Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

The exceptional ‘Battle of Arnhem’ M.C. group of ten awarded to Colonel B. W. Briggs, 1st Parachute Brigade and Leicestershire Regiment, who, having served with the Paras in North Africa, Sicily and Italy, was among those who secured the northern end of Arnhem Bridge with Lieutenant-Colonel J. Frost’s 2nd Battalion on the first night of Operation Market Garden, proceeding to command a composite force occupying buildings on the eastern perimeter. Only after nearly three days of close-quarter fighting, faced with continuous attacks by enemy artillery and armour and when ‘every house was burnt down’, did he begin to fall back - his wireless conversation with Frost exemplifying the spirit of the defence:

Captain Briggs: The position is untenable. Can I have your permission to withdraw?

Lieutenant-Colonel Frost: If it is untenable you may withdraw to your original position.

Captain Briggs: Everything is comfortable. I am now going in with bayonets and grenades.

Fighting to the very end among a dwindling core of defenders, Briggs was finally taken prisoner and, while being transported east, was witness to, and a survivor of, the massacre at Brummen

Military Cross, G.VI.R., reverse officially dated ‘1945’; 1939-45 Star; Italy Star; France and Germany Star; Defence and War Medals 1939-45; Korea 1950-53, 1st issue, with M.I.D. oak leaf (Major B. W. Briggs. M.C. R. Leicesters.); U.N. Korea 1950-54, unnamed as issued; Africa General Service 1902-56, 1 clasp, Kenya (Major B. W. Briggs. M.C. R. Leicesters.); General Service 1918-62, 1 clasp, Arabian Peninsula (Lt. Col. B. W. Briggs. M.C. R. Leicesters.) mounted as worn, generally very fine (10) £36,000-£44,000

M.C. London Gazette 20 September 1945:
‘In recognition of gallant and distinguished services at Arnhem.’

The original recommendation states: ‘Early on the night of D Day (September 17) Captain Briggs was given command of a mixed force of Brigade HQ, Signals, RE and Ordnance personnel, and ordered to hold an important sector East of Arnhem Bridge. The position was difficult to hold as fruit trees and shrubs gave the enemy a covered line of approach.
During the following two days the enemy repeatedly attacked this position with tanks and infantry in greatly superior numbers. They were driven back each time with heavy losses. The position was under continuous mortar fire. During the afternoon of D + 2 and morning of D + 3 the situation was made more difficult by the enemy setting fire to the houses Capt Briggs' party was occupying. In spite of this and resulting enemy infiltration he continued to hold the position until every house was burnt down. He then skilfully withdrew the remnants of his force to "A" Company’s position and continued to fight with them.
Captain Briggs’ skilful and inspiring leadership was an example to all and it was undoubtedly largely due to his efforts that the most important and difficult position was held for so long.’

M.I.D. London Gazette 10 October 1952:
‘In recognition of gallant and distinguished services in Korea, during the period 1st January to 30th June, 1952.’

Bernard Walter Briggs was born in 1914 and was commissioned 2nd Lieutenant in the Royal Warwickshire Regiment on 27 April 1940. He was promoted War Substantive Lieutenant on 27 October 1941 and Temporary Captain on 12 March 1942. A founder member of the Parachute Regiment, he served with them in North Africa, Sicily and Italy before joining 1st Parachute Brigade H.Q. as Staff Captain prior to Operation Market Garden.

1st Parachute Brigade at Arnhem
The 1st Parachute Brigade’s objectives during Operation Market Garden were to seize the crossings over the Lower Rhine at Arnhem and hold them for 48 hours until relieved by XXX Corps, coming 60 miles from the south. Commanded by Brigadier G. W. Lathbury, the Brigade was part of the the British 1st Airborne Division (Major-General R. E. Urquhart) and consisted of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Parachute Battalions, together with Brigade Headquarters (of which Briggs was Staff Captain) and their Defence Platoon and 1st Airlanding Anti-Tank Battery, R.A., 1st Parachute Squadron, R.E., and 16 Parachute Field Ambulance, R.A.M.C. A total force of 9000 airborne troops were scheduled to arrive at Arnhem over 3 days with the 1st Parachute Brigade among those arriving on day one. Having encountered light flak but suffering no casualties en-route, 145 Dakotas of the USAAF took just ten minutes to drop 2700 men of the 1st Parachute Brigade Group on Drop Zone ‘X’, seven miles west of Arnhem Bridge. Briggs recording in his diary ‘dropped Arnhem 1407hrs 17 Sep 44’.

Falling in with his unit, 1st Brigade HQ, under Major Tony Hibbert, Briggs immediately set off for Arnhem:
‘John Frost, commanding 2nd Para Battalion, got off at good speed along the Southerly route next to the river, followed by 1st Brigade HQ. Moderate fire opened up early on 1st and 3rd Battalion fronts. After we'd been marching for two hours up roared General Urquhart. He was a reserved, gentle person but now he was really angry and asked me what the hell we were doing. I said we were advancing on the bridge, and he said, “I can see you're doing that but you're moving too bloody slowly, get your Brigade moving, Hibbert. Where's your Brigade Commander?” I told him he was back with the 3rd Battalion trying to push them forward faster, and off Urquhart went in a cloud of steam to find him. His parting words were, “Unless we can get to the bridge before those bloody tanks this is going to be a cock-up.” I passed on the gist of the message to John Frost who was advancing along an unreconnoitred route and was up against more vigourous opposition than we'd been led to expect. We continued to advance behind the 2nd Battalion, and by now it was getting dark. We were in single file and strung out; it was our task to slip through to the bridge without getting involved in street fighting and it was important we kept quiet as the Germans were only two streets away.’ (Major T. Hibbert’s personal account refers).

Defence of the Perimeter
Brigade HQ arrived at Arnhem Bridge at 20:45 just as the first men of 2nd Battalion were moving into buildings on the waterfront and each side of the ramp, establishing a firm hold on the northern approaches to the bridge. After conferring with Lieutenant-Colonel Frost it was decided that Brigade Headquarters would be established in the large three storey office building neighbouring Frost's own headquarters. This building had at one time been a hospital, but was now the headquarters of the Provincial Roads and Waterways Department. As only a portion of the 2nd Battalion had reached the Bridge at this time, and the arrival of Brigade Headquarters had more than doubled their strength, Hibbert in consultation with Major Digby Tatham-Warter, A Company, split his men into groups and posted them to a number of buildings which extended the perimeter as far as possible and increased the effectiveness of the defensive positions. Captain Briggs was given command of a combined force of Brigade HQ, Signalmen, Medics, Engineers and Ordnance personnel operating in infantrymen roles and positioned in a group of buildings east of the bridge. A night of sporadic fighting followed and at this stage Lt. Col. J. Frost, in overall command of troops at the bridge, believed the plan was still intact. However, no further members of the Parachute Brigade had yet managed to join the 750 or so now under siege at the bridge and during the Monday morning a sudden eruption of violent contacts with the enemy and persistent artillery fire left copious wreckage and dead and wounded on both sides. Amidst this continuing chaos, Briggs’ force defended their positions for the next few days under continuous sniping, mortaring, shelling and enemy infantry infiltration, a task made even more difficult by the fruit trees and shrubs which provided the enemy with a covered line of approach to their positions. Movement was extremely dangerous but the dead were removed and the wounded taken to the comparative safety of cellars. With the coming of dusk on D+2, the perimeter had become ringed with flames as buildings were set on fire and German reinforcements, including Tiger tanks, started to converge on Arnhem from all directions:

‘After a lull, the Germans started exerting more pressure. A new phase had begun. Rather than mount costly infantry attacks, the Germans would now destroy by artillery and tank shelling the houses in which the British were positioned. Some of the shells used were phosphorus to set the houses alight. The methodical bombardment which started that afternoon would, with the usual mortaring, continue until the end of the bridge action and the effects of it would eventually bring about the collapse of the airborne men’s resistance. One building after another was hit, usually in one of the upper storeys, and started to burn or was steadily battered down... During the evening the first Tiger tanks, with their 88-millimetre guns, appeared and ran along the street between the Van Limburg Stirum School and the nearby houses [where Briggs and his men were positioned], systematically shelling each house as it went past, and spraying with machine-gun fire the crew of an anti-tank gun who tried to unsuccessfully to engage it... Sapper George Needham was in one of the first buildings, the school, to be hit by the tank: “Suddenly there was a terrific explosion underneath this flight of stairs. It was the first time the building had been hit by such a big shell. There was a tank on the ramp firing at point-blank range. We had been used to small arms fire and mortaring, but it was absolutely stunning when this explosion took place.”

Another recipient of the tank’s shelling was a house occupied by a mixed party of twelve Royal Army Ordnance Corps and Royal Signals men [under Briggs]. The RAOC party were weapons and ammunitions specialists whose duty on this operation should have been to examine captured German stores. They had followed the 2nd Battalion into Arnhem on the Sunday evening and now found themselves defending this house. Private Kevin Heaney of the RAOC describes the shelling: “A shell came whooshing through the open bedroom window and hit the back of the house. The back wall became a pile of rubble, and the floor fell in. One of the signallers, resting on a bed in the back bedroom, came down with the floor and was trapped. He could not move, as his back was broken. Sergeant Mick Walker, one of our men, climbed down to give him a morphine injection. My pack was in the back bedroom and I was disappointed when this lost; I had not touched the rations inside. We then took shelter in a cellar and started hoping for the best. There was a noise at the top of the stairs, and someone started to wave a white handkerchief, but Mick Walker knocked this out of his hand. It was probably only more rubble falling down.”

The remaining defenders evacuated the house and went to another nearby, but this also had to be given up. All this was a serious weakening of the eastern defences of the perimeter. Several men mentioned the courage shown by Captain Bernard Briggs, a Brigade HQ officer who was in command of this sector... The day came to end with the British force weakening not in spirit of resistance but in the means to resist.’ (Arnhem 1944: The Airborne Battle by Martin Middlebrook refers).

The following day as the battle raged on, Captain Mackay, commander of A Troop, 1st Parachute Squadron R.E., leading the resistance in the now beleaguered school building adjacent to the northern end of the road ramp, overheard the following, now famous, wireless dialogue between Captain Briggs, still fighting to maintain control of his eastern perimeter section, and Johnny Frost in Battalion HQ on the west side of the ramp:
Captain Briggs: ‘The position is untenable. Can I have your permission to withdraw?’
Lieutenant-Colonel Frost: ‘If it is untenable you may withdraw to your original position.’
Captain Briggs: ‘Everything is comfortable. I am now going in with bayonets and grenades.’ (By Air to Battle, The Official History of the British Paratroops in World War II by Bob Caruthers refers).

The position was retaken but later that day (Wednesday), Briggs’ force, shelled and burnt out of their position, was forced to retreat back towards the road bridge. The perimeter was finally beginning to shrink:
‘Sensing that resistance was starting to fail, the Germans now launched a series of infantry attacks with close tank support from the east, trying to reach the area under the ramp. The last defence in front of this area had been the group of houses defended by Captain Briggs and a mixed group of Brigade HQ men, signallers and six RAOC men. But shelling had forced the evacuation of these men to a position under the ramp where they barricaded themselves in with some timbers. Private Kevin Heaney, one of the RAOC men, says ‘The atmosphere and tension became unbearable. We were expecting to be attacked but uncertain from which direction this was going to come. The mood varied between hope and despair, and the lack of news from the rest of the diversion or of progress by Thirty Corps was bad for morale. A young officer [likely Briggs], a studious looking chap, gave us a pep talk, trying to be a morale booster, saying how well our brigade had done in North Africa and how our performance at Arnhem would go down in history.’ (Arnhem 1944: The Airborne Battle by Martin Middlebrook refers).

Briggs’ force then retreated to join the remnants of A Company positioned in houses west of the bridge. It was in this vicinity and around this time that Lieutenant Grayburn was awarded the only V.C. for the battle at Arnhem Bridge:
‘There developed a series of vicious attacks and counter attacks by infantry and engineers from both sides in which the Germans placed explosive charges against the pillars supporting the archway and Royal Engineers led by Lieutenant Donald Hindley attempted to stop the demolition preparations. Hindley’s party, accompanied by Lieutenant Grayburn and some of his A Company men, dashed out and removed the fuses from the charges around the piers supporting the arch - “a nerve-wracking experience”, says Hindley, “working a few feet away from a large quantity of explosives which could be fired at any moment.” Grayburn was wounded again but returned after being treated, one arm in a sling and with bandaged head. Hindley says: “It was obvious that the enemy would quickly restore the fuses, and a second, heavier attack was made to try to remove the charges themselves. However, the enemy had by now moved up a tank to cover the work. We were mown down. Lieutenant Grayburn was killed- riddled with machine-gun fire. I escaped with flesh wounds in my shoulder and face”.’ (ibid)

Last Stand at the Bridge
‘The final stand was made, first in a warehouse, and then underneath the bridge, the total number still capable of fighting being about 110 men and five or six officers. The position was shelled by a German tank and armoured car, but they were unable to hit that part of the underside of the bridge where the defence was holding out...Every time a patrol went out it suffered casualties, and with each hour the situation became more and more hopeless. There was no ammunition, there had been no food for a long time, and hardly a man was but wounded.’ (‘By Air to Battle - The Official Account of the British Paratroops in World War II by Bob Caruthers refers)

The Paras at Arnhem Bridge never actually surrendered as a group, but concern for the wounded brought the fighting finally to an end:
‘As the last of our buildings were destroyed or set alight, attempts to re-occupy burned-out ruins failed as the ashes were too hot. John Frost, Doug Crawley, Father Egan, Pat Barnett and Digby Tatham-Warter were wounded and Freddie Gough took over command. By dusk Brigade HQ was being heavily shelled, the fires were out of control and the medical situation was getting pretty dire. In the basement of Brigade HQ we had by now nearly 300 wounded, many of them very seriously; they were packed like sardines and lying in the dark. They were now in danger of being burned alive as we had no water to tackle the fires eating into the house. We asked the Germans for a 2 hour truce and assistance to get the wounded out of the cellar who included a number of Germans. The Germans agreed but during the cease-fire they infiltrated the perimeter. The area round the bridge was ablaze and we no longer dominated it. We were down to around 100 unwounded and walking wounded, with about five rounds of ammunition per head. I formed the survivors into patrols of ten men and an officer, with orders to escape to the perimeter’ (Major T. Hibbert’s personal account refers).

Prisoner of War and Brummen truck massacre
Briggs was captured the following morning, as recorded in his diary ‘Captured Arnhem am 21 Sep (Thurs). Spent day in ruined church, & evening in Mission Hall. Moved early am.’ The next entry in his diary states ‘Arrived house outskirts Arnhem am 22 Sep. Left for Zutphen aft. 24 Sep. Massacre on way.’ The massacre referred to occurred at Brummen as a lorry of mostly officers, including Briggs and Majors Hibbert, Cotterell and Byng-Lewis, were being transported in the direction of Zutphen on the way to German Prison Camps. The German guards becoming irritated by the victory sign the prisoners were making in the direction of the civilians, stopped the lorry, with one of the guards walking to the rear of the vehicle to warn the captured soldiers that if they continued, they would be shot. The warning was ignored by the paratroopers. Just before the Brummen Post Office, as the column slowed down to take a sharp bend in the road, two British officers jumped from the lorry in an escape attempt. One of them, Major Dennis Mumford, was soon caught, but the other, Major Tony Hibbert, was successful. Panicking in response, one of the German guards emptied his Schmeisser magazine on the men, killing or mortally wounding six prisoners. Among the dead was Major Anthony Cotterell, a war correspondent who had been at the defence of the Bridge at Arnhem.

Briggs survived the incident and was sent to permanent camp Oflag VII-B (Eichstatt, Bavaria). He was later route-marched to Stalag VII-A at Moosburg, the camp being liberated by U.S. Forces on 29 April 1945. He maintained a record of all his movements in captivity in his diary:
‘Arrived house outskirts Arnhem am 22 Sep. Left for Zutphen aft. 24 Sep. Massacre on way.
Arrived warehouse Zutphen pm 24 Sep. Left for Enschede am 25 Sep.
Arrived warehouse Enschede pm 25 Sep. Left for Oberusel aft. 26 Sep. Journey down Rhine.
Interrogation Dulag Luft Oberusel pm 27 Sep. Left for Wetzlar aft. 6 Oct. 9 1/2 days Solitary
Arrived Transit Camp Wetzlar pm 6 Oct. Left for Limburg am 10 Oct.
Arrived Transit Camp Limburg pm 10 Oct. Left for Diez pm. 16 Oct.
Arrived Interrogation Centre (Army) Diez pm 16 Oct. Left for Limburg aft. 19 Oct. Solitary for 3 days. Lost Douglas. He rejoined at Hadamar 23 Oct.
Arrived Transit Camp Limburg aft. 19 Oct. Left for Hadamar aft. 20 Oct.
Arrived Transit Camp Hadamar aft. 20 Oct. Left for Eichstatt aft. 21 Jan (3 months)
Arrived Permanent Camp Eichstatt aft. 23 Jan. Left for Moosburg pm (2 3/4 months) March Route
Arrived Permanent Camp Moosburg am 22 Apr. Liberated Apr. 29th 45. (32 weeks since drop).’

Korea, Kenya, and the Arabian Peninsula
Arriving back in England on 10 May 1945, Briggs was advanced Captain in December before transferring to the Leicestershire Regiment three months later. He was promoted Major, attached Parachute Regiment, Depot Airborne Forces on 6 December 1950 and served at the Midland Brigade Training Centre before rejoining the Leicestershire Regiment for service in Korea. The 1st Battalion embarked in October 1951 from Hong Kong for Korea where Briggs commanded 'D' Company, 1st Battalion. Briggs was mentioned in despatches for his services during the campaign, in which Battalion won the last two Battle Honours of The Royal Leicestershire Regiment including, on 5 November, the Battle of Maryang San (afterwards known as the Gunpowder Plot Battle).

Returning to the UK, Briggs was appointed to the command of 'C' Company in 1953, before commanding the 1st Battalion's Coronation Detachment, 2 June 1953. He also served at the Army Air Transport Training & Development Centre, 1953-55. Briggs’ impressive career saw him serve also in two further two campaigns, firstly with the 1st Kings African Rifles, in Kenya, 1955-57 and lastly as Lieutenant-Colonel, commanding 1st Mobile Battalion Aden Protectorate Levies, on the Arabian Peninsula 1958-61. He retired 27 September 1961 and in later life he changed his name to Myddleton-Briggs.

Sold with the following original items and documents:
The recipient’s Parachute Regiment Red Beret, complete with Badge and recipient's name stitched into lining, as worn on Arnhem Bridge, slight moth damage; M.I.D. Certificate, dated 10 October 1952; A card diary (in pencil) used by recipient from his ‘arrival’ in Arnhem to his repatriation to the UK; Aden Protectorate Levies Car Pennant; Several photographs from various stages of his service career; a hardback copy of ‘Major Cotterell at Arnhem’ by Jennie Gray; and various copied research.