Operation Amherst

Operation Amherst was a Free French SAS, led by brigadier Mike Calvert of Chindit fame, attack designed to capture intact Dutch canals, bridges and airfields during World War II.

The battle

The operation began with the drop of 700 Special Air Service troopers of 3 and 4 SAS (French) on the night of the 7 April 1945. The teams spread out to capture and protect key facilities from the Germans. Advancing Canadian troops of the 8th Reconnaissance Regiment relieved the isolated French SAS.

The majority of the French paratroopers were dropped over the North-western part of the province of Drenthe. Here they managed to occupy a series of bridges and conducted hit and run attacks on the withdrawing German troops. A small group of paratroopers under the command of Captain Pierre Sicaud were dropped in south-east Friesland close to the border of Drenthe. Under the cover of heavy clouds several sticks consisting of approximately 15 paratroopers each managed to land without being detected by the Germans. Captain Sicaud, however, landed in a pine tree and his eye was pierced by a branch seriously limiting the use of his eye.

Some of the French paratroopers were discovered by a band of Dutch resistance fighters who had made their shelter in the vast forests south of the small village of Appelscha. Led by an agent of the Dutch government in exile in England, the paratroopers managed to re-group and start a series of attacks on German troops retreating through the area to Germany.

Sicaud and his paratroopers managed to occupy an important bridge, seriously frustrating German troop movements. A series of running battles between the French, the Germans and Dutch Nazi collaborators were conducted near the bridge.The civilian population of Appelscha, after a relatively calm five years of German occupation, were drawn into five days of heavy fighting leaving no civilian casualties but plenty of German dead.

One group of paratroopers was dropped too far from Captain Sicaud and ended up on the outskirts of the small village of Haulerwijk, ten kilometers north of Appelscha. German troops discovered the French in the early morning of the 8th April and a fire fight broke out between the French and the Germans. One French SAS trooper was killed, whilst some of the French were captured and some managed to flee and catch up with the French fighting in and around Appelscha.

Eventually, in disarray, the Germans managed to counter attack with the rest of their troop. Some SAS and civilians were killed, but the remaining SAS troops forced the Germans to withdraw. This mini battle was referred to as "the last Amherst" where part of the town was destroyed, and a huge conflict ensued.

References

• Bonnecarrère, Paul (1985). Qui Ose Vaincra. Marabout Université. ISBN 2-501-00748-4.