The Germans were able to seize the initiative again and opened a counterattack in late October with well-armed and skilfully led combat units. The British were able to halt the German advance by quickly redeploying troops from other fronts to the battlefield in Limburg. All of Nederweert was finally liberated on 15 November.

The Netherlands

Fallschirmjäger soldiers and a destroyed M4A3 Sherman Tank, 1944

German troops

German Panthers in the Netherlands

Nederweert on the front line for two months 

Contrary to what may be imagined, the soldiers who have been buried here were not killed in the surroundings of Weert or Swartbroek, except for one. They died in operations near the river Meuse during the last months of 1944. Later, their mortal remains were reburied in Swartbroek.There is one exception: 20-year-old Sidney Thomas Owles. He was killed during a fire exchange in Swartbroek on 3 October 1944 and was the second Allied fatality in the municipality of Weert around the time of its liberation. The first one had died two days earlier. He is buried in the British cemetery in Nederweert.The graves used to be in the general cemetery, closer to the church. After an exchange of letters between the British Commonwealth Graves Commission and the municipality/parish, it was decided in 1949 to move the graves. Since it concerned more than 40 British soldiers, a monument in the shape of a cross, bearing a sword in relief, was also erected in the cemetery. The monument is known as the Cross of SacrificeThe Cross of Sacrifice adorns many British war cemeteries. It was designed by Sir Reginald Blomfield. The freestanding white Latin cross is placed on an octagonal base. A bronze sword has been affixed to the front of the cross.Every year, the dead are commemorated here on the first Sunday after 11 November.

War graves of the Commonwealth of Nations 

The entry of the Americans and British in Limburg between 12 September 1944 and 3 March 1945 sparked spontaneous liberation festivities everywhere. Finally liberated from the hated German yoke and the violence of war; finally able to breath freely. Liberation had taken such a long time to arrive and been looked forward to so very much. The rest of the Netherlands followed not much later. On 5 May 1945 at 8 o'clock in the morning, the German capitulation went into effect throughout the Netherlands. All that joy over freedom regained deserved an outlet. Therefore, liberation festivities and liberation parades were organised throughout the country in the next few weeks and months.Including in Nederweert. On 9 June 1945, a magnificent three-day liberation celebration with a parade was kicked off. Every hamlet contributed to the celebration by constructing one or more floats. The carnivalesque streak of the people of Limburg came in handy. Some participants dressed up as members of the Royal Family, while others held Hitler and his Nazi scum up for ridicule. Brass band St. Joseph added lustre to the party.

Liberation festivities

The German counterattack that was launched in the early morning of 27 October 1944 was aimed at cutting the narrow and vulnerable Allied corridor through the province of Noord-Brabant. This corridor had been formed after the Allied airborne landings near Arnhem and the capture of a number of important bridges in Noord-Brabant on the way there (Operation Market Garden).More than 20,000 well-armed and fanatical German soldiers took the allied troops by surprise at the front at Nederweert, Ospel, and Meijel. For now, the target was the village of Aspen, that had been liberated just a while ago. Initially, the attackers benefited from some important advantages. First and foremost, the tanks of the 9th German armoured division proved more suitable to operations in the soggy Peel region than their allied counterparts. Moreover, the offensive was led by the skilled, experienced and tactically excellent field marshal Walter Model. Another advantage for the Germans was that they were up against the shaken 7th American armoured division, which was recovering its breath exactly here after the heavy and bloody fighting at Overloon a few weeks earlier. They were completely overrun, among others by parachutists (Fallschirmjäger) who crossed the Noordervaart at the Hoeben Bridge and captured the hamlets of Winnerstraat, Kreijel and Waatskamp between Nederweert and Ospel.One day later, on 28 October, the Germans recaptured Ospel. The advance went above expectations, and field marshal Model moved heaven and earth in an attempt to get reinforcements. They were refused because Hitler was very busy preparing the Ardennes Offensive. Reinforcements did come in the end, but not for the Germans. On 29 October, the British transferred a Scottish infantry division and an armoured division from Tilburg, which had just been liberated, to the front in the Peel. With the support of the Americans, they managed to stop the German advance.

German counterattack

Nederweert is situated north of the intersection of the Wessem-Nederweert Canal and the Noordervaart. In the autumn of 1944, that geographical condition was used to the full by the German defenders and made a swift Allied advance more difficult.Scouts of the 3rd British infantry division liberated the town centre on Friday 22 September 1944. One day earlier, they had already crossed the municipal border by passing through the hamlet of Strateris. A. Smit wrote in his diary: “Our liberators are coming across the Booldersdijk. Two tanks have been spotted: a small flat one and one with a turret. Great excitement! Until 5.30, nothing special happened. Only three rockets that got the Jerries running back in a hurry. At 8.30, a short fierce fire: one of the English armoured cars has been shot to pieces.”The next day, the Germans evacuated the village and withdrew behind the Noordervaart and the Wessem-Nederweert Canal, from where they bombarded Nederweert and its surroundings with artillery fire. They kept doing that for two months. It was not until 20 November that the southeastern part of the municipal area (Nederweert-Eind) was finally rid of Germans.

German retreat

In September 2010, Stichting Luchtoorlog 1939-1945 opened the permanent exhibition. The numerous items that remain from plane crashes in Nederweert and its surroundings are the silent witnesses to the air war on site. That war was very intense here, as the region was situated within the German Kammhuberlinie. This defence line ran from Denmark across the East Netherlands region and Belgium to Switzerland and was intended to protect Germany against Allied air raids by means of an extensive radar and alarm system. For this purpose, the line was also equipped with numerous searchlights and locations where night fighters were ready to engage in combat after an alarm. During the years of German occupation, dozens of Allied bombers and German fighters crashed in this area. To this very day, remnants of these acts of war are found and preserved.

Museum Air War 1939-1945 

In the morning of the 23rd of January 1945, marines of the British 1st Commando Brigade advance on Maasbracht and Brachterbeek. The streets are empty and it is eerily quiet. They soon reach the centre of Maasbracht. They then decide to push on towards the station and the Vlootbeek. A few minutes later, all hell breaks loose and the British come under heavy mortar and machinegun fire.A few days earlier in the battle for St. Joost, the feared German paratroopers of Kampfgruppe Hübner paratroopers had suffered a defeat and, with those still able to fight, they have entrenched themselves behind the Vlootbeek and in the windmill.The men of the 45th Royal Marine Commandos seek cover in the open field. They lie in the ice-cold snow and some are wounded.From the first aid station, 32-year-old Corporal Henry Eric Harden sees the wounded cannot move forward or back. Risking his life, Henry Eric Harden recues one of the wounded from the field but is himself wounded in the process. He goes back twice out into the field to save the wounded men. For Henry Eric Harden, the attempt to save Lieutenant Corey proves to be fatal.Eric Harden and his fallen comrades are placed in temporary grave in an orchard on the Kloosterstraat in Maasbracht. A year later, they are transferred to their final resting place, the British Military War Cemetery in Nederweert.

Nederweert on the front line for two months

Photos

Sites and stories along the route

War graves of the Commonwealth of Nations

Liberation festivities

German counterattack

German retreat

Museum Air War 1939-1945

Risking his life