Skip to main content

Netherlands

“One nation is a copy of the other,” said John Adams on his first visit to the Netherlands; two centuries later, an American visitor to Holland can still trace the connection.

We are well-weaned from the delicate milk of our mother country, and inured to the difficulties of a strange and hard land,” wrote John Robinson and William Brewster in 1617.

Operation Market-Garden promised to lay an airborne red carpet to victory, but its final objective proved to be “a bridge to far.”

It would have taken considerable effort to locate an Allied fighting man on the battle line in Western Europe on September 10, 1944, who doubted that the end of the war was just around the corner.

Over 350 years a mighty pageant of history has moved through the myth-haunted valley of the “Great River of the Mountains”

Enjoy our work? Help us keep going.

Now in its 75th year, American Heritage relies on contributions from readers like you to survive. You can support this magazine of trusted historical writing and the volunteers that sustain it by donating today.

Donate