7d ago in Book Reviews
Lippmann Kessell - 'Surgeon at Arms'
Lippy is the Father of two ladies I met at Kate ter Horst's house in Lower Oosterbeek during the 80th Anniversary this year - on the morning I was due to fly back to Blighty.
https://amzn.to/3VgSu6z is the link to the book on Amazon.
Lippy was a Surgeon who lobbed on D-Day (Market Garden) the British 1st Airborne as part of 16 Parachute Field Ambulance RAMC, commanded by Lt Col E Townsend.
My paper-back dog-eared annotated, coffee-stained copy of Martin Middlebrook's 1994 book Arnhem 1944, reprinted a good many times (which is the equivalent of my 'Aide Memoire') ties much of the additional reading I've done into one 'doesn't-conveniently-fit-into-trouser-map-pocket' volume of reference.
(Incidentally I bought my copy from the shop at the National Archives in Kew on 5th March 2020, ten days before we all went into Covid Lockdown 1. The receipt is still tucked in the frontispiece.)
In Appendix 1 Middlebrook lists 16 Parachute Field Ambulance RAMC as being based at Culverthorpe.
They flew to Arnhem in 6 x C-47 Dakota aircraft from Barkston Heath and Saltby; and 6 Horsa gliders from Keevil.
+ 135 men went in.
+ 6 were killed in action.
+ up to 129 missing*.
As they were primarily all looking after the wounded at St Elisabeth's hospital, it is unlikely none were evacuated on the night 25th & 26th September. Lippy's story does tell the tale of a few of his colleagues who he crossed paths and endured escape efforts with.
We join Lippy's story just a couple of days before the initial evacuation of the infantry across the Rhine on the fateful night of 25th/26th. He and his colleagues are at St Elisabeth's Hospital, which is on the western approach into Central Arnhem close to where Route LION (the river road) joins the middle Route TIGER (Utrechtseweg) at an area of high ground called 'Den Brink'. From memory the main building is a series of high-end apartments.
Without spoiling the narrative, the account begins as a journal of the experience of the surgeons and staff of the Hospital which were now under the oversight and command of the German SS Divisional Doctor, Divisionsarzt Skalka. Harrowing and difficult conditions prevailed for all within the building, and the surrounding enemy forces had not particularly been behaving themselves, causing more casualties and deaths within the building. The Hospital becomes a haven for the wounded of all the Regimental Aid posts and Main Dressing Stations as the main Divisional body evacuates across the river, and the SS guard the hospital, but allow a core team of staff to stay behind with a small troop of German nuns and a skeleton team of local hospital staff who were primarily treating injured civilians.
ADMS Graeme Warrack features throughout Lippy's book, which gives a nice second facet to the escape & evasion ("E & E") plan of those who were still caring for the wounded after the remnants of the fighting fit had evacuated. Medical staff and patients were eventually being taken as Prisoner of War to the camp in Apeldoorn, to the north of Arnhem. The still severely wounded, including those already under the knife were being taken away by ambulance, presumably to Germany.
Graeme Warrack wrote an excellent book about his own E&E experiences entitled 'Travel by Dark', which I highly recommend and review in a separate post.
The story develops into the efforts to escape capture and then make his and his fellow escapees way back to British lines. It's an easy and fairly fast-paced read, and conveys the horror and chaos of treating patients with such proximity to a combat zone and well as the enduring spirit of the evader.
Surgeon at Arms has been in and out of print, but is available on Amazon at the very least.
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Lippmann Kessell - 'Surgeon at Arms'
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