Citizen Soldiers_ The U.S. Army from the - Stephen E. Ambrose [33]
Ten British tanks and an artillery battery were lined up along the river to give covering fire when Cook crossed. But not until 1500 did the trucks arrive. They brought only twenty-six assault boats, instead of the thirtythree that had been promised. And they were the frailest of craft-six metres long, of canvas, with a reinforced plywood bottom. There were only three paddles per boat. The Waal was almost 400 metres wide, with a swift current of about ten kilometres per hour.
The paratroopers pushed off into deep water, thirteen men to a boat, plus three British engineers with the paddles. As they got out into the current and headed for the far bank, the Germans opened fire. Cook and Keep were in the first boat. "It was a horrible picture, this river crossing," Captain Keep wrote to his mother, "set to (lie deafening roar of omnipresent firing. It was fiendish and dreadful. Defenceless, frail canvas boats jammed to overflowing with humanity, all striving desperately to cross the Waal as quickly as possible, and get to a place where at least they could fight."
Some boats took direct hits, leaving nothing but flotsam. The flotilla came on. Only eleven boats made it to the far shore, but when they did, the paratroopers who had survived the ordeal had their blood up. They were not going to be denied.
"Nobody paused," a British tank officer wrote. "Men got out and began running towards the embankment. My God what a courageous sight it was!"
Cook led the way. Captain Keep commented, "Many times I have seen troops who are driven to a fever pitch-troops who, for a brief interval of combat, are lifted out of themselves, fanatics rendered crazy by rage and the lust for killing, men who forget temporarily the meaning of fear. However, I have never witnessed this human metamorphosis so acutely displayed as on this day. The men were beside themselves. They continued to cross that field in spite of all the Kraut could do, cursing savagely, their guns spitting fire."
In less than a half hour his men had reached the top of the highway embankment and driven the Germans out. The engineers, meanwhile, had paddled back to the west bank and returned with a second wave. Altogether it took six crossings to get Cook's battalion over.
As those crossings were being made. Cook led the first wave in an assault on the bridges. His men came on fast. Meanwhile, Vandervoort's people on the west side had finally overrun the park. The Germans scrambled frantically for the plungers to set off explosives on the bridges, but Cook's men did what they had been trained to do-wherever they saw wires on the ground, they cut them. The German engineers hit the plungers, and nothing happened.
Cook's men set up defensive positions at the bridges, facing east. As the British tanks with Vandervoort started across the highway bridge, their crews saw the Stars and Stripes go up on the other end. Of Cook's men forty were killed, a hundred wounded, but he had the bridges. There were 267 German dead on the railroad bridge alone, plus many hundreds wounded and captured. It was one of the great feats of arms of World War II.
Darkness was descending. Arnhem was but eleven kilometres away. Frost's battalion was still barely holding the eastern end of the bridge. But General Horrocks decided to set up defensive positions for the night. The Guards began to brew up their tea.
Cook's men were enraged. They yelled and swore at the Brits, told them those were their countrymen in Arnhem and they needed help-now. Horrocks commented, "This operation of Cook's was the best and most gallant attack I have ever seen carried out in my life. No wonder the leading paratroopers were furious that we did not push straight on for Arnhem. They felt they had risked their lives for nothing, but it was impossible, owing to the confusion which existed in Nijmegen, with houses burning