A REGULAR photo contributor to the Star, who goes by the name “JB”, sent me this fascinating story as the 72nd anniversary of the Battle of Arnhem is marked this month.


The British 1st Airborne Division was engaged in battle from September 17-26, 1944.


JB writes: “Confronted by superior German forces, The film A Bridge Too Far gives a dramatic account of the battle, but few would realise from watching it that the majority of troops arrived in daylight by glider rather than by parachute. 


“Those glider pilots suffered the highest casualty rate of the airborne forces involved in the battle.  After landing their wooden gliders, these ‘total soldiers’ defended the landing zones and fought house to house, leading mixed groups of infantry, gunners, medics, and engineers. 


“Finally, the survivors of the Glider Pilot Regiment marked the evacuation route for the remnants as they withdrew across the Rhine to avoid captivity.  Though 90 per cent successful, the battle, even if it had been a total success, would have been a Pyrrhic victory for the glider pilots.


“Recently, I did some research for one of the Centurion Centre volunteers at St Marks Church on North Road, whose uncle, Richard William Briscoe, a man from St Helens, was a glider pilot on the first day of Operation Market Garden.


“As a former flying soldier myself, at the end of July I was pleased to be at the headquarters of the Army Air Corps for the last working day of the Westland Lynx Mark 7 Helicopter. 


“I flew in the Lynx in Germany, the Falklands, the UK, and have many flying hours logged in Northern Ireland.  In Northern Ireland, at RAF Aldergrove, above one of the hangars, where the Lynx and Gazelle helicopters of the present day Army Air Corps were once worked on by technicians, it said in large letters, ‘Nothing is Impossible’, the motto of the Glider Pilot Regiment.

 
“I wandered round the Arnhem Room, named after that infamous battle in Holland that was Field Marshall Montgomery’s plan to bring the war in Europe to a speedy conclusion. 


 “Due no doubt to his previous military service, on the 30th October 1943 RW Briscoe was given an emergency commission in the Royal Army Service Corps as a 2nd Lieutenant. Later he volunteered for pilot training and on the 21st March 1944 he transferred into the Glider Pilot Regiment of the Army Air Corps.


 “He is listed for the week ending 16th September 1944 as a Lieutenant, Section Commander, in E Squadron, No 2 Wing, Glider Pilot Regiment, Army Air Corps.


“D-Day for Arnhem was the 17th September 1944 and with Sergeant T. Smith as his co-pilot.


“To give you some idea of the scale of the operation, on Sunday the 17th September, 157 Royal Air Force Dakotas were needed just to drop the three Parachute Regiments, 1, 2 and 3 Para and the rest of the 1st Parachute Brigade, and 345 Horsa and 13 Hamilcar gliders were needed to carry the troops used to capture the bridges to the south of Arnhem, at Nijmegen and Eindhoven.


 “Once on the ground the glider pilots became fighting soldiers and their initial job was to then secure the landing zones for the following day’s lifts of 286 Horsa and 15 Hamilcar gliders bearing the remainder of 1st (Airlanding) Brigade and the Royal Artillery. On ‘Black Tuesday’, the 19th September, the 1st Polish Independent Parachute Brigade were delayed for 24 hours due to bad weather. 


“Sadly however, 35 Polish gliders did arrive and were met by anti-aircraft fire from all types of German guns.  


“On Thursday 21st September, with his co-pilot Sgt ‘Jock’ Smith killed, Lt Briscoe was in charge of four slit trenches on the north-west corner of Hartenstein, Oosterbeek, less than 4 miles from the bridge at Arnhem. 
“Armed only with rifles and bayonets, with no automatic weapons or grenades, they were subjected to salvoes of mortar bombs. The Germans had moved up considerable numbers of infantry and self-propelled artillery, the nearest only 80 yards away. 


“The situation being chaotic, with no information to the true situation, Lt  Briscoe decided to go to headquarters for orders. After this he must have been captured as he is later listed as Prisoner of War No 52945 in Oflag IX at Spangenburg, Hesse.


 “Sadly Lt Briscoe is later listed as Killed in Action on the 10th April 1945, less than a month before the war ended in Europe, aged just 27.
“He is buried in the Overloon War Cemetery, the Netherlands, Section 4A number 13.”