The following speech was given by John Witcombe in Nijmegen at the 70th anniversary of the bombing on February 22. To commemorate this all the churches of Nijmegen come together every year. The city which has been affected greatly during the Second World War was awarded their Cross of Nails in 1953.
Nijmegen was one of the first Dutch cities to be invaded by German troops in 1940 and was later heavily bombed by American planes on 22 February 1944, who thought they were bombing the German city Kleve. The city was then used as a springboard for Operation Veritable, which allowed Allied Troops the invasion across the Rhine River.
The entire speech can be read here; a video recording of the all the speeches in the Stevenskerk including this one can be found here.
