Hi there! I've just found your website/formum and this is my first posting. I'm making a family albus for my mother. Her father Lies Boers and grandfather Gerrit Boers where probably in the resistance. And I would like to find out more information. Because Elize Gerrit (Lies) Boers did not speak much about the war. I do know that Gerrit Boers had two people in hiding. A policeman and a painter/ he was also a document forger in the war. Lies Boers and his father where allowed to drive a car to transport ill and wounded people to a hospital in Zwolle. They drove regularly also at night. The resistance group Beernink (de groene) had a secret transmitter in the hospital in Zwolle. Maybe Lies Boers went to the same hospital with someone wounded of ill and took also the forged documents to the resistance group Beernink? Who knows... According to my uncle my grandmother got a pin from a french paratrooper which Lies Boers brought to the staatsbos to Jos Bonvanie. The pin has two wings and the text: hepolite for speed. I found out on te internet that Hepolite is an English company that makes pistons and rings for cars / motorcycles. Why would a paratrooper wear a pin like that? Probably he liked motorcycles or because of the wings. I'm trying to find out the name of this paratrooper. Lies Boers and his father lived in Den Hulst, Holland and thanks to the book -de laatste sprong- I know now that the sticks 14 and 15 landed near den Hulst. A part of stick 14 probably walked along the house of Gerrit Boers: Stick 14 crossed a channel by boat apposite the notaris house and than took the BH spijkerweg the writer said. But to come from the crossingpoint to the BH Spijkerweg is 500 meters walking along a busy road and there is a more quiet road leading from the crossing point away from the busy street and than picking up the bh spijkerweg at a different point, closer to the staatsbos. That quiet road is passing the house of Gerrit Boers (in just a few meters). So I think they took that road... and maybe thats te point where Gerrit met the paratroopers. Is there anyone who has a photo from stick 14 from before the landing in Holland? Maybe I can see one of the paratroopers is wearing the pin. It's a long shot, I know... Ellen
Hi Ellen, welcome to the forum. Have you seen my thread over here: OPERATION AMHERST: French SAS in Holland, April 1945 If you are looking for names of individual SAS men, this French site, "Parachutistes S.A.S de la France Libre", will probably be the best place to start with: Welcome
Hi there! I am still searching for the paratrooper... my aunt told me that the paratrooper landed near or in the channel with the name Dedemsvaart...and it was close to the house of my grandparents in Den Hulst/ Nieuwleusen. On the internetsite Kwartaalblad Ni'jluusn van vrogger .... i found out that approximately 12 paratroopers landed on the southside of the channel... my grandparents lived on the other side... So now i would like to know... did the paratroopers leave the plane always in the same order? so always the same paratrooper goes first out of the plane and always the same leaves the plane last? With the help of David Portier i know now that it was not stick 14 and 15 that landed near Den Hulst/ Nieuwleusen but stick 15 and 16... And stick 16 landed in Den Hulst. So one of these 15 paratroopers from stick 16 my grandparents met. Does someone now? Ellen
Hello Ellen. The website here would be a great help to you in your search. You have to register but that is just a matter of providing an email address and a "user name": Bienvenue The stick numbers/dropping zones compared to where the sticks actually came down are a bit of a nightmare. Definitive/correct stick number identification is still a problem even today, but I would be inclined to say that the fflssas.org website has it right, or as close as it can be. In the meantime, a couple of things that will hopefully help you get closer to the name of he particular parachutist attached as pdfs. Within one of the pdfs I have listed the names of the men of sticks 15 and 16, and in the other pdf you will find this photo which has the description and text as below (note, the text there has it as stick number 4!) "The stick that landed furthest south in the 2ème RCP area was No. 4 commanded by Lieutenant Jean Sriber. They came down close to the town of Dedemsvaart, a full 45 kilometres from their prescribed drop zone. One man, Soldat Pierre Rufenacht, sprained his ankle in the jump. Learning from local Dutch where they were, they soon linked up with the Canadian ground army, scout cars of the 18th Armoured Car Regiment (12th Manitoba Dragoons) already reaching the town that same evening. For the next few days, the SAS men carried out patrols, searched the area for stray Germans and on April 11, in two separate ambushes on the Ommen to Hardenberg road, destroyed two enemy supply vehicles. In all, they captured seven German soldiers and killed or wounded four others. Prior to leaving for the rendezvous point at Coevorden, they posed for a group shot with members of the local resistance. Right: The picture was taken in front of No. 360 Langewijk, which remains completely unchanged." Good luck with all your searching, and if I can come up with a name of an individual parachutist that may fit with the details you've previously provided I'll be sure to post it in this thread for you. Kind regards, always, Jim.
Ellen - 10 paras of the stick Lagallarde landed south of the Dedemsvaart Canal (see:OPERATION AMHERST: French SAS in Holland, April 1945). I derived this information from the book of G.J. Westhoff, "De Laatste sprong, De zuidflank van Operatie Amherst op de grens van Overijssel en Drenthe", which apeared in 2020. I do not have the names of these paras, but suggest you contact the author, who resides at Genemuiden. I know he did some 'in-depth' research in the actions in the area.
Good morning Ellen, and following on from all the good work of Stolpi here on WW2 Talk, and his magnificent thread on Operation Amherst (apologies for not posting this last night, completed the images way too late for that unfortunately) Please note that the information that follows is all as a result of the work put into the website fflsas.org by it's superb organiser, worker, and users of said site, and gathered from same. Note that the stick numbers ("15", "55", "56", "57") as mapped are as per Michael Calvert's map from his operational report into Amherst (map extract here below). The Maps that then follow this one show the positions of the sticks on modern day google maps (the most pertinent to you, and where your Grandparents lived, being sticks as numbered 56 and 57). "17" is the number of the DZ (drop-zone) that sticks 55, 56, 57, had hoped to land on. Below are modern day maps (as per the interactive map on fflsas.org) progressively zoomed in. The names of the SAS parachutistes Francais dropped in "stick 56" (stick commander in bold - usually jumped first or last, but there was no standard operating procedure for where any individual would be positioned in the stick) were: Anastaze, Gaston Sgt Beyries, Jean Lucien Bongeot, Julien Sgt/C Bouffartigue, Jacques S/Lt Chappuis, André Farudja, Maurice Cpl/C Gelot, Maurice Hanny, Joseph Cpl Laborde, André Cpl Loichot, Yves Emile Loichot, Raoul Cpl/C Noël, Jacques Sgt Petit, Michel Plateel, René Sgt Roux, Pierre Aspt The names of the SAS parachutistes Francais dropped in stick 57 (again, stick commander in bold) were; Bonnard, Rémy Caillon, Daniel David, Roger Fourniaud, René Galesne, Louis Adj Gastaud, Lucien Godet, Henri Guillon, Gérard Lagallarde, Gérard Aspt Le Deuff, Jean Lepoutre, Bernard Marnetto, Marcel Perdreau, Jean Sgt Pruvost, André Sgt Saiveau, André I have included the stick lists below as pdfs for you Ellen so that you (and others) may print them if you wish, and again, I would highly recommend signing up to fflsas.org here: Bienvenue Good fortune to you, and good luck with all your searching. Kind regards, always, Jim.
In 1965 the Dedemsvaart canal, which had been dug between 1825 - 1854, had become obsolete. It was too narrow for the larger modern barges. It therefore was decided to close the waterway and partly fill it up. The modern road N377 now follows the trajectory of the old canal. Below a historical map showing the canal. It ran westward from Hasselt on the IJssel River to the Vecht River between Gramsbergen and Coevorden. For more info see: https://www.vandedemsvaart.nl/kaart/kaart.html According to Westhof the men of the stick Lagallarde were scattered on both sides of the canal, with the larger part, about ten men, landing south of the canal. The latter, landed between the farm of Evertsen (now-a-days 'De Hulstkampen') and the Bosmansweg. The French paras congregated at the farm of Klaas Oosterveen at the Burgemeester Backxlaan 80 and from there were led by civilians to the house of the Borger family at Den Hulst 93, which was situated near the canal. Since the bridge over the canal, known as the Ommerdijksebrug, and the bridge at the sluice gate were out, the paras had to use an abandoned ship, that was docked in front of the adjacent notary house, to cross the canal. Once across they were led by their civilian guides along the Spijkerweg and Kanlaan towards the shed inside the Staatsbos, where they joined the rest of the stick Lagallarde. I hope this is of help.
I tried to make a map of the paces where the paratroopers were sighted by eyewitnesses in Den Hulst…(the map is in dutch). I made the map with the help of the book from Westhoff, nijluusn van vrogger, kwartaalblad.nl and the imagebank of nieuwleusen… You can also see where my grandparents and greatgrandparents lived. According to info the paratroopers crossed the channel called dedemsvaart in front of the notariswoning and the house of my greatgrandparents was right next to that… and next to their house was a small road that leads to the BH Spijkerweg. The house of my grandparents was near the gebo.
I have found new information and I am almost certain that stick 14 from Baratin landed on the south side of the channel Dedemsvaart in Den Hulst.... and not the group of Lagallarde. From stick 15, Bouffartigues we know that he landed near Punthorst (book Laatste Sprong) + Yves Loichot, stick 15, was killed in Punthorst. Raoul the brother of Yves, also in stick 15, wrote in a document that when he and his group arrived in the house from the forrester that the group Baratin is already there. I also found a book written bij P.A. Léger (dazermont) stick 14... He mentioned Baratin (stick 14) and Bouffartigue (stick 15) that landed both close to him... He wrote: Just like me Baratin and Bouffartigues have no idea where we are.... And he also wrote when they were in the house probably from Schoemaker zandspeur 47: I smile to the children and kneel down and Baratin and Bouffartigue do the same. This group of about 11 paratroopers took a boat to cross the channel so they where on the south side of the channel dedemsvaart... I also found the son of Octave Bernault and he gave me 16 pages of the book his father Octave wrote... He tells about a civilian and his interpreter... This must be Loman and Wiep van Werven... Loman lived in Den Hulst... Octave also says... it is about an hour walk...and he also crossed the channel... but in a small boat (Balkbrug is more than an hour walk to the forrest of Staphorst. There is also a newpaper that tells the story of Borgers who lived Den Hulst 93... where the paratroopers crossed the channel Dedemsvaart... He speaks of an officer probably with the rank of captain... and this captain has a red beard... And according to Raoul Loichot (stick 15) : Commander Simons (he also has a red beard) was not in sector Staphorst... only captain Baratin was there. Raoul Loichot: Mission en Hollande. Opération Amherst (7/8 avril 1945 au 20 avril 1945) P-A. Léger: Aux carrefours de la Guerre Octave Bernault: 1944: Parachuté sur le bois d'Anjou
