Jan van Hoof Memorial Bas-relief, Nijmegen road bridge
Jan was a young student in Nijmegen who worked for the Dutch Underground Resistance. The Nijmegen bridge had to be captured intact by American Airborne forces during Operation Market Garden so that British Armoured forces could cross the river Waal and move onward towards Arnhem. The Germans had laid mine charges under all the important bridges and intended to blow them if the Allies attempted to cross them. The trigger for the explosion of the mines was connected by wires from the bridge to a safe point from which the bridge could be watched. Jan cut some of the wires and this bas-relief shows him holding a cut wire. However, the young RE officer Captain (later Major-General) A.G.C. (Tony) Jones, did climb under the bridge with a couple of his men and was seen to cut the wires
