Item Description:
Invitation to Never Played
Football Game
Introduction:
Through an online auction
Battledetective bought a very
interesting document from
renowned expert on the Battle of
the Bulge; Pierre Godeau. An
invitation card to a football
game which never took place as a
result of The Fuehrer's plans
for a counter attack in the
Ardennes in December 1944.
The entire 101st Airborne
Division, including all
Screaming Eagles and Sky Train
team members had to hurry to
Bastogne and stop cold
everything the Germans threw at
the Eagle-men. And they
succeeded!
The Story: We already
knew of the existence of the
document from the "Screaming
Eagle Bible", Rapport and
Northwood's Rendezvous with
Destiny.
This is a part of page 559:
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It took a while to finally get the
document delivered to our office,
but with this football game
invitation we own a piece of
history. It proves that the future
can't be planned.
This is the original document: |
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(click on the
pictures to enlarge) |
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By the time the 101st was planning
this football game, it had already
learned the painful lesson that the
course of war can't be predicted.
Their role in Operation Market
Garden was planned to only last a
few days. Eventually it was after 72
days in combat in Holland that the
eagle men were sent to Mourmelon to
recuperate and refit. This is how
the original end goal (the 'final
planned dispositions') was indicated
in the map of Operation Market
Garden ('Appendix "B" to part II';
Operation Garden, the role of the
British Second Army):
(click on the
pictures to enlarge)
This is
the map of the positions that the
101st held after it was transferred
out of the 'Hell's Highway-'area to
'The Island', South of Arnhem. It
was the Northern-most Allied
position of World War Two for weeks:
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The lesson that the future can't be
planned is edged in a stone plaque
in a wall on a boulevard named after
Field Marshal Sir Bernard Law
Montgomery in Eindhoven, Holland.
The plaque was already installed
into the gable of an apartment
building waiting for the Field
Marshal to unveil it on September
18th 1959, fifteen years after the
liberation of Eindhoven as part of
operation "Market Garden".
Legend has it that this operation
was named after the field marshal's
name; "MG" for "MontGomery".
But, unfortunately, the Field
Marshal could not attend the
ceremony and the plaque was unveiled
on a later time by another, lower
ranking, military authority whose
identity remains obscure to this
agency to date.
The inscribed text remains: "In
memory of the dedication of this
avenue by Field Marshal Montgomery
on 18 September 1959".
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(click to enlarge)
Veldmaarschalk
Montgomerylaan (Field Marshal
Montgomery Avenue) in Eindhoven,
Holland today |
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