Джон Даниэль Баскейфилд: Герой Арнхема и кавалер Викторианского креста.

British Army soldier (1922–1944)

John Daniel Baskeyfield (18 November 1922 – 20 September 1944) was a British Army soldier and an English recipient of the Victoria Cross (VC), the highest award for gallantry in the face of the enemy that can be awarded to members of the British and Commonwealth armed forces. Born in 1922, Baskeyfield was called up to the British Army in early 1942. He served with the 2nd Battalion, South Staffordshire Regiment, a glider infantry unit of the 1st Airlanding Brigade, part of the 1st Airborne Division, in Sicily and Italy in 1943 before returning to the United Kingdom. The division was next deployed in Operation Market Garden and fought in the subsequent Battle of Arnhem. While defending the Oosterbeek perimeter three days into the battle, Baskeyfield commanded a pair of anti tank guns that destroyed several enemy tanks before the crews were killed. Baskeyfield subsequently fired the guns alone before he too was killed. His body was not identified after the war and he has no known grave.

John Baskeyfield was born on 18 November 1922 in Burslem, Stoke on Trent, England, the son of Daniel and Minnie Baskeyfield. He trained and worked as a butcher during the early years of the Second World War, until he received his call up papers in February 1942 at the age of 19.

The Battle of Arnhem was part of Operation Market Garden, an attempt to secure a string of bridges through the Netherlands. At Arnhem the British 1st Airborne Division and Polish 1st Independent Parachute Brigade were tasked with securing bridges across the Lower Rhine, the final objectives of the operation. However, the airborne forces that dropped on 17 September were not aware that the 9th SS and 10th SS Panzer divisions were also near Arnhem for rest and refit. Their presence added a substantial number of Panzergrenadiers, tanks and self propelled guns to the German defences and the Allies suffered heavily in the ensuing battle. Only a small force managed to hold one end of the Arnhem road bridge before being overrun on 21 September. The rest of the division became trapped in a small pocket west of the bridge and had to be evacuated on 25 September in Operation Berlin. The Allies failed to cross the Rhine, which remained under German control until Allied offensives in March 1945.

Owing to a shortage of aircraft, the Allies planned to fly the entire division to Arnhem over three days. The South Staffordshire Battalion was split between the lifts on day one and day two; most of the unit arrived on day one, with the rest arriving with the second lift. The battalion's anti tank guns were flown from RAF Manston on day one. Major General Roy Urquhart's original plan envisaged the 1st Airlanding Brigade securing the drop zones for subsequent lifts, but by the end of day one the Allied advance into Arnhem had stalled. Only a small group of the 1st Parachute Brigade, mainly elements of Lieutenant Colonel John Frost's 2nd Battalion, were able to reach the bridge. The 1st and 3rd Battalions were unable to penetrate the outer suburbs of the city and their advance stalled, so in order to support them the first lift of the South Stafford's were sent forward on the morning of 18 September. When the second lift arrived later that day they too were sent forward and arrived at the outskirts of Arnhem that night. The South Staffordshire's anti tank platoon was kept in the divisional area. In the early hours of the morning of 19 September, an attack was launched on a narrow front between the river and the railway line, in order to force a passage through to the bridge. Most of the support weapons were left in the rear, as they were unable to suitably deploy in the dark and in the narrow confines of the urban surroundings. However, in the face of strong enemy positions and armour, the attack faltered and the British were routed.

The remnants of the four battalions fell back in disarray to the main divisional positions at Oosterbeek. Here they were gathered into defensive units by Lieutenant Colonel Sheriff Thompson, Commanding Officer of the 1st Airlanding Light Artillery Regiment, who forcibly stopped many of the panicked troops and had Major Robert Cain form them into a defensive screen half a mile in front of his own 75 Millimetre Howitzers positions. The German forces made determined attacks against Lonsdale's force on 20 September, starting soon after dawn. Baskeyfield was in charge of two 6 pounder anti–tank guns defending a T junction on the Benedendorpsweg, the southernmost road between Arnhem and Oosterbeek. Baskeyfield's guns faced up the Acacialaan, which joined the Benedendorpsweg from the north, and covered the likely enemy approach along this road and from open ground to the north east. In an initial German assault, Baskeyfield and his gun crews destroyed two tanks and a self propelled gun as they advanced down the Acacialaan. Baskeyfield allowed the armour to come within 100 yards of his positions before ordering his crews to fire, while paratroopers of the 11th Battalion in nearby houses dealt with attacking infantry. In the course of this action, Baskeyfield's crew was killed or wounded and Baskeyfield himself was badly injured. The force continued to hold the Oosterbeek perimeter until the Allies withdrew in Operation Berlin on the night of 25 September.

After Arnhem was liberated in April 1945, Grave Registration Units of the British 2nd Army moved into the area and began to locate the Allied dead. Over 1700 men were buried in the Arnhem Oosterbeek War Cemetery, but Baskeyfield's body was never identified. Instead Baskeyfield's name is inscribed on the Groesbeek Memorial Four more VCs were awarded after the battle, including one for Major Robert Cain, commander of B Company, 2nd Battalion, South Staffordshire Regiment. The 2nd Battalion thus became the only British battalion to receive two VCs during one engagement in the Second World War. A twice life size memorial statue of him was erected in 1990 at Festival Heights in Stoke on Trent, by sculptors Steven Whyte and Michael Talbot. but was renamed Saint Nathaniel's Academy on 1 March 2014. Baskeyfield is commemorated by the retirement community at Baskeyfield House, Angels Way, Burslem, built in 2015, and by the Army Reserve Centre, also called Baskeyfield House, at Anchor Road, Stoke on Trent. The artist Terence Cuneo made a painting of Baskeyfield's action, and in 1969 a Staffordshire filmmaker spent three years making a short film about his role in the battle, entitled Baskeyfield VC. A tree on the site of Baskeyfield's second gun, on the corner of Benedendorpsweg and Acacialaan, has been named the Jack Baskeyfield Tree.