OPERATION ‘AMHERST': the French SAS in Holland, 1945. Karel Margry describes how on the night of Arpil 7/8, 1945, the Allies in the West launched Operation ‘Amherst’ — the last airborne operation of the war — dropping some 700 parachutists of the French 2ème and 3ème Régiments de Chasseurs Parachutistes, part of the Special Air Service (SAS) Brigade, into north-eastern Holland.
Their task was to assist the advance of the First Canadian Army to the North Sea by creating maximum confusion behind the German lines and securing vital road bridges. The Battle of Perano — On November 18, 1943, New Zealand armour went into action for the first time in the Second World War when the 19th New Zealand Armoured Regiment, a unit converted from infantry to armour in Egypt and freshly arrived in Italy, participated in an attack on Perano, a hilltop village overlooking the Sangro river plain.
Jeffrey Plowman and Perry Rowe tell the story. Gestapo Headquarters in Brussels — The headquarters of the Gestapo (or more correctly, of the Befehlshaber der Sipo-SD) in occupied Belgium was housed at No. 453 Avenue Louise in Brussels. Karel Margry looks at this building with its unique place in history.
