Richard Lonsdale Service Order. His citation read: Most of the 1st Airborne Division returned to the United Kingdom in November 1943 and were kept in reserve during Operation Overlord. In September Lonsdale was made second in command of 11th Battalion, Parachute Regiment and in the same month the division was deployed in Operation Market Garden. The Allies planned to use airborne forces to secure key bridges over a number of rivers and canals in the Netherlands, opening a route around the Seigfried Line and into the heart of Germany. 1st Airborne Division was tasked with securing bridges across the Lower Rhine at
British logistics in the Normandy Campaign still possible to end the war in 1944, but this did not eventuate. British logistics in the Normandy Campaign British logistics in the Normandy Campaign played a key role in the success of Operation Overlord, the Allied invasion of France in June 1944. Planning for this operation had begun in 1942. The Anglo-Canadian force, the 21st Army Group, consisted of the British Second Army and Canadian First Army. Between them they had six armoured divisions (including the Polish 1st Armoured Division), ten infantry divisions, two airborne divisions, nine independent armoured brigades and two commando brigades. The entire army group was