Airborne Assault MuseumArticle
Arnhem (Operation Market Garden)
1st Allied Airborne Corps, which included the American 82nd and 101st Airborne Divisions, was tasked to secure the main canal...
George Edmund Hemelryk, known as Gerard by his family, served as a Warrant Officer Class 2 prior to being granted an emergency commission (7 February 1942) into The Intelligence Corps in 1942. He transferred to The Royal Signals later that year and volunteered for airborne forces towards the end of 1943, qualifying as a military parachutist on course 103 which ran at RAF Ringway in February 1944.
Gerard Hemelryk served as a Cypher Officer in C Section, 1 Company, Divisional Signals of 1st Airborne Division during Arnhem, where he was wounded and taken as a prisoner of war.
Claire Harvey, Gerard's great niece recalled:
"At the Battle of Arnhem Gerard was wounded in the knee At the inquest into his death in a motorcycle accident the coroner suggested that because of his injured knee Gerard was (perhaps) slow to respond to the ice on the road and ran into an oncoming lorry. At the time of the accident he was on his way to Liverpool where he was training to be an architect."
Service History
- 1944 1st Airborne Divisional Signals (Captain)
