page_title: 181st (Airlanding) Field Ambulance
section_title: Arnhem
hierarchical_section_title: 181st (Airlanding) Field Ambulance / 181st (Airlanding) Field Ambulance / Arnhem
caption_attribution_description: English: Arnhem 17 - 25 September 1944: A wounded paratrooper of 1st Airborne Division being taken into the front line dressing station, Arnhem.
context_page_description: The 181st (Airlanding) Field Ambulance was a Royal Army Medical Corps unit of the British airborne forces during the Second World War.
  The Field Ambulance was assigned to the 1st Airlanding Brigade, the glider borne element of the 1st Airborne Division. Some men of the unit took part in the first parachute raid on the French coast in 1942. The unit then moved to Tunisia for operations in the Mediterranean theatre.
  During Operation Ladbroke, part of the Allied invasion of Sicily, a shortage of gliders resulted in only six, instead of the required thirty, being allocate to the Field Ambulance. Of those six, only one reached land the others crashed into the sea. They were next deployed during the Allied invasion of Italy in Operation Slapstick. Soon afterwards the Field Ambulance returned to the United Kingdom, then in September 1944, they landed by glider in the Netherlands. In the battle of Arnhem the Field Ambulance remained behind with the wounded, and he majority of its men became prisoners of war.
  The 181st (Airlanding) Field Ambulance was reformed after Arnhem, and were sent to Norway at the end of the war to assist in the repatriation of the German forces.
context_section_description: The 1st Airborne Division, was not involved in the Normandy landings and was next in action in Operation Market Garden and the Battle of Arnhem. The 181st would be on the first of three lifts spread over three days. Not everyone would be flying into Arnhem, some including most of the vehicles would come by land. The airborne party included the new commanding officer, Lieutenant-Colonel Arthur Marrable, another nine officers and 104 other ranks, however No. 5 Section with one officer and twenty-three men were the divisional reserve section. The divisions three field ambulances carried enough medical stores for forty-eight hours, and all the gliders were equipped with two folding airborne stretchers and extra blankets. As the airlanding brigade was the first unit to arrive, the 181st would establish a Main Dressing Station (MDS) at Wolfheze to treat any casualties from the landings. They would then move into Arnhem, to take over the municipal hospital. The reserve section was under control of division and was on standby to open an Air Casualty Evacuation Centre at Deelen airfield once that had been secured.
  On 17 September on the first day of the operation, the 1st Airlanding Brigade, arrived in the Netherlands between 13:15 and 14:00 a full thirty minutes before the parachute troops. By 16:00 the 181st had established their MDS at Wolfheze and were taking in casualties from the landings. Overnight they conducted eight surgical operations and were treating another sixty men who had been wounded. Casualties in the division were mounting and by 08:00 the following morning the MDS had admitted 180 men. At 17:00 the unit received orders to move closer to Arnhem, and moved into the Hotel Schoonhord on the main road at Oosterbeek. A second position at the Hotel Taffelberg, around 200 yards (180 m) away was fitted out for the surgical teams. Casualties were mounting and as the only firmly established MDS most of them arrived at Oosterbeek to be treated by the 181st. The situation was becoming serious and more buildings were taken over by the MDS including a large house belonging to Kate ter Horst, and the local school Having remained at Wolfheze with the wounded unable to be moved, the reserve No, 5 Section left to join the rest of the 181st at 20:30 19 September with the casualties that were able to be moved. By this time the 16th (Parachute) Field Ambulance in Arnhem had been captured by the Germans and the 1st Parachute Brigade units trying to fight through to the bridge, were sending their casualties to the 181st at Oosterbeek.
  By the 20 September day four of the operation, the divisions medical services at Oosterbeek consisted of the 181st, and around forty men including the two surgical teams from the 133rd (Parachute) Field Ambulance of the 4th Parachute Brigade. However, during a German assault at 10:00 one of the outlying dressing stations with around 400 wounded, manned by the survivors of 133rd was captured. The walking wounded and most of the medics, excepting the surgical teams were taken away as prisoners of war At the Hotel Schoonhord the MDS was subjected to mortaring and some of the 300 casualties there were wounded for a second time, and the hotel was also captured. The surgical teams at the Taffelberg had continued to operate through the bombardment. But by 15:00 the surgical teams and No. 5 Section which were the only part of the MDS that had not been captured by the advancing Germans. That evening a counter-attack by the 4th Parachute Brigade liberated the Hotel Schoonhord and some of the remaining wounded were moved further inside the divisional perimeter.
  The following day 21 September No. 5 Sections dressing station with around 100 lightly wounded, was caught in a cross-fire killing the section commander and five medics, as soon as the shooting died down, they evacuated the station and set up in the grounds of the Horst house. By that evening the dwindling medical services around the MDS were dealing with over 1,000 casualties. At 17:00 having completed sixty operations, the two surgical teams from the 181
caption: Stretcher bearers and casualty during the Battle of Arnhem.
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