Battle of Arnhem veteran from Peterborough made MBE days before 100th birthday
A veteran who fought in the Battle of Arnhem has been recognised in the King's Birthday Honours, just weeks before his 100th birthday.
Geoffrey Roberts, from Peterborough, is being made a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) for services to the commemoration of the Battle of Arnhem and to charity.
Mr Roberts' daughter, Claire Welburn, said her father had been surprised when he found out about the news.
'His first words actually were, 'I'm not very happy about that',' she said. 'It's taken him a while to come to terms with it, because he always says, 'I didn't do anything'.
'I keep saying to him, 'it's not about what you did in the war, Dad, it's about what you've done since, it's about your act of remembrance'.'
She added: 'He always says, 'the heroes are the ones lying in the cemetery', and he's just one of the lucky ones.'
Ms Welburn said she was 'immensely proud' of her father, who she described as having been committed to 'keeping the story [of the Battle of Arnhem] alive'.
She said they had been trying to keep the honour a secret from friends until Mr Roberts' 100th birthday on 28 June.
Mr Roberts, who was born in the Chelsea Barracks in London in 1925, signed up in 1942.
On 17 September 1944, he flew into the Netherlands as part of Operation Market Garden – depicted in the 1977 Hollywood film A Bridge Too Far – which saw 35,000 British, American and Polish troops parachute or glide behind German lines.
While the operation succeeded in capturing the Dutch cities of Eindhoven and Nijmegen, it failed in its key objective – securing the bridge over the Rhine at Arnhem.
A defensive battle was fought until the order to withdraw was given on 25 September.
More than 8,000 British soldiers were killed, missing or captured in the offensive.
Mr Roberts was captured on 26 September, with a German officer giving him some cigarettes and telling him, 'for you, the war is over'.
He was sent to a prisoner-of-war camp and put to work in a coal mine until the end of the war.
In May 1945, Russian troops came to release the soldiers from the camp, telling them to wait for the Allies to come.
After a week of waiting, Mr Roberts and two other soldiers decided they had had enough.
Ms Welburn said: 'My dad always tells the story that he and two friends 'liberated' some German officers' bicycles, and the three of them cycled to try and get back to the UK as quickly as they could.
'They got to a junction and the three of them had a discussion about which was the right way.
'One soldier went one way, and dad and his friend went the other, and they never saw the other soldier again.'
Ms Welburn said her father goes back to the Netherlands to pay his respects every year.
'Every time he goes back, it's very emotional, every year we always go to Oosterbeek Commonwealth War Cemetery,' she said.
'He goes straight to his two friends Plummer and Brown, who died during the battle.'
She said her father wanted to praise the Taxi Charity, which has been instrumental in helping him go back each year and 'help keep dad's story alive'.
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