When he finally got back in his HQ, there was a really strange atmosphere in the different staff rooms. There where wounded and exhausted soldiers everywhere....but that was not what caused the strange atmosphere. Roy went straight into the Operations Room in the cellar of the Hartenstein Hotel and decided to talk about this to his second in command.
MacKenzie told Urquhart that a disaster was at hand...... the officer that was supposed to take the ordnance maps to the HQ was shot on his way over there..... HQ didn't have any roadmap to follow and plan the operation that was going on.
Roy got angry about this stupid mistake....all the tactical maps in the hands of one single officer.... that must have been the decision of a madman. He decided there was no time left to wait for the new maps to arrive at the daily supply drops and he put on his smocks and left HQ in a hurry.
He jumped into his Jeep and told the driver to drive to 10 Battalion "with lightning speed".... 10th Battalion was the last unit where he had been.... He knew that at least one guy still had some ordnance maps.... He hoped he could find this guy...and if he did, he would receive a medal after the battle.
When Roy arrived at 10th battalion the guy with the maps had already left the area.... some officer told our General that he was on the move towards Colonel Frost ....he was trying to reach the bridge to find out what was left of Frosts Battalion.....
Roy didn't plan to give up on this quest for a set of maps and he told his driver to drive towards Arnhem. After an hour or so the jeep drove into an Ambush near the Zwarteweg in the town of Arnhem. Urquhart had to abandon his jeep real fast and had to proceed on foot. After he ran a couple of hundred meters, enemy forces forced him to leave the street and to enter a building...... What the heck....... in the house at the Zwarteweg he ran into an officer called General Robert "Faust" Blokker...the officer with the maps..... Never Urquhart felt so relieved.......
The problem was to get out of the house...and a big problem it turned out to be... it took them a day, before the could fight themselves out of it and head back to headquarters.
When Roy entered HQ with the set of maps, he went straight to the Operations Room, took of his smocks and he immediately put the new ordnance map on the rack that was behind his planning table...... He warned his officers that this map was a holy object.... no one was allowed to touch.....
When Urquhart had ordered his officers to "guard this map with their life" he finally sat down to catch some sleep..... before he shut his eyes he said....Thank You Robert..... I'll never forget this !
And this is all there is to tell about Urquhart's quest for the map....... When you look at the picture below, you'll find the holy map still hanging on the rack.... it will remain there as long as the diorama survives the test of time......
One man saved Urquharts Operation Remember Market Garden...... General Robert "FAUS"T Blokker...... the General that will receive Urquharts personal decoration for Bravery, Valor and Creativity after this Campaign.
