Colonel Hilaro N. Barlow
Unit : Headquarters, 1st Airlanding Brigade
Army No. : 34606
Awards : Officer of the British Empire
Hilaro Barlow served as a Captain in the 2nd Somerset Light Infantry before the war. In 1944 he was made Second-in-Command of the 1st Airlanding Brigade, and in the event of the battle being victorious, Barlow was designated to become the Town Commandant of Arnhem. After the battle, he and his assistant, Lieutenant-Commander Arnoldus Wolters of the Dutch Navy, were also to go through top secret lists of members of the Dutch Resistance in the area, and organise them into specific groups - intelligence, sabotage etc.
After the disappearance of Major-General Urquhart, Barlow was given temporary command of the Brigade throughout Monday 18th and Tuesday morning, while Brigadier Hicks assumed command of the Division.
Upon Urquhart's return on Tuesday morning, he realised that the units fighting in Arnhem had no overall leader as Brigadier Lathbury had been wounded was now presumably captured. He decided to send Colonel Barlow, the ideal choice, to the area to take control of the 1st Para Brigade, the 11th Battalion, and the 2nd South Staffords, and then produce a coordinated advance towards the Bridge. Barlow and his batman, Lance-Corporal Raymond Singer, sped off to the area in a jeep, but they were never heard from again. Official reports state that Barlow never made it to the area and that he simply disappeared.
However Captain John McCooke of the 2nd South Staffords comfirms that the Colonel did indeed reach the area. McCooke was sent to the rear of the South Staffords positions by Lieutenant Colonel Derek McCardie, to make sure that the Battalion's vehicles didn't approach any further towards the fighting. He found the vehicles on the junction where the "Tiger" and "Lion" routes met, and shortly after, Barlow arrived in this area and asked McCooke what the situation was. He tried to help the Colonel get forward, but heavy mortaring soon started and snipers fired on the three men. They took refuge in a house and decided to proceed by moving forward from building to building. They agreed that Captain McCooke would leave first, followed by Barlow, and finally his batman. McCooke ran to a house across the street, but before he got there he heard a loud crash behind him and was hit in the leg by shrapnel fragments. He fell inside the doorway, but no one followed him in. He looked outside, but could see nothing. McCooke then went upstairs to get a better view from a front bedroom window, and he saw what he could only describe as a mess on the pavement, with a body behind it in the road. He deduced that the mess was the remains of Colonel Barlow, while his batman lay behind. Lance-Corporal Singer is buried in the Arnhem Oosterbeek War Cemetery, while Colonel Barlow is credited on the Groesbeek Memorial for those who were listed as missing.
See also: Maj John Waddy.