60 sorties but later this was reduced to 45. Roelfzema completed 72 operational sorties, including 25 missions over Berlin, the most heavily defended city in the Reich. For his service the RAF awarded him the Distinguished Flying Cross. While serving in the RAF, Roelfzema flew with pilots and aircrews from other nations that had become occupied by Nazi Germany, whom he saw as comrades in arms. Years later he came to realize that working with Danes, Poles and others gave him a broader sense of the world which he came to appreciate. Adjudant to the Queen In early 1945, with France and parts of the Netherlands liberated, Roelfzema was appointed adjudant (assistant) to Queen Wilhelmina. To his surprise and delight, Peter Tazelaar had been selected as well. The two accompanied her back to the Netherlands when she returned 13 March 1945, after a five-year exile in London. The Queen landed in Antwerp, Belgium, and traveled west by car to Maldegem, where she turned north to enter the Netherlands at Eede. The Queen chose Eede as the point to enter her country because the village and surrounding area had been severely damaged by the war, resulting in many victims. The arrival of the Queen symbolized the end of years of oppression and loss of freedom and the beginning of a period of peace and prosperity. She stepped out of her armored carriage and walked firmly over the border, which was marked for the occasion. Years later, she recalled the border crossing in her memoirs as "One of the greatest events of my life". He flew the Queen home on the liberation of the Netherlands in May of that year. Shortly afterwards Roelfzema attended the two future Dutch monarchs, Princess Juliana and her daughter Princess Beatrix, on the aeroplane which brought them back to the Netherlands on the Gilze en Rijen flight of 2 May 1945. He helped Beatrix take her first few steps on liberated Dutch soil. At the Queen's inauguration in The Hague on 6 July 1945, Roelfzema was in attendance at the Queen's request. He was also on hand when the princesses returned at Teuge Airport 2 August 1945. After the war After the Second World War, Queen Wilhelmina offered him a permanent appointment as her adjudant but he declined this position. Shortly thereafter he emigrated to the United States, became a US citizen and married his long-time girlfriend