This is the vivid account of how a brilliant plan turned into an epic tragedy. This book tells the true story of the Battle of Arnhem which was fought in September 1944. Nine thousand men of the First British Airborne Division were parachuted into the peaceful countryside that surrounded Arnhem. Their objective was to capture and hold the bridge over the Rhine ahead of the advancing British Second Army. Nine days later, after some of the fiercest street-fighting of the war, 2000 paratroopers managed to escape to safety. 'Finely recorded...truly the battle of Arnhem has been fortunate in its historian' Sunday Times