VIDEO: Moor Park Mansion - a bridge into history
Today Moor Park Mansion is home to the golf club that shares its name. But in the midst of war in 1944 the building became the frenzied focus of military planning which led to one of the most audacious and infamous exploits of the Second World War - Operation Market Garden.
Today Moor Park Mansion near Rickmansworth is home to the golf club that shares its name. But in the midst of war in 1944 the building became the frenzied focus of military planning which led to one of the most audacious and infamous exploits of the Second World War - Operation Market Garden.
The operation envisaged 35,000 Allied troops being dropped behind enemy lines in the Netherlands - to secure the River Rhine crossings and advance into northern Germany. Although it ultimately failed, the determination and courage shown by the airborne troops and the units that assisted them has gone down in the history books, and was immortalised in the 1977 Hollywood epic, A Bridge Too Far.
The Chair of Three Rivers District Council, Cllr Keith Martin, visited the elegant mansion - now home to Moor Park Golf Club - and stepped foot in the very room where this historic military campaign was painstakingly plotted more than 70 years ago.