In October 1943 a poster began to appear in barracks and military camps which read: “Volunteers who are interested in parachuting and guerrilla warfare and with a knowledge of French, step forward” So began the recruitment by SOE of a total of fifty-five British Jedburgh officers and around forty-five radio operators. It’s those Jedburgh officers and radio operators who were dispatched to the Netherlands in 1944-45 who form the central story of Jelle Hoodveld’s highly readable and fast paced narrative in Dutch Courage – Special Forces in the Netherlands 1944-45. Starting with the concept which gave rise to Jedburgh the reader is taken through the rigorous demands of training, carried out at Milton Hall in Cambridgeshire. Which, as one of its pupils remarked was “Truly a Warriors Domain” The central action of 1944 in the Netherlands was of course Operation Market Garden and the book explores the role of the Jedburgh Teams during it who were active in the region and gives a detailed analysis of all the disparate Resistance Groups operating in the country. It was these groups who, with co-ordination from the Jedburgh team, carried out 30 separate attacks on the Dutch Railway network in and around Arnhem in early September 1944. The actions of these Groups and the Jedburgh Teams is described well within a pleasantly accurate overview of Market Garden, which, set against some recent tomes on the subject presented for this reader a refreshing change. With the failure of Market Garden the book moves on to and concludes with the sometimes overlooked events which took place in the Netherlands in late 1944 and 1945. The story largely surrounds Jedburgh Team ‘Dudley’ who operated in the still-occupied Northern half of the country for seven months. One by one the Team were captured and the radio operator, Sergeant John Austin, who as German interrogation reports showed, never once gave up his real name was executed as an act of reprisal in April 1945. Even with the impending conclusion of the war the reprisals didn’t end there. SS and police commander for the Netherlands, Rauter, was injured in a resistance attack near Apeldoorn. The reprisal? 117 prisoners were executed. Its incidents like this which goes some way to explaining the animosity in parts of the Netherlands by those of a certain generation to the Germans which still lasts to this day. In conclusion, whilst a niche subject, this beautifully produced and lavishly illustrated book is well recommended for helping explain part of the war largely unseen from British eyes. Dutch Courage - Amberley Publishing
Very interesting book about an unknown subject. Hooiveld took the pain to investigate where others abandoned. And indeed the result gives the reader some very good knowledge about partisan activities, SOE, SAS, droppings, covert ops, Jedburghs and The Netherlands. Some SAS-operators never left Holland, but some Dutch agents dropped by SOE didn't either. Good book, very well documented and nicely illustrated.
