The Rhine Crossing: 150 miles in 18 Days
It was troops of the 43rd Division, supported by tanks of the 8th Armoured Brigade, who, after smashing some of the toughest resistance in the Rees bridgehead and forcing crossings of the rivers Aa and Lower Ijssel, broke out northwards to liberate the important Dutch town of Hengelo on 3rd April and then thrusting due east captured the German communications centre of Kloppenburg on 13th April.
The entry of the Hampshires into Kloppenburg completed eighteen days and over 150 miles of battle and pursuit, on the extreme left flank of the Second Army, against pockets of desperate resistance, blown bridges, cratered roads, and formidable road blocks thickly sown with mines.
While the Divisional Artillery gave supporting fire to the first assault crossing of the Rhine the infantry battalions were crossing within 48 hours. The first battle was for the town of Millingen, a few miles inland from Rees itself. After difficult fighting against paratroops, much of it house clearing at night, the Dorsets, aided by one Company of the Hampshires, and the Canadians under command together won the town. Millingen and an area of scattered farm buildings to the south, lying between Millingen Meer and the Millingen-Haldern railway, were cleared during the night of the 26th March only after close grim fighting against a tough enemy.
On the morning of the 27th 129 Brigade launched en attack with the object of cleating up to the line of the unfinished autobahn running north west to Emmerich. The Wiltshires advanced against fairly light opposition until the area of the autobahn was reached. Here the enemy had constructed their mein defence line, a deep and intricate trench system strongly held with many automatic weapons. 214 Brigade attacked in the afternoon and met desperate resistance and heavy shelling before this trench system was overrun. The Worcestershires and the 7th Somersets made the assault. Reaching the edge of the wood, with the German trench system only 80 yards ahead, the Somersets were held up for several hours by vicious machine gun fire from the trenches. A section worked its way up the road ditch to reach the shelter of an unfinished fly-over bridge and outflank the Germans in their trench system. Only after a heavy exchange of fire was this strongpoint eliminated and the line of the autobahn finally won.
At the same time the DCLI were advancing in Kangaroos on the village of Megchelen to the north east. Stiff fire from 88 millimetres early forced the infantry to abandon their armoured troop carriers after several had been hit. Advancing on foot the DCLI fought their way over 2,000 yards of ground in darkness and fog. It was not until daylight that they reached the outskirts of the village to fight their way in against machine guns and fire from light anti-aircraft guns used in a ground role. Supporting flame throwers were bogged on the way in: one only remained to fire the houses and intimidate the enemy as the DCLI routed them out of the cellars.
The autobahn defence line and the village of Megchelen proved to be the main cores of German resistance on the left flank of the Rees bridgehead. It was the type of fighting where fanatical Nazis shot comrades in arms atttempting to surrender. Pressing on, the Dorsets and the Hampshires cleared the villages of Anholt and Landfort, the Royal Engineers bridging frequent streams and cratered roads, and went into the assault of the rivers Aa and Oude Ijssel.
Several assault crossings were made, both in daylight and during the night. The 5th Dorsets, bothered more by the state of the ground and the darkness than by the enemy, surprised the Germans by crossing before first light. The Hampshires captured a bridge intact after a platoon had dashed across 70 yards of open ground under machine gun fire. Other troops crossed over the remnants of demolished bridges or swam and waded to the east bank. The speed of the operation was its success, giving the enemy no time for more than patchy resistance, By the morning of the 30th, with Anholt captured and the rivers crossed, the stage was set for a breakout.
The 4th Somerset Light Infantry and the 4th and 5th Wiltshires, on tanks of the 8th Armoured Brigade, now struck due north through Varsseveld and Ruurlo to Lochem, clearing each against small though tough enemy forces. Driving hard along this road in bright moonlight the leading tank crew of the 417th Dragoon Guards saw a group of Germans completing demolition preparations on a bridge right ahead. An object lying on the bridge was identified through a telescope as an aerial bomb. As the enemy ran for their firing point to blow the bridge the Pioneer Section of the 4th Somersets raced forward towards the bridge. Though fully aware that the bomb might explode at any moment the Pioneers found and cut the demolition wires, lifted a number of mines found to be connected to the bomb, and rolled it clear of the bridge.
The armoured thrust went on and the Somersets finally entered Loam in the early hours of 1st April after the German Commander had refused to surrender to a demand made over the telephone by the 4th Wiltshires.
Just ahead lay the important Zutphen-Hengelo Canal.In the next 24 hours several brave, though unsuccessful, attempts were made to capture crossings over this canal. Tanks of the 8th Armoured, with the Worcester-shires in support, actually got astride two bridges, But the first collapsed under the weight and the second was brown by the Germans at the very moment that a tank, after driving clean through close range fire, got on to the crossing. This canal obstacle was only outflanked after 130 Brigade, the Dorsets and the Hampshires, had made a long forced march at night in heavy rain and appalling ground conditions, Confined to a loose sand track, tanks and other track vehicles towed wheeled vehicles and guns through feet of mud, passed through Enschede, and prepared to mount the attack on the big town of Hengelo from the east.
Both Hengelo and the adjoining town of Borne, and with them the German canal defence line, were cleared on 3rd April against light opposition. The 5th Dorsets attacked from the south-east. advancing up the main road, while the Hampshires came in from the north-east. The southerly attack was met by spasmodic resistance from machine gun nests, causing the infantry to dismount from the tanks of the Sherwood Rangers Yeomanry and deploy, Gallant work by individuals quickly disposed of one particularly troublesome Spandau position and mines which delayed the tanks on the road, This resistance proved to be all that the enemy could muster. The 5th Dorsets reached the centre of Hengelo, turning the canal defences also. while the Hampshires entered from the north against even less opposition. The 4th Dorsets liberated Borne, a few miles north, without a fight a few hours later. Our entry into Hengelo had cut the Amsterdam-Hannover railway, a V 2 supply route, and one of the two main escape lines for the Germans in Holland.
A brief pause and then the Division thrust strongly From Lingen due east along the main Amsterdam-Bremen road, Though considerably impeded by bridge demolitions and heavy road blocks the impetus of the pursuit was maintained. Approaching Haselunne the 7th Bn Somerset Light Infantry, the Worcestershires and the DCLI swung left-handed to cross the river Hase to the north-west of the town itself, The enemy had blown the main road bridge on the immediate outskirts of Haselunne, The river crossing by the Somersets was unopposed though small groups of the enemy with a few machine guns did serve to slow the advance a little, The Worcestershires now passed through and entered Haselunne on the 9th April without a shot being fired against them. The Royal Engineers, already fully occupied dealing with continual craters, reopened the main road from the west by throwing a Bailey bridge over the river Hase.
Two days later, now almost unopposed except by demolitions and obstacles, the Dorsets entered Herzlake and Loningen. 129 Brigade, the 4th Somersets and the 4th and 5th Wiltshires, now left the main axis to move along a secondary road to the north, and converge again on the important junction town of Kloppenburg. The capture of this place would mean the final cutting of enemy communications between Holland and Bremen. The Hampshires launched the attack on the early afternoon of 13th April. Advancing along two routes companies reached the demolished river bridge in the centre of the town and a second bridge in the northern suburb before the enemy reacted. Then a stiff fight developed with a force of tough young Nazis, amongst them elements of the Gross Deutschland Brigade - Hitler's so called bodyguard. Faced at a distance of 30 - 40 yards only by two self-propelled guns in the main street, and fired go from the houses, the Hampshires and tanks of the Sherwood Rangers Yeomanry fought on into the darkness. Clearing house to house they bit by bit drove the enemy out, killing or capturing over a hundred. As they pulled out the Germans were further engaged by the DCLI in a left flanking move to the north of the town, and to whom a Company 100 strong surrendered.
The capture of the important communications centre of Kloppenburg was for the main elements of the Division the culmination of eighteen days and over 150 miles of continuous and tiring battle and pursuit east of the Rhine. But this phase was not completed until the next day when the Worcestershires faced the First counter attack reported on this sector since the breakout from the Rees bridgehead. With a cross roads at Ahlhorn, ten mrles east of Klopperiburg, as its objective, this Battalion, with formidable armoured support, advanced along a road frequently broken and barred by craters and road Hocks. These obstacles imposed considerable delay and the troops were already tired as they reached a river crossing in the evening. The bridge was blown, but two platoons got across to engage the enemy on the far bank. In the meantime an alternative crossing was found and the whole Battalion got over to cover the bridging operation by the Royal Engineers.
The Germans then reacted strongly, They first stopped the bridging by heavy and accurate shellfire; and then switched their fire to the area in which the Worcestershires had consolidated, Their counter attack followed immediately. Some 100 infantry debouched from the woods and overran two forward platoon positions. But the Company rallied so well that the counter attack was abruptly halted and then smashed with the help of strong fire from a second Company on the flank, After an hour's fierce fighting the Germans pulled back, leaving many dead and prisoners behind. This was the last counter attack within the Division.
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