked up from the flying helmet he had worn on his way to Brussels on 10 September.

  There to see off the HQ were SHAEF’s Deputy Supreme Commander, Air Chief Marshal Tedder, and Brereton’s Chief of Staff, Brigadier General Floyd L. Parks. The latter was intrigued by the contents of Boy’s glider.2 ‘I have never seen so much junk,’ he told Brereton later, ‘it looked like a gypsy caravan. There were bicycles, bazookas, bedding rolls, radios, and all sorts of stuff he planned to use for his Command Post.’3 He would have been even more surprised had he investigated the contents of Boy’s pack, which contained four items that went with him everywhere on his travels. Three were teddy bears and the fourth was a framed print of Albrecht Dürer’s famous drawing The Praying Hands, which he had carried with him from the Great War onwards.

  At 1120 Boy’s glider was the first of the HQ to leave, pulled by a Stirling of 295 Squadron, piloted by Wing Commander Angel. His fellow passengers were Cator, Major Spencer Thomas, the GSO2 (Ops), Captain Louis, the HQ Medical Officer, and four other ranks, including Johnson and Boy’s driver, Johannides. The pilots were Chatterton himself and Major Andy Andrews, with Boy positioned just behind them, perched on an old Worthington beer crate. In a letter to Daphne on the previous day, he described himself as the third pilot, ‘in the event of them being shot in the backside.’4 Across a wide swathe of Southern and Eastern England, 1,534 aircraft and 491 gliders were taking off from 24 airfields at much the same time, a colossal feat of planning and logistics. They had been preceded by thousands of other aircraft, bombers from Bomber Command and US Eighth Air Force and both fighters and bombers from Second Tactical Air Force and US Ninth Air Force, which had hit German airfields, flak batteries and barracks along the route and at the destinations.

  The weather over England was dry and partly cloudy, the cloud melting away as the armada crossed the North Sea before bubbling up again after the Dutch coast had been crossed. Some light flak was encountered, but caused no damage. Advance HQ was to use Landing Zone N near Bruuk, south of Groesbeek. The tugs approached from west-south-west and cast off the gliders as they crossed the Maas. The gliders then flew on briefly over the edge of the Reichswald before turning north for the landing. Boy’s glider touched down just before 1400 in an allotment full of cabbages behind some cottages, losing its front wheel in the process, but leaving the passengers and crew intact. It was followed immediately by the glider carrying among others Walch and Newberry and piloted by Major Billy Griffith5 and then by the rest of the HQ. The BGS was surprised to see Boy leap out and run over to the nearby wood. On being asked on his return what he was doing he replied: ‘I wanted to be the first Allied soldier to pee in Germany!’6

  Mindful of a possible German reaction, the staff unloaded the gliders and moved off as quickly as possible to the agreed site for the HQ, which was just north of the road from Mook to Groesbeek and not far from Gavin’s Command Post. There were only three casualties, Lieutenant Gee of the Royal Signals and his driver, who were blown up by a mine leaving the landing zone, and Wing Commander Brown of the RAF, the officer in command of the RAF Light Warning Units, who was killed on the landing zone later by a strafing Messerschmidt 109.

  Three gliders failed to arrive, one after experiencing difficulties over the UK and one landing in the sea off Walcheren. The third, carrying members of the Corps HQ Phantom detachment and an American liaison officer, came down near Dongen, between Breda and ’s-Hertogenbosch. The occupants were attacked by German soldiers and one of them was killed before they surrendered. The American officer, Lieutenant Prentiss, tried to burn the papers he was carrying, but some were not destroyed. It is probably these which were delivered to General Student at his HQ at Vught that afternoon and which he claimed contained details of the plan for the whole operation, although what survived was actually only the operational order for 101 Airborne Division. Student had some experience of losing plans himself when two of his officers had made a forced landing in a light aircraft in Belgium with plans for the airborne landings in 19407 and he may have welcomed the chance to prove that this could happen to anyone. Even if they were not the full plans those for 101 Airborne, which had landed in Student’s operational area, would have been still very valuable, giving as they did details of the second and third lifts. Why an officer as junior as Lieutenant Prentiss was carrying such sensitive documents has never b
een explained.

  Radio communication was established by I Airborne Corps with both 82 Airborne Division and Rear HQ in England, with Second Army on the Phantom net and, after some delay, with XXX Corps, but no contact could be made with either 1 or 101 Airborne Divisions. By early evening the news from 82 Airborne was good. It had achieved most of its immediate objectives, first and foremost of which was the bridge over the Maas at Grave, the longest in Europe, where a landing on the south side had taken the Germans by surprise. By late afternoon the lock bridge across the Maas-Waal Canal at Heumen had also been seized. Two of the other canal bridges were blown up in the faces of the attackers, whilst the Honinghutie rail and road bridges were badly damaged before their capture early on the following morning. On the most direct route for XXX Corps to Nijmegen, the Honinghutie bridges remained open to foot traffic and light vehicles, but could not carry tanks, which would now have to cross the canal at Heumen. This would bring them much closer to the high ground and increase the importance of continuing to hold it.

  Gavin had also positioned troops at key points along the Groesbeek Heights and was sufficiently confident as night fell to be able to send 1/508 Parachute Infantry towards the Nijmegen Bridge. As the troopers approached they came under heavy fire, were forced to pull back and then cut off. A platoon from the 3/508 Parachute Infantry was also repulsed. Reinforcements were sent, but this only had the effect of thinning out the units facing the Reichswald, from which German infantry was now beginning to deploy.

  Boy met Gavin on the evening of D-Day, driving over to the latter’s Command Post. He arrived back at his own HQ to find that it was about to be relocated, as a German ammunition dump had been discovered nearby. With Gavin clearly on top of the situation, Boy’s main concern was communications with the other airborne forces. It had been agreed in advance that 101 Airborne would come under the command of XXX Corps as soon as it had landed and would remain so until Dempsey, Boy and Horrocks agreed otherwise. Communications with Taylor were desirable, but not essential in the immediate future. Of far greater importance was 1 Airborne, which was under Boy’s direct command and with which there was no contact at all.

  As 18 September dawned, the news from the south was less satisfactory, as a report was received that Guards Armoured Division had been held up south of Eindhoven. In fact it had encountered serious resistance at Valkenswaard and had been forced to harbour for the night. Boy was also shortly to find out that 101 Airborne, which had taken the majority of its objectives on the first day, had failed in the case of the bridge over the Wilhelmina Canal at Son, possibly as a result of Taylor’s decision not to land a party on the south side. Taylor had managed to get a small force across and now held both ends of a makeshift footbridge, but any vehicles would require a Bailey bridge, which could only come up behind Guards Armoured. The original timetable was now beginning to slip badly.

  During the morning of 18 September the Germans continued to build up their forces facing Gavin from the Reichswald and along the road between Wyler and Nijmegen. The plan was for 450 gliders to arrive in the early afternoon, carrying much of his artillery and a battalion of engineers, followed by a major supply drop by parachute, but the Germans had infiltrated the landing and drop zones. Gavin immediately brought up what reserves he possessed and ordered them to clear the ground, but fighting was still continuing as the gliders arrived at 1400. Notwithstanding, the operation was highly successful with most of the guns and jeeps being recovered, together with 80 per cent of the supplies.

  Boy spent the day visiting all parts of his extensive front. He knew by this time that the second lift of 1 Airborne had left England as planned, but he had news neither of its arrival nor of any other events at Arnhem. The first intimation of what was going on was not received until 0800 on 19 September, when a short signal reported that elements of 1 Parachute Brigade had penetrated into Arnhem, but were no longer in possession of the north end of the bridge. This, as it subsequently turned out, was inaccurate as John Frost’s 2nd Parachute Battalion was still holding on tenaciously.

  The fog of war now descended on Boy, as such news as he was able to garner from or about 1 Airborne, some of which came from the Dutch Resistance through the still functioning telephone system, was infrequent and often contradictory.8 He did not know it, but by dawn on 19 December the situation was already dire. Frost still held the north end of the bridge and had successfully repulsed the 9 SS Panzer Division Reconnaissance Battalion, which had crossed the bridge on its way to Nijmegen before the arrival of the British paratroopers and then returned to try to retake it. The advance of 1st and 3rd Parachute Battalions, on the other hand, had been held up by blocking forces defending the roads into Arnhem. Urquhart, handicapped by non-existent communications, had gone forward into Arnhem with Lathbury of 1 Parachute Brigade to find out what was happening and been cut off, Lathbury being subsequently wounded. Philip Hicks, the commander of 1 Airlanding Brigade, had taken temporary command of the division, a situation not at all to the liking of Hackett, whose 4 Parachute Brigade had landed in the middle of a battle. With no forward progress possible, the divisional HQ had already been relocated to the Hartenstein Hotel in Oosterbeek, where it was to remain for the duration of the battle.

  Other than his deep concern about events at Arnhem, 19 September started well for Boy when he was informed that Guards Armoured Division would be arriving at the Grave Bridge early in the morning. With Chatterton acting as his driver, he and Gavin rendezvoused at Overasselt to greet the Guards.9 Boy now found himself among very old friends. The first tanks to arrive were those of the 2nd Battalion Grenadier Guards, in which he had served for most of the Great War and commanded immediately prior to leaving the regiment. Its Commanding Officer was Lieutenant Colonel Rodney Moore, who had been a subaltern in the 3rd Battalion in the early 1930s, whilst Moore’s opposite number in the 1st Battalion, which provided the infantry element of the Grenadier Guards Group, was Lieutenant Colonel Eddie Goulburn, who had served under Boy in Egypt. The Grenadiers were followed by the 3rd Battalion Irish Guards whose Commanding Officer, Joe Vandeleur, had commanded another battalion of the same regiment in 24 Guards Brigade Group in 1941. At a more senior level Brigadier Norman Gwatkin of 5 Guards Armoured Brigade was, like Boy, a former Adjutant at Sandhurst, whilst the divisional commander, Allan Adair, was a longstanding friend of Boy’s own generation.

  Many of the Grenadiers were to remember seeing Boy standing by the side of the road, immaculately dressed as ever. They included Boy’s cousin, Brian Johnston, and Peter Carrington, who recalled that Boy took one look at the dusty guardsmen and said ‘I told you that it was better to come by air!’10 The mood of festivity, however, was shortly to give way to more serious matters, particularly once Horrocks had appeared on the scene. As he wrote later: ‘Boy Browning and I were old friends, and from now onwards we took all the major decisions together without any semblance of friction.’11 In the light of future events, this might be seen as generous, but for the time being it was certainly true.

  A meeting was held at noon between Boy, Horrocks, Adair and Gwatkin at Boy’s new HQ, which had just moved to a house on the road to Nijmegen at De Kluis, north of Malden, so as to be on Guards Armoured’s axis of advance. Adair recalled that ‘General Browning was in his usual fine form – clear, definite, coping well with the involved situation and pressing the urgency to relieve the 1st Airborne Division.’12 Gavin arrived later and he and Adair agreed that the Grenadier Guards Group should cooperate with 2/505 Parachute Infantry in an attack on the south end of the Nijmegen Bridge, but this was unable to kick off before 1700 hrs. As the Americans formed Gavin’s divisional reserve, Boy arranged for him to receive the Coldstream Guards Group as replacements. However, in spite of outstanding cooperation between the British and the Americans, the paratroopers and Grenadiers were unable to break through the defences and the attack was called off after dark. It was now clear to all that the defenders were both more numerous and of better quality than they h
ad been led to expect.

  Apart from the surprisingly stubborn defence of the Nijmegen Bridge, the tentative attacks on the Groesbeek Heights and the difficulty experienced by Guards Armoured in breaking through south of Eindhoven, neither Boy nor his fellow commanders yet had a complete picture of the scale of the German response to Market Garden, which had been both swift and vigorous. It was coordinated by Field Marshal Model, C-in-C of Army Group B, who had been rudely surprised in his HQ at Oosterbeek by the arrival of 1 Airborne. Known as ‘the Führer’s Fireman’, Model was a skilful, energetic and ruthless commander who had on numerous occasions pulled the Wehrmacht’s chestnuts out of the fire on the Eastern Front. Decamping with some speed, he had arrived at General Bittrich’s HQ II SS Panzer Corps at Doetinchen less than two hours later and immediately began to make his dispositions.

  Bittrich himself was charged with defending Arnhem and the Nijmegen bridgehead with 9 and 10 SS Panzer Divisions, which had both arrived from Normandy significantly reduced in numbers and equipment. The full 1944 establishment of a panzer division was 14,700 men and 100 tanks; on 17 September 9 SS Panzer had approximately 2,500 men and no tanks, whilst 10 SS Panzer had approximately 3,000 men and a few tanks. However, both were composed of seasoned veterans of Russia and Normandy, who had been specifically trained in combating airborne operations, and possessed a variety of other armoured vehicles, including self-propelled guns. 9 SS Panzer, less its Reconnaissance Regiment, which had gone south to Nijmegen and been nearly destroyed on its return, was ordered to recapture the Arnhem Bridge and to hold off any further advance towards it by 1 Airborne. A motley collection of other units was put together under Lieutenant General von Tettau13 to attack the airborne positions around Oosterbeek from the west. 10 SS Panzer was directed on Nijmegen, with orders to hold the bridge there and, in the event that there was any crossing of the Waal, the southern approaches to Arnhem. As the Arnhem Bridge was closed, the division would have to cross the Lower Rhine by the Pannerden ferry, whose limited capacity would slow its build-up.