May 10th....

[Derk]

I'm not that old but if I had lived 72 years ago, I would have been woken up this morning by the sound of anti aircraft guns, artillery firing from a wood nearby, if I would have looked to the sky it would have been full of 3 engined transport planes, parachutes and modern fighters and bombers. Groups of enemy soldiers roamed through the fields around our village. A few miles down the road, the bridge at Haagsche Schouw would have been blocked by paratroopers and the Hague could not be reached . A full scale battle raged over Valkenburg airfield. Soldiers were being killed and wounded and the nearby University Hospital was fully occupied in taking care of them. A mile or so to the north at the Postbrug on the motorway a bus full of soldiers was hit by a Stuka and 26 were killed..... WW II had come to our country and history was being written right on our doorstep.... In four days it was all over and the next 5 years terror reigned ........

 

Edited May 10, 2012 by Derk

[Slartibartfast]

[+Muesli]

 

Valkenburg Airfield......

 

My ex-wife's grandfather was stationed there in the 1940 May days..

He told me stuff (as veterans among eachother he said) he never told

anyone else. It made my neck hair crawl.

 

Good story Derk, hopefully makes people realise that freedom

never is 'free'.

 

 

Iwan

[+ST0RM]

Good story Derk, hopefully makes people realise that freedom

never is 'free'.

 

Quote of the day.

[+Dave]

[+Typhoid]

[Lt. James Cater]

[Capitaine Vengeur]

Just to add with some delay that 10 May 2012 was also the 40th anniversary of the hardest day of aerial battle over Vietnam. That day, no less than 7 Viet MiGs were downed in various air combats, to one F-4D. With 3 kills tallied during an epic fight, 'Duke' Cunningham and 'Irish' Driscoll became the first American aces of the War, and the last ones for the US Navy to that day. The same day, Steve Ritchie shot down his first victim on his way to become the last US Air Force ace pilot to that day...