Family say farewell to veteran at funeral
Soldier was captured by Germans in Holland
FRIENDS, family and veterans have said farewell to one of the last remaining survivors of the Battle of Arnhem.
Jim Duplock, 96, of Lutterworth, took part in one of the most heroic failures of the Second World War in which 10,000 men went into battle, but only 2,100 avoided death or capture.
Loved ones, parachute regiment veterans and a retired Colonel in the Dutch Air Force paid tribute to him at his funeral in Countesthorpe last Friday.
Jim flew in a Dakota from Saltby airfield, near Melton, on the second day of the Arnhem landings, on September 18, 1944.
He was a member of the 11th battalion in the Parachute Regiment, whose numbers were so depleted by the battle, it was disbanded.
Operation Market Garden saw the British 1st Airborne Division – many based in and around Melton – given the task of capturing a bridge in the Dutch city of Arnhem against German forces that proved far stronger than expected.
The paras jumped from just a few hundred feet, laden with heavy kitbags, and had only a few seconds to prepare for landing.
Jim told the Leicester Mercury in 2014: “You used to drop from as low as you could.
“I think it was 350 feet at Arnhem – you couldn’t get down quick enough with all the bullets flying around.
“I had a good jump and the first thing I remember seeing were two dead Germans on the ground.
“We landed in a field near Oosterbeek, and we could hear shots as we landed.”
Jim recalled being “dug in” by the side of the road when two Allied sections came past.
“They said there was a tank coming and they had got nothing to stop it,” he said.
“Our major told us to stand fast. That tank came right up to us as we lay there, but they never saw us.”
Two days after he landed, Jim and several of his comrades were captured as they made their way through back gardens in the wartorn city.
He said: “They’d got machine guns, we’d got .303 rifles.”
After his capture, a letter was sent to his mother in November, 1944, which read: “His comrades in A company join me in extending their sympathy over the posting of your son as missing.
“He was a good soldier and a good comrade. We can only hope that he turns up soon in the hands of the Dutch Underground or, at worst, as a prisoner.”
It was only after Christmas, 1944, that Jim was able to send his family a postcard letting them know that he was alive.
Jim added: “I still wake up at two in the morning sometimes thinking about what I saw and it’s the first thing on my mind again when I wake up in the morning.”
Jim revisited Arnhem for the first time, in September, 2014, to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the landings.
He said afterwards: “It was lovely, the Dutch people couldn’t do enough for you.
“When we took part in the parade, people clapped for a mile. People were shaking my hand and kissing me, it made me feel special. I was amazed at the number of people lining the streets.
“I cried that day and I cried again when I visited the cemetery to lay my wreath alongside all the others.”
Retired Dutch Air Force Colonel Gerritt Pijpers, whose family lived in Oosterbeek, near Arnhem, during the landings, read the eulogy at the funeral.
He quoted war correspondent Alan Wood who said the men at Arnhem were “the stuff of which England’s greatness is made.”
Col Pijpers, whose family connection to the battle led him to write a book on the 11th battalion, added: “Jim was one of these men...we will remember him.”
Major Sean Philips, Officer Commanding D Company 4 Para, said:”People like Jim walk among us, but it is not until occasions like this that we realise what they have achieved.”
Jim’s sister, Annie and niece Sandra McGuchin, of Sharnford, were at the funeral at the South Leicestershire Crematorium, in Countesthorpe.