page_title: VIII Corps Troops, Royal Engineers
section_title: Rhine crossing
hierarchical_section_title: VIII Corps Troops, Royal Engineers / Rhine crossing
caption_attribution_description: English: The British Army in North-west Europe 1944-45 Infantry with bicycles cross the River Seine across a Folding Boat Equipment Mk III pontoon bridge at Vernon, 27 August 1944.
context_page_description: VIII Corps Troops, Royal Engineers was a battalion-sized unit of Royal Engineers attached to the British Army's VIII Corps Headquarters in World War II. It served with 21st Army Group during the campaign in North West Europe 1944–45. It built the first British bridges across the Rhine and the Elbe after the assault crossings in March and April 1945 and continued in British Army of the Rhine after the end of the war.
context_section_description: VIII Corps was not directly involved in the operations to clear the Reichswald (Operation Veritable) in early 1945, nor was it scheduled to take part in the assault crossing of the Rhine (Operation Plunder), but the most direct route to the assault position crossed the Maas in VIII Corps' sector, so it was given responsibility for developing the necessary roads in the weeks beforehand. The corps was assigned a large number of RE units for these tasks, of which its own VIII CTRE was given the job of building a 400 feet (120 m) Class 9 Folding Boat Equipment (FBE) bridge at Venlo.
  For the Rhine crossing, VIII CTRE (except 508 Field Park Co) was assigned to XII Corps. Under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel J.E. Marsh, the three field companies of VIII CTRE (100, 101, 224) had the job of building a Class 9 FBE bridge codenamed 'Twist' opposite Wolfskath. The assault crossing on XII Corps' front (Operation Torchlight) by 15th (Scottish) Division began at 02.00 on 24 March, and by 09.00 10th Battalion Highland Light Infantry had cleared Wolfskath after bitter fighting. Lieutenant-Col Marsh called forward his first bridging vehicles at 06.00, but because of enemy fire they did not begin to arrive on site until 13.00. 'Twist' with its 1,000 yards (910 m) of approaches was opened for traffic 10 hours later – the first British-built bridge across the river. During the night of 24/25 March a traffic jam built up and broke the bridge, 22 bays being half-sunk and displaced downstream; however, it was repaired and reopened 13 hours later.
caption: A class 9 FBE bridge.
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