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04 Jul 2026

The Temporary American Cemetery at Son

Battlefield Blog101st Airborne, Hell's Highway, Margraten, Netherlands American Cemetery, Operation Market Garden, repatriation, Son, temporary cemetery

On the northern edge of Son, near a farm called the Waterhoef, a dirt track runs out into open fields. For a few years after 1944 those fields held one of the first American cemeteries in the Netherlands. The track was its entrance. Today the land is farmed again. The 101st Airborne Division landed around Son on 17 September 1944, the opening day of Operation Market Garden. The fighting along the corridor was hard, and the dead mounted quickly. Within days the Americans had established a burial ground in the fields by the Waterhoef farm. The graves were dug by…

27 Jun 2026

By Joris

Urquhart House: The Attic at Zwarteweg 14, Arnhem

Battlefield Blog1st Airborne Division, Arnhem, Battle of Arnhem, Operation Market Garden, Roy Urquhart, Zwarteweg 14

Zwarteweg 14 is an ordinary terraced house in the Lombok district of west Arnhem, a short walk from the old St Elisabeth's Hospital. A small piece of wood by the door, hand-painted with the words "Urquhart House," is the only sign that anything happened here. Most people walk straight past it. In September 1944 this house held the commander of the entire British 1st Airborne Division. The commander goes forward Major-General Roy Urquhart landed near Arnhem on 17 September with one task: take and hold the road bridge over the Neder Rijn. Almost at once his radios failed. He could…

17 Jun 2026

By Joris

The Barracuda Sherman Tank on McAuliffe Square, Bastogne

Battlefield Blog11th Armored Division, Ardennes, Barracuda, Bastogne, Battle of the Bulge, McAuliffe Square, Sherman tank, WWII memorials

A Sherman tank stands at the entrance to Place Général McAuliffe in the centre of Bastogne. Most people photograph it and walk on. Look closer and you find two holes in the armour, both still open. One is a clean punch through the left side, made by a German 75mm armour-piercing round. The other, in the rear, is jagged and torn, the work of a Panzerfaust. Four of the five men inside survived the war. Two of them came close to being shot after the fighting was over. The tank is an M4A3(75)W Sherman, serial S48935, named Barracuda by its…

06 Jun 2026

By Joris

The Market Garden Briefing at Leopoldsburg

Battlefield BlogBelgium WWII, Brian Horrocks, Guards Armoured Division, Irish Guards, Leopoldsburg, Operation Market Garden, Sherman Firefly, XXX Corps

A Sherman tank stands outside the railway station at Leopoldsburg, in northern Belgium. Most people walk past it. It marks one of the quietest turning points of the war in the west: the morning the ground plan for Operation Market Garden was handed to the men who would carry it out. A cinema called the Splendid "This is a story you will tell your grandchildren, and mightily bored they'll be." Edward Fox delivers the line as Lieutenant-General Brian Horrocks in the film A Bridge Too Far. The detail of the scene is invented, but the place was real. It stood…

28 May 2026

By Joris

Thinking He Was Safe: The Final Journey of Flight Officer Dana T. Mudd

Battlefield BlogGlider Pilot, Groesbeek, Operation Market Garden, Uden, Uden CWGC

Dana Mudd On the edge of the Dutch town of Uden, the war entered a dangerous in-between phase in September 1944. Uden had been liberated during Operation Market Garden on 19 September by the Guards Armoured Division. The front appeared to have moved on, but it had not yet settled. Three days later, on 22 September, German forces of Kampfgruppe Walther struck back, attacking along the narrow corridor that ran through Uden and nearby Veghel. Roads that had seemed safe only hours earlier were suddenly contested again, swept by ambushes, confusion, and fast-moving counterattacks. It was in this narrow window,…

23 May 2026

By Joris

The Waal River Crossing Documentary Is Out, and I Was the On-Camera Historian

Battlefield Blog504th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 82nd Airborne Division, Battle for Nijmegen, Nijmegen, Operation Market Garden, Paul Giamatti, Waal River Crossing, World War II Foundation, WWII documentary

The Waal River crossing now has its own documentary. WAAL RIVER CROSSING: 1944 is an hour-long film from the World War II Foundation, directed by Tim Gray and narrated by Paul Giamatti. I was the on-camera historian for the shoot, filmed along the banks of the Waal where the assault went in. The film tells the story through archival footage and the accounts of the men who were there. Watch the film here: https://wwiifoundation.org/portfolio-item/the-waal-river-crossing-1944/ The crossing site sits on the south bank of the Waal at Nijmegen, about a mile and a half from the road bridge. The river here…

21 May 2026

By Joris

A New Memorial to Captain Lionel Queripel VC at Wolfheze

Battlefield Blog1st Airborne, Arnhem, Operation Market Garden, VC, Wolfheze

Captain Lionel Queripel VC stayed behind alone in a ditch near Wolfheze on the evening of 19 September 1944, covering his men's withdrawal with an automatic pistol and a few grenades. A new memorial to him was unveiled in May 2026 by the Friends of the 10th opposite the culvert near where he was last seen alive. Earlier that day his company had been advancing along a road towards Arnhem when continuous machine-gun fire split them on either side of the road. Queripel, 10th Parachute Battalion, crossed and recrossed under fire to reorganise his men. He carried a sergeant to…

14 May 2026

By Joris

The Surviving German Anti-Tank Blocks at Nijmegen Bridge

Battlefield Blog82nd Airborne, Guards Armoured Division, Nijmegen, Operation Market Garden, Waal Bridge

On the north bank of the Waal at Nijmegen, close to where the road bridge comes down on the Lent side, two grey concrete blocks stand in the open. They are scarred, weathered, and easy to walk past without a second look. They are also among the last surviving pieces of German road defence of their kind anywhere in the Netherlands. The blocks are part of a Panzerkampfwagenmauer, an anti-tank wall the Germans built across the northern approach to the bridge in 1943. Each block stands 3.4 metres high and 2.3 metres wide, with a broad base that originally sat…

08 May 2026

By Joris

Robert Cole: The Medal of Honor He Never Knew He Had Won

Battlefield Blog101st Airborne Division, Battle at Best, Hell's Highway, Medal of Honor, Operation Market Garden

A parachute-shaped stone stands at the edge of a field in Best, in the Netherlands. The marker carries the Medal of Honor citation of Lieutenant Colonel Robert Cole, and it sits next to the ground where he was killed. The memorial was unveiled on 18 September 2009, the 65th anniversary of his death, with his son and veterans of the 101st Airborne Division present. Cole commanded the 3rd Battalion of the 502nd Parachute Infantry Regiment. On 18 September 1944, the second day of Operation Market Garden, his battalion was in contact with German positions near Best. Cole had requested air…

01 May 2026

By Joris

Tripadvisor Travellers’ Choice 2026

Battlefield Blog

News from last week. The Battlefield Explorer Tours has received a Tripadvisor Travellers' Choice Best of the Best Award for the fourth year in a row, placing it in the top 10% worldwide in the Things to Do category. That judgement doesn't come from Tripadvisor itself. It comes from the people who have travelled with me over the past years, across the bridges of Market Garden, through the streets of Arnhem and Oosterbeek, or into the forests of the Ardennes, and took the time to write something about it. Thank you.