Author: Abigail Sirrell, Museum Assistant

At the centre of this article is an object from our collection that marks what can be considered as one of the most significant moments of the British Army’s history. It is a small wooden model of the stone plinth and plaque erected on Lüneburg Heath commemorating the surrender of German forces in North-West Europe in May 1945. The metal plate is inscribed:

“Here, on 4th May 1945, a delegation from the German High Command surrendered unconditionally to Field Marshal Montgomery all land, sea and air forces in North-West Germany, Denmark and Holland.”

Featured above the plaque is the shield of 21 Army Group. Renamed the British Army of the Rhine (BAOR) in August 1945, it was the primary British-led formation in North-West Europe in the closing stages of the Second World War.

The model of the stone memorial erected on Lüneburg Heath, in the museum’s collection. 1968.886.

Bernard Law Montgomery

Bernard Law Montgomery was one of the most prominent and successful British commanders of the Second World War. He is perhaps best known for leading the Allied forces to victory at the Second Battle of El Alamein in October 1942 and later commanding the invasions of Italy and Normandy. Promoted to the rank of Field Marshal in 1944, he was highly respected by his soldiers for his meticulous planning, morale-boosting leadership style and his determination to minimise casualties.

His thorough but cautious strategies, however, often caused friction with American allies and fellow Commanders. A controversial and polarising figure, he famously lacked diplomacy and tact when dealing with others. He was described by Winston Churchill as “in defeat, unbeatable; in victory, unbearable.”

After the war, Montgomery was created a Knight of the Garter and Viscount Montgomery of Alamein.

German Surrender at Lüneburg Heath

The Second World War drew to a close as the Allied forces crossed the River Rhine at the end of March 1945 and executed a rapid advance through North-West Germany. April saw the breakdown and encirclement of German defences as 21 Army Group and the American Ninth Army met at Lippstadt as part of Operation Veritable, forming a pincer around Germany’s Army Group B. By the end of April, British and American troops had linked up with their Soviet allies, the Red Army, on the River Elbe, severing German forces and trapping the last substantial German fighting force left on the western front in the Ruhr industrial heartland. The Allies captured the cities of Bremen and Hamburg and reached the Baltic Sea at Lübeck and Wismar on 2 May. The rapidly shrinking pockets of German troops began to surrender by the thousands and over 300,000 Germans became prisoners of war.

Lüneburg had been captured by the British forces on 18 April 1945. Field Marshal Montgomery established his Tactical Headquarters (TAC HQ) on Timeloberg hill in the village of Häcklingen. A German delegation led by the new Commander-in-Chief of the German Navy, Admiral Hans-Georg von Friedeburg, crossed the British lines north of Hamburg and was escorted to HQ on 3 May. They had been sent by Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz, who had been nominated Head of State and Supreme Commander of the German Armed Forces following the death of Adolf Hitler on 30 April, to negotiate with the British Field Marshal. Dönitz hoped that a partial surrender of Army Group Vistula, which was being cut off to the east by the advancing Red Army, might buy time for German troops to evade Soviet capture and escape through the Baltic Sea ports. Montgomery snapped back that he had never heard of any of the officers in the delegation and rejected their offer with characteristic bluntness. He instead demanded the unconditional surrender of all German forces on his northern and western flanks. This included the Netherlands, all of North-West Germany, Denmark and all naval ships in these areas. Should they refuse, Montgomery threatened to press on with air and ground attacks against mili­tary and civil­ian German targets. The German delegation left to confer with Dönitz and were given 24 hours to do so.

They returned to Montgomery’s TAC HQ tent the following day, 4 May, at 17:00 hours. After keeping the party waiting outside in the rain, Montgomery stepped out of his command caravan in Battledress uniform, then grinned and declared to a reporter, “This is the moment!”

The ceremony was filmed by the British Pathé News and recorded for broadcast on radio by the BBC. Montgomery sat at the head of a table and announced the terms of the surrender into two BBC microphones. At 18:20, the German delegates signed the Instrument of Surrender, which would come into force at 08:00 hours on Saturday 5 May 1945. The Field Marshal signed on behalf of the Allied Supreme Commander-in-Chief, General Dwight D Eisenhower. A further unconditional surrender of all forces on land, sea and in the air under German control was signed by Colonel General Alfred Jodl on 7 May, at General Eisenhower's Allied Expeditionary Force Headquarters at Reims. It was ratified in Berlin the following day. Though the war stretched on in the Far East, 8 May 1945 marked the end of the Second World War in Europe.

General Admiral von Friedeburg signing the Instrument of Surrender. Field Marshal Montgomery sits beside him. © US National Archives and Records Administration, Public Domain.

The forested heath upon which the signing took place had long served as a significant German defence force training ground and was considered the birthplace for German Armies. After the war, a stone memorial was erected on the site, quarried and constructed by 855 Quarrying Company and 5 Engineer Base Workshops, Royal Engineers. Five German soldiers were employed to guard the memorial at all hours, day and night. By the end of 1955, though, the annual cost of security was over 100,000 Deutsche Marks and the guard was withdrawn. When the bronze text was stolen and the stonework defaced, it was dismantled and re-erected at the Royal Military Academy in Sandhurst in 1958. A limited series of commemorative inkwells of the memorial were produced and are believed to have been presented as gifts for Montgomery’s staff. The model in our collection is one such piece and it was donated to the museum in 1968.

The Instrument with which all German armed forces in Holland, North-West Germany, Frisian Islands, Heligoland, Schleswig-Holstein and Denmark surrendered, signed by Montgomery and the German delegation. © US National Archives and Records Administration, Public Domain.

REME’s Movements

REME played a decisive role in sustaining the Allied advance through Germany in the final months of the war. They proved beyond doubt the value of a dedicated Corps of craftsmen and engineers embedded within the British Field Army. Their push through the heart of the Reich tested men and machines alike. Road verges were heavily mined, leading to frequent tank casualties. During the last five weeks of fighting, the Guards Armoured Division suffered more than 220 tank casualties. At this late stage of the war, transport was suffering from considerable wear and mechanical breakdowns were increasing. Nevertheless, 21 Army Group made a steady advance following the crossing of the Rhine. The opposition remained fierce, but progress was in full flow and it was evident the end was in sight. 8 Corps, 12 Corps and 30 Corps pursued the enemy for five weeks after the Rhine crossing, covering between three and four hundred miles.

Every bridge or obstacle they faced was likely to become a bottleneck in the advance, but REME were prepared and well-equipped, ready to assist with recovery vehicles when needed. When crossing the Elbe River, for example, a Beach Recovery Section was made available for recovery at the bridges. This proved indispensable once again at Artlenburg, where a large and steep hill rendered a bridge exit nearly impassable. Officers on motorcycles with tractors at call were organised along the advance routes and Caterpillar D8 tractors and Armoured Recovery Vehicles were kept continuously busy clearing abandoned vehicles that blocked the roads. Recovery was generally limited to clearance during the day and backloading at night, facilitated by the formation of four moonlight battery workshops from two independent Searchlight Battery Workshops. Illuminating forward areas, this enabled operations to continue at night unimpeded.

In the North-West Europe campaign, the Anti-Aircraft component took a greater proportion of the total REME effort than in any other theatre. The practice of leap-frogging workshops had also become a principle of REME operation in the field. Third line workshops supplemented Light Aid Detachments and Brigade Workshops, which had to keep pace with their units and formations. Each one leap-frogged over the others a considerable distance after remaining in a location long enough to do a significant amount of repair work.

So vital was the contribution of REME that Montgomery himself famously described the Corps as keeping “the punch in the Army’s fist.”

This final advance was the culmination of hard-won experience that had been forged in the deserts of North Africa, refined in Sicily and Italy and further developed in the campaign of North-West Europe.

This article is the first of a wider series examining the achievements of REME alongside Montgomery throughout the Second World War. 

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Information in this article is taken from E:07.0981.02 and A:1961.0644.

Published in The Craftsman, April 2026.