Bridging Operation Market Garden: Keeping Up With The Joneses (Part 2)

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3:33at 8 30 hours we moved off i was in the turret of the humber light recce car with my normal crew of two, driver and operator, in the front two seats. I followed the tanks over the bridge. There was no trouble until they passed through a roadblock 50 yards from the far abutment on the embanked approach road. It consisted of a single line of concrete cubes across the road, with a 10-foot gap in the middle. I heard later that just after the leading tank had passed through the roadblock, the commander saw an enemy self-propelled gun. One shot knocked this out. Much to their surprise, the tank commanders could not see any Americans.

4:10However, they pushed on and contact was made 1 ,500 yards ahead. It transpired subsequently that the American signal to indicate that they had reached the north end of the railway bridge was misinterpreted to mean that they had reached the north end of the road bridge. This mysterious mistake had had the fortunate effect of speeding up the operation. And that, of course, was Captain Tony Jones, MCRE, describing the events of the evening of the 20th September 1944 at Nijmegen Bridge. Now, I think it's fair to say, Al, you're a big fan of Tony Jones, MC, aren't you?

4:43Al Murray: I certainly am. Absolutely. Welcome, everyone, to We Have Ways of Making You Talk. With me, Al Murray, James Holland. For our second episode, Hurrah for the CRE, the sappers at Operation Garden, not Market Garden, Garden. And this episode, second episode, is called Keeping Up with the Joneses, because we have two... Joneses that we've been looking at. We've been looking at Brigadier Charles Jones, who's the Commander Royal Engineers for Guards Armour Division, part of 30 Corps. And here we have one of his subalterns, one of his chaps. And when Tony Jones wrote this account, he had been proposed to captain, but he was a lieutenant when he did this, which is what's remarkable.

5:19That's amazing.

5:20Al Murray: First sapper officer on the bridge, sent ahead, right in the van with the tanks, with Peter Carrington in the tanks, going across Nijmegen Bridge over the wall, is a left-hand subaltern. He's just a lad. And what we did in our last episode is we tried to lay out the sheer scale of the sappering effort for Operation Garden, the sheer amount of bridging kit and the difficulties involved in an operation of this size and scale. And I think it's, you know, it's fair to say the big idea with Market Garden is you go round the high ground, you avoid the rice fowled, which will be very tricky to fight through, is the feeling, isn't it?

5:55Al Murray: However, in order to do that, you go over the bit that requires That's the biggest bridging effort imaginable. You know, it's the Netherlands, for heaven's sake. It's canals. It's dykes. What are you going to do? It's raised roads, right? Yes, of course. Yes, you've avoided one awful tactical problem, having to not fight through the rice valve. But look at the operational complications you've made for yourself in the process. But they're up for it. They're equipped for it. Can I just make another point? Is that, you know, we were talking in the last episode about the extraordinary achievement of getting to this scale in four years.

6:27But actually, think about it. They've done it in kind of effectively 18 months. Yeah. Because in North Africa, there aren't any rivers. You haven't got bridging problems in North Africa. You've got them in Sicily, but you haven't got that many in Sicily.

6:38Al Murray: Yeah. Well, the first one's used at Medjez al-Bab, the first Bailey Bridge in November of 1942. It's brand new, the Bailey Bridge at that point. Parts of it being built in the Littlewoods Pools Factory. 25 ,000 panels a month are made by Littlewoods because they turned the place over to making bridging equipment. By the end of the war, US Fifth Army and British Eighth Army in Sissing Italy alone have built 3 ,000 Bailey bridges, Jim, totaling over 55 miles of bridging, each with an average length of 100 feet, so a 30-metre bridge. And, of course, the bridge over the Sangro is 343 metres, is 1 ,126 feet.

7:16Al Murray: There's one on the Cindwin, which is 1 ,154 feet. It's mad. I mean, it's just superb, isn't it? From a standing start, you know, there is no Bailey Bridge at the start of the war. There's the English Bridge, which isn't going to be up to the job that they need and isn't as clever in the way you can just throw them up. Anyway, we met Brigadier Charles Jones. And it does beg a belief, doesn't it? You have this invention, the Bailey Bridge, and then, you know, you operationally build everything around. It's incredible, Jim. You're quite right to make us pause and consider how amazing it is. It's bonkers, isn't it?

7:50Well, it's at the speed at which they're adapting and being able to span such enormous distances. And also the osmosis effect of getting this knowledge and experience over to the Far East, which we've talked in the past about the difficulty of getting supplies, getting just spitfires to Burma, for example. And there they are kind of bridging the Chindwin, the longest single bridging operation ever. I mean, it's absolutely nuts. The scale of these things is just so enormous. and it does require us to pause and gawp and just take our hats off and take a bow because it is it is truly incredible and we take all this stuff for granted because it's not part of the narrative you know we we're not interested in that we're interested in in people with tommy guns and brand guns and storming bunkers and what have you or jumping out of landing craft and and we forget all this stuff but it's absolutely such a key part of the whole way of war and this long tail this big war that I always say about how the Allies operate.

8:48Look after the guys who've got to do that charging of the bunkers with their Tommy guns. Make sure that they've got the best possible support. And the best way to have the best possible support is to make sure they've got supplies coming up, they've got firepower, tanks, artillery coming up. And how do you do that? Well, you have to bridge. You have to get across obstacles and barriers. So it's all absolutely,

9:10Al Murray: well interconnected isn't it and then even further back this reaches into 600 firms involved in making these bridges half a million tons of bridges love it bill jim half a million tons yeah you've got the steel to be able to do that that's the other thing 700 000 panels of the stuff yeah you've got the steel you've got the factories but a national resilience yeah exactly and there's an american factory where there's a sign up on the wall that says your you know build it your son could be using it. That whole cohesion all the way across home front to the front line through the operational side of things.

9:44Al Murray: Anyway, so we met Brigadier Charles Phibbs Jones, Commander Royal Engineers for Guards Armoured, and he has these gigantic resources at his disposal. Bridges shipped from England, 9 ,000 sappers under his command. The chief engineer, who's his boss further up, had ensured that stockpiles of bridges with columns of trucks were staged at Borg Airport in Belgium, ready to go when scrambled. But he has the immediate issues of IEDs, of mines, of road maintenance, as well as having to set up a 110-foot Class 40 Bailey Bridge at Son, where the Germans had successfully demolished the bridge. So from D.D.

10:18Al Murray: of Guard, and he's been pushing hard to get his saffering task complete, making sure that Guard's Armoured can get to where they need to be. And so at the end of the last episode, we got to Tuesday the 19th, D plus two. Him and his headquarters have got to the outskirts of Nijmegen, where there's a fight going on to take control of the town because us 82nd airborne haven't taken control of either road or the rail bridge at nimeggen nor had the enemy succeeded in destroying them and we know now why but at the time on the ground they can't work it out they're thinking why are they why are they leaving these bridges open it would be much to their advantage to destroy these bridges and then the whole house of cards is a goner and the germans are holding out stubbornly and of course if you don't get across the while, you aren't going to relieve First Airborne Arnhem.

11:02Al Murray: It's full stop. There's going to be none of that. So at the end of the last episode, as I said, we left Brigadier Jones on the morning of the 20th, and he's rung up early in the morning and asked if he has any assault boats. And he says, yes, 32 serviceable. And he's then told to get the boats to US 82nd Airborne Division as soon as possible. I set the wheels in train, and then I started to scratch my head. What on earth they could be wanting them for? Jumping into my Jeep, I went to see 82nd Division and found that they proposed to carry out an assault crossing of the wall in the power station area with the idea of taking the bridge defences in the rear in conjunction with an attack by the Grenadier Group from the south onto the near end of the bridge.

11:37Al Murray: A formidable project. And we'll come to that in a moment. That's what it is. It's a project, not an operation. Yeah. We're going to switch away from Brigadier Jones and look at this other Jones who we met at the start of the episode. Yes. Yes. So who is Tony Jones, MC? Well, he's the troop leader of 14 field squadron his account of all this is absolutely in that sort of downplayed style as we'll as we'll see later on a couple of hairy moments a couple of hairy moments it's all that as always he's with the recce section with the grenadier group and saparecki involves getting ahead and finding out what needs fixing so that the fighting people can get on with their fighting lieutenant jones worked alongside the guards for a while and he felt the things were working very well within what he calls a battle group.

12:22Al Murray: Everyone knows each other. Everyone understands each other's priorities and they all get along excellently. And this is the business end of combat engineering and the granular work that keeps guards armoured on the moon. And the SAPPA troops are broken up into three parts. You have one recce section, one armoured section, and one normal section. Okay. What does that actually mean, though? Well, recce section, as we'll see, is the people are going front troubleshooting. The armoured section are the people in armour who can do avari tasks. And then the normal section is basically some lads in some lorries who are going to, if there's a minefield, are going to turn up.

12:57Al Murray: And once, you know, the recce section discovers and apportions tasks to the other two sections and undertakes work itself. That's how things are divided up. And the recce section travels in a pair of half tracks. And the half track is supposed to carry 3 ,000 pounds of equipment, but Jones recollects getting far more stuff in them. A short list of the contents of East Half Track includes eight men, one Lance Sergeant or Corporal, one driver, six sappers, their bedding, four days' ration, small arms, about 300 pounds of explosive, eight jerry cans of petrol, a pick and a shovel per man, saws, hammers, crowbars and other section tools, minefield recce box, bridge recce gear, recce boat, two made-up rolls of arm co-culverting, about 10 feet long and a 0.5 browning.

13:39Every man should have that kit, shouldn't they? Yeah. In the garage. That needs to be in the garage. You know, all wrapped up in a tarpaulin.

13:45Al Murray: Any of you prepping, you need four days' rations, small arms, 300 pounds of explosives, eight jerry cans of petrol, a pick and a shovel per man. A pick and a shovel per man. That's sappering. Sawers, hammers, crowbars, other section tools. I mean, it's all there, isn't it? It's just superb, isn't it? That's just tremendous. And everyone needs a 0.5 browning. We all know that. Everyone needs a 0.5 browning. And arm co-culverting. Exactly, some arm co-culverting. you know, for the immediate sapling job right in front of you. And he's in a Humber Scout car with a driver and a wireless op who are on the garden sapling net that, of course, they've had set up.

14:22Al Murray: And Jones regards the number 19 set as the most important piece of equipment that he has with them. And it's not wrong. He's not wrong because it means he can speak to the CRE as and when he needs to. And the boss can then go, right, send the bridging column from Borg Leopold. So this is not unlike, you know, a captain who's a forward observation officer can call up an army group stonk, can call on all the guns possibly available to help him out of his sticky spot in a combat situation. You see that in Normandy from time to time when someone will get on the net and go, can you absolutely obliterate this, you know, call in a Mike shoot and obliterate this square mile of territory or square kilometre or whatever.

15:02Al Murray: This is not dissimilar, except it's on the engineering side. He can get on the line to his brigadier and say, you're going to need to send those 580 vehicles to cross this river. And his boss might do it. Yeah. Right. It's the same operational grease to make the ball move. And this setup, Jones's setup, is mirrored by two troops from 14 Field Squadron who accompany the Irish Guard. So 14 Field Squadron has its troops, you know, broken into the different sections with each of the formations in guards armoured. So there's sharp end sappers everywhere. Right from the off, there's stuff for Jones to do.

15:41Al Murray: On the afternoon of D-Day, on the 17th of September, 1st Battalion Grenadier Guards tried to find a way around where the Irish Guards got stuck at Valkensvard. And Jones, who's at battalion headquarters, heard they're having trouble with a weak bridge. so takes himself off to find out what the problem was and to help and what he finds is a turf track leading up to a 10 foot tall dyke from which the germans have removed the reinforced concrete beams and dumped them in the canal to weaken it and simple enough jones regards this as a class 10 problem you know what from now on i'm just going to convert all the problems in my life into classes it's a nine it's a 40 it's a 10 oh i'm i'm definitely a class 40 problem but um he regards this as a class 10 problem these are mechanized infantry in half tracks they're worried they can't get across the dike safely there's no enemy about the locals however are eager to help and jones asks him if they can move the concrete beans and put them back onto the bridge yes and he writes this they did in a surprisingly efficient manner in spite of a tremendous amount of talking.

16:48Shut up and get home with it.

16:51Al Murray: That's absolutely fun. And he gets them to put the beams at the same width as the half tracks tracks, which means the grenadiers are over the dike nice and quickly and over the canal. And so that night after Liegring and attending midnight O groups, Jones is then sent out to look for routes that will take tanks southwest of the Valkenstvoort. And, you know, he's asked not only can they take tanks, but how long can they take the tanks for? How long will these roads withstand? You know, Sherman's, which I think are class 30. You know, how long will the wear and tear of armour? So he's got to ascertain a time limit.

17:28Al Murray: This detail. So at half past midnight. Bear in mind, he's a mere lieutenant. He's probably only 23 or something. Yeah, if that. Yeah. And he's got to go with a section of carriers and he finds a track that he actually thinks is a good class 40 route. It's good enough for Shermans because that's what guards armoured are using. And this task takes him until first light, at which point he returns to headquarters and told thanks, but no thanks. They're going to go up the single road anyway. So he has spent his whole night, you know, walking this track, seeing how firm the ground is. Yeah, everyone else has had their two hours sleep, right?

18:04Al Murray: What, their three hours sleep? He hasn't. I mean, it's the load on these guys. And then he goes on to Eindhoven. His troop are spared having to work on the Sonne Bridge. They're being kept fresh for whatever might come as guards' armour go forward. Lead elements, as we heard in the last episode, cross the Sonne Bridge at quarter past six that morning, 15 minutes later than Brigadier Jones, the CRE, had estimated. But by 1100 hours, Tony Jones and his party, they arrive at the bridge on the Marswall Canal, which the Germans have damaged, the Grava Bridge. And he says, you know, where we've been then, it's an extraordinary bridge, an extraordinary sort of box construction, isn't it?

18:42It was a normal steel girder bridge with a reinforced concrete roadway. The demolition had been far too hated to do any real damage.

18:48Al Murray: So he deems it fit for tanks if operation necessary, but recommends that it's repaired first if possible. And as we heard in the last episode, that's what they do. They take three days to fix it so that it's actually running properly. So on his recommendation, Then at 12.30, a battalion conference is called, and it's decided that with the Americans, 1st Battalion Grenadier Guards would attempt to push through to the road bridge. And the Dutch underground had recommended the post office needed to be captured as the cable to the demolitions on the bridge went to the post office, as far as the Dutch underground knew.

19:21Al Murray: So Jones splits his troop into three parties, one for the road bridge, one for the rail bridge, and a third for the post office. And he goes with the road bridge party. And this is the battle, the roundabout, James, that we've done walking the ground there. You sit at that roundabout with the cars going around and you can see the problem up the hill to where the bridge is, up to the top, which overlooks the bridge. And, you know, the Americans have got stuck there before. There have been indecision and hesitation around taking the bridge on the first day and then the same kind of flap on the second day.

19:55Al Murray: but this is the third day and and the with armor there's the effort to actually do something about it but they come up with a plan to take the bridges that night and to cross the river in assault boats because they can't get into the town because they set off at 1600 they set off the roundabout at the roundabout they run into stiffer opposition than predicted things were to a halt one of jones's sergeants is killed when he went the wrong way in the town in confusion so overnight they're going to clear and take the bridge the next day is the is the plan which brings us back to Brigadier Jones, the CRE.

20:25Al Murray: So the assault boats are in the rear. There are some in the van, but not enough. And they're brought forward up the road through the traffic jam of Hell's Highway. They just speed past, do they? They just speed past and they crack on and they get on with it. And this is a colon coming up from Belgium. And the assault boats themselves are going to be crewed by the 82nd Zone combat engineers. But Jones suggests the Americans might like to ferry their anti-tank weapons across the river as well. And in doing so, he discovers that the airborne guys are completely unfamiliar with this kit with this raft kit that they've got so 615 field squadron are all to take part in the crossing and get the american six pounders over the 75 build guns over the river what in that river assault crossing there are british sappers doing their bit to get the americans some proper anti-tank weapons over the river don't remember that in a bridge too far no no it's not in a bridge too far is it come on dicky come on dicky but if you're airborne soldiers you need your anti-tank weapons so jones has got that right and the plan is for the attack to go in at 14 30 hours and he recalls how everything was got ready in time i cannot imagine i bet he can imagine it involves lots of lots of ncos yelling at lots of people get up fucking lorry yes of course um and of course the story of the wild river crossing is really really well known you know it's hail mary full of grace julian cook aka robert redford paddling across the river and jones brigadier jones like everyone else watches it from the power station and you can go to the power station and it's by the new road bridge at Nijmegen but you can stand there and you can picture yourself with your binoculars and he says it was the most gallant and hazardous operation and was successful despite considerable opposition the American sappers used our assault boats for the first time and handled them with great skill the first wave came under fire from the fire bank and suffered casualties some reached the fire bank in the boats and others swam ashore but a small bridgehead was obtained and held until the follow up waves arrived i watched tim neil commanding 615 field squadron build the first close support raft and then piloted across the river the first raft of its type to cross the rhine or while as it is called in holland i mean hurrah for the cre that's just isn't that raw indeed airs on the back of my neck i don't know about you this isn't it you think of that you're putting that raft together and thinking oh god i'm gonna have to yes go across the river in it now absolutely tremendous then while he's making his way back into Nijmegen Brigadier Jones, Charles Jones here's Tony Jones come up on the air Lieutenant Jones is joining the Grenadiers as they prepare to rush the bridge and was giving a running commentary as he went comes up on the sapper net so in the next part we'll rejoin Lieutenant Tony Jones as he sets off for Nijmegen Road Bridge with the Grenadier Guards after the break we'll see you in a tick fantastic

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24:59Al Murray: Welcome back to We Have Ways of Making You Talk. I'm Neil Murray, James Holland. And in the first part, we looked at sappering stuff. around the Nijmegen, the crossing of the Wall, the Grava Road Bridge, disrupted dykes and so on. And so we now come to the river crossing and the seizing of the road bridge on the Wall, the Wallbrug. And we have the account of the Columbia Broadcasting Service reporter, Bill Downs, describing the 504th Parfait Infantry Regiment as they cross the Wall. American Airborne Infantry and British tanks beleaguered the streets to Nijmegen, only 300 yards from the bridge that night, but they couldn't get it.

25:39Al Murray: A daring plan was drawn up. Wednesday morning, the infantry, 504th, made its way to the industrial outskirts of the riverbank. British tanks, protected troopers in street fighting, acted as artillery when the crossings were made. 26 assault boats were in the water. 260 men would make the first assault. Waiting for them on the bank were 400 to 600 Germans. The shelling continued. A smoke screen was laid, but it wasn't very effective because of the wind. Men slumped in their boats. Of these 260 men, half were wounded or killed. Only 13 of 26 boats came back. Others didn't wait for boats. Some stripped off equipment, took a bandolier of ammunition and swam the river, rifles on their backs.

26:17Al Murray: Yeah, stirring stuff. Incredible high drama, isn't it? Yeah, it absolutely is. We watched a reenactment, didn't we, a few years ago? With fellows paddling across. Yes, and it was tremendous, wasn't it? Yeah, they put up the smoke screen, which blew away. Straight away, didn't they? there you go yeah yeah yeah yeah absolutely it was amazing and it took them several minutes didn't it get across exactly exactly and you are it's quite obvious what you're trying to do when you're coming over the river like that it's it's you know yeah the element element of surprise is long gone well you know i go back to the comparison with with the rapido i mean yeah yeah how to do it how not to do it anyway how to do it and not to do it so as this river assault goes in and everyone like Bill Downs has their heart in the mouth.

27:02Al Murray: In a house by the river at 1630 hours and not far from the main road bridge, Lieutenant Tony Jones is scanning the Nijmegen road bridge with his binoculars for demolitions. He's going, I can't quite, what can I see? I don't know. And an hour and a half earlier, he'd gone up to join 1st Battalion Grenadier Guards, whose attack had got within 400 yards of the road bridge. And he's waiting to see how things unfold, see what problems are going to come their way. And he goes and joins the leading company headquarters. which decided to stay put. The fighting had warmed up considerably, as he put it.

27:33Al Murray: So he goes back to his scout car at about 1800 hours. Yeah, things have warmed up considerably. It's pretty hot out there. Yeah, it's warmed up considerably, old boy. And when he gets back to his scout car, he receives an urgent order from his commanding officer of 14 Field Squadron to report to the roundabout in Nijmegen to be told he's got to join 2nd Battalion Grenadier Guards who are going to make their move on the road bridge. because 1st Battalion have basically blown themselves out in the attempt to get into the town, into the bridge. They have had the report that the Americans have reached the far end of the road bridge, and it's time to rush the bridge and join up with them.

28:10Al Murray: And this means, as he's the Saporeki officer on the spot, Jones has to join the leading troop. He has to go with them. Bouldly heart-stopping moment. As we heard, he gets the CRA up on the net to let him know what's happening. He's got basically what Jones is going to have to do, Tony Jones is going to have to clear the bridge of charges and make sure it won't be denied the Allies. It's as simple as that. And the thing is, this isn't without precedent because demolitions had, of course, been used by the Dutch on the Walbrook on the 10th of May 1940, when the German airborne soldiers had bodged its capture.

28:43Al Murray: Of course. And the bridge had only been opened for four years, opened by Queen Wilhelmina in June 1936. Before then, you had to get a ferry to get across the river. So this is part of this big bridge building effort in this part of the world. this spectacular bridge that crosses the Valle. And, you know, it's only just been fixed. And the Arnhem Bridge has only just been reopened that summer after repairs by the Germans. So at 1830, this armoured column from 2nd Battalion Grenadier Guards sets off. Jones is in his Humber Scout car. Over the bridge they go to find no Americans, thanks to the signalling mix-up that was mentioned at the start.

29:23Oh, dear.

29:24Al Murray: But that's interesting, isn't it? They do the bridge assault themselves sort of unassisted. And leading the 2nd Battalion Grenadier Guards in number one squadron is its 2IC Lieutenant Peter Carrington. And Carrington ends up, Lord Carrington, of course, who's Foreign Secretary in Margaret Thatcher's government in 1982 when the Falklands War emerges. And he gets a military cross, which is awarded immediately. Yeah, amazing, isn't it? He's immediately awarded an MC. You read his citation, Jim. Go on. On the 20th of September 1944, this officer was ordered to guide a troop of tanks down to the Nijmegen Bridge and then push them across with a view to capturing the bridge intact.

30:05The troop duly attacked, captured the bridge, and then pushed up the main road on the far side for some distance to consolidate their gain. Hearing that the enemy had infiltrated between the troop and the bridge, this officer, on his own initiative, crossed the bridge in his tank and engaged the enemy, driving them off and remained holding the far side of the bridge until relieved by another tank. He then proceeded up the road and joined the troop holding the centre line. By his devotion to duty and initiative, this officer was undoubtedly instrumental in control being retained of the northern approaches to the bridge at a very vital time.

30:39I mean, that is quite impressive, to be fair. Rather him than me. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'd have given him an emcee. Yeah, exactly.

30:46Al Murray: Bare minimum. And Peter Carrington, he's a third generation grenadier. His father and grandfather had both been guardsmen. Not that that made things easy for him. When he joined the regiment, he was told by the lieutenant colonel he was not to marry before he was 25, to hunt in Leicestershire twice a week, and never to wear a grey top hat before the June meeting at Epsom. Quite right. It's another planet. I'm a bit surprised he had to be told, to be honest. And his fellow officers behaved as if he wasn't there for the first three months. Just ignored him completely. And you'd think that had obviously been done to them.

31:21Al Murray: So we'll do it to him. So we're going to do it again. Yeah, exactly. Precedent had seamlessly been continued through prep school, public school, into the guards, and finally to the Nijmegen Road Bridge.

31:36Al Murray: After the war, he said comradeship in war obviously has an effect on you and how you think. Any social divisions disappear when you share your life with three other people in a tank. i'll never forget the brave splendid people i served with oh oh makes makes you makes you proud doesn't it one came to appreciate that there's people from all walks of life exactly not just people who have to hunt in leicestershire twice a week not i'm getting ignored for three months oh dear absolutely amazing anyway but he's not alone is he yeah exactly because hot on his heels is tony jones and once the last tank has got through the roadblock he gets to work no rest for the wicked the thing is there's the main span and there's a second span for the runoff of the bridge north the road bridge because he jumps out of the scout car orders the wireless up onto the bren gun to cover him and he gets to work jim and he says the first thing i saw was about half a dozen wires on the footway to the side of the bridge these i cut exactly and he found as he went that while german preparations uh for the demolition of the Wahlberg weren't exactly thorough, there was plenty of it.

32:43Al Murray: And we heard about the improvised, the IED in the previous episode that was a slit trench full of explosives. After the wires, the first thing he finds is 10 Telamine 35s in a slit trench next to the roadblock. Yikes. The Telamine is an anti-tank mine, so it's a powerful explosive filled with five and a half kilos of explosive. And he finds 10 of these daisy chained together, which would have caused quite the bang. So he removes and then throws the igniters into the river, just tosses them into the river. Then he orders his driver to turn the car around and walk north. And he walks north. There are more charges.

33:17Al Murray: And he thinks these are intended to cut the road rather than blow the bridges as such. So the Germans are sort of, they've got a half in, half out demolition policy there. Delay rather than destroy completely. Because they might want to use the bridge themselves. That's actually, in the end, German reticence about blowing the bridges, about being able to use it themselves should the battle flow the other way. And these have been left on the footpath either side of the second pier at the north end of the bridge. So he thinks, these aren't in position, so they're safe. So he carries on searching.

33:46Al Murray: He just leaves those explosives there. He then walks over to the western side of the bridge and has a look underneath the bridge to see if there are charges to match those meant to cut the road. There he finds what he thinks is three dead Germans who suddenly spring to life with their hands up. So he wants him out of his lights as he's searching. So he sends them to the armoured car. One of them is really badly wounded. So Jones makes sure he has a seat in the Humber. Then four more of the enemy emerge with their hands up. With these seven prisoners, he returns to the southern end of the bridge and hands them over to the troops there.

34:14Al Murray: When he arrives at the northernmost end of the bridge, he meets Lieutenant Vivian, who's with the Sapareki officer with the Irish Guards. And together they carry on hunting for explosives and found a way down into the bridge's superstructure. The bridge has four piers, two pairs of towers the bridge sits on and they get into these piers. And it's inside these piers that they find all sorts of stuff. As they make their way down the ladder, he says, A voice said, don't shoot. And we found a couple of Germans. One of them spoke excellent English and said he would show me the charges, but that there were none in this pier.

34:48Al Murray: Jones leaves Vivian with the prisoners and he checks that the Germans are telling the truth. And there are no charges in any of this pier's compartments because it's got four compartments and there are no charges in that pier. But in the next pier, it's a completely different story. Led by this helpful German, they find charges on the girders in the second pier in line with the charges for cutting the road. So there is something a bit more serious in there. Then they've hit the jackpot here. This is the serious effort by the Germans to destroy the bridge. And Jones says, there was an elaborate system of staging and the charges were made of TNT packed in green painted boxes.

35:25Each charge with a serial number corresponding to a serial painted on the girder. The charges were to be fired electrically, and the detonators were in and connected to one of the wires which I had previously cut on the deck. We removed these and decided to check the rest of the bridge, though our prisoner had said there were no more charges. Yeah.

35:44Al Murray: So by the time he's finished this task, it's dark. The Americans are now on the bridge, and a platoon had shot and killed an SS man who'd fired on them while they were on the bridge. And Jones had been going about this business with lurking riflemen the entire time. and he doesn't mention this in his account at all. I've got this account in front of me here. He doesn't mention the fact that there's enemy on the bridge, apart from these people he takes prisoner. Enemy all over the place. The CRE notes, Brigadier Jones says, bullets must have been flying in every direction as numerous snipers were hidden in the girders and enemy posts had a good field of fire from the North Bank.

36:18Al Murray: But Jones Jr. never mentions this. No one's interested in that gulf. They're just interested in how many wires there are. Exactly, and how many prisoners he takes. Exactly. They search the Southern Pier. They find more enemy wounded, but no more charges. In all, Jones and his guys take 81 prisoners during their search for the explosives. That's just amazing. Yeah. Yeah, so you presumably start off all shooting at him, as you point out. Yeah, exactly. And he's left his guy with a Bren gun in the Humber, who's obviously delivering and covering fire. Even so, the charges, which are disconnected, but still in place, are removed the following day.

36:52Al Murray: He's done what he has to do. For this action, Jones receives the military cross. But I think what it does is it explains, you know, there's this great supposed mystery. Why don't 30 Corps push on? Why don't they just get on with it? Well, because they run out of light and because this bridge has to be made safe before you can proceed, doesn't it? Before they can go anywhere. Yeah. Before we can go anywhere. and i i think you know this idea that the british stop and make tea is obviously a load of crap it's just an insult isn't it yeah because what you've got is a sapper officer at great personal risk picking his way through the explosives on the bridge yeah yeah because once the bridge has been made safe and he has to be made safe night's fallen and no one's going anywhere at night in armor you know the next part of sapping actually in garden is 43rd wessex division's efforts to reach, reinforce, and then withdraw first ever one of the Naderheim.

37:50Al Murray: But we'll come back to another time. You get this very vivid picture, don't you, the scale of this and some of the problems. And I think we've sort of touched on this before, but the problem with the narrative of the Second World War is that it's all about what you see in front of you rather than that long tail. And I think, you know, one of the things we have done over the last seven years is spend a lot of time on the operational level of war. But it's really good to do this as well, because this is the operational level of war but it's also in the spearhead but it's a spearhead that we don't know about or haven't known about before you did these notes and done this short series but one that people should know about because these guys are absolutely key to the whole thing and they're kind of they're they're manipulators of success aren't they i mean yeah exactly it's incredible what they do and ingenuity and problem solving and thinking on their feet and that agility which is so often that kind of that tactical agility on an operational level is something that that we always apply to the germans and less so to us but actually here you are you've got a classic demonstration of just how agile these guys and that you know a young 20 something lieutenant is making really profound and important decisions on which the entire operation is going to be dependent and and he just gets on with it yeah but also the way it's the way it's done this is how they do it with the artillery so there's the echo of that it's how they're going to do it with the engineers that the the subletons these these decisions are devolved the bloke on the ground is allowed to make the decision yeah and then the difference is with the german army is the bloke on the ground is allowed to make the decision right but what what you have here is the bloke on the ground makes a decision and his boss knows about it and then his boss if he needs to can action the enormous bridging column further back.

39:39Al Murray: So you have this thing where the flexibility isn't just tactical, which is the German example that's always cited, the amazing German tactical flexibility. You have this incredible operational flexibility, which means that you can call up the 450 vehicles to bridge the wall if you need to. And obviously, it's going to be a ball eight doing it, but you can do it. You can call for the assault boats. You can improvise a river assault of that scale effectively overnight. And I think Market Gardens always portrayed as this great sort of, you know, 30 core didn't get the finger out, but look at what they're having to deal with.

40:15Al Murray: Look at what the nature of the problems are. I think it is really interesting. And the fact is, this operational stuff has to, you know, there's no successful operational level without a successful tactical level and vice versa. It's a Merbius strip. The thing completely goes round on itself. There's no one without the other. Anyway, we hope you enjoyed this episode. A hurrah for the CRE. Absolutely hurrah for the CRE. But also, we don't like to just offer you big sweep on this show, do we? We want to get into the ground here as well. Who knows, Jim? Maybe we'll do some airfield construction at some point.

40:52Only if we can add what happens once the typhoons arrive.

40:56Al Murray: Yeah, of course. I mean, by the way, if you think that the engineering effort for Market Garden was something, you wait till you see the operational orders for plunder. I mean, dear God, the bridging provision for crossing the Rhine itself. You know, there's nine million lorries, basically. Yeah, that's tremendous. I can't wait. If you've enjoyed this episode, then become a patron. Why not? Then you can listen to it again with no adverts, and you can get stuck into all our upcoming stuff. Thanks for listening, everybody. We'll see you again very soon. And cheerio. Cheerio.

41:33Thank you.