Special Air Service Chronology of the liberation Operation Amherst was a Free French and British attack designed to capture intact Dutch canals, bridges and airfields during World War II.

A small group of paratroopers under the command of Captain Pierre Sicaud were dropped in south-east Friesland close to the border of Drenthe.

Some of the French paratroopers were discovered by a band of Dutch resistance fighters who had made their shelter in the vast forests south of the small village of Appelscha.

Led by an agent of the Dutch government in exile in England, the paratroopers re-grouped and conducted a series of attacks on German troops retreating through the area to Germany.

One group of paratroopers was dropped too far from Captain Sicaud and ended up on the outskirts of the small village of Haulerwijk, ten kilometers north of Appelscha.