75 years ago - D Day

This post is in memory of the 61^st Reconnaissance Regiment

 and their sacrifice 75 years ago on 6^th June 1944

For nearly a year the Allies had been planning in detail and in secret the invasion of France.  Secrecy was vital to maintain the element of surprise, keeping Hitler’s defences strung along the whole of northern France and the Low Countries.  The Germans knew an invasion was coming from the build-up of radio traffic and ships but poor air reconnaissance meant that the dummy army in Kent and Sussex left them expecting an attack in the Pas de Calais, nearest to Belgium, even when Allied troops and tanks had landed in Normandy.

Eisenhower’s ‘bravest act of the war’ (according to General Miles Dempsey, the Commander of 2^nd British Army) was to send the invasion force across the Channel on the night of 5^th June.  Bad weather made a postponement of the original D-Day from 5^th June inevitable.  On 4^th June the Supreme Allied Commander received a fresh forecast that the weather might ease overnight and decided that Tuesday 6^th June would be D-Day.  The Germans, who had much less accurate meteorological reports, thought landings would be impossible between the 5^th and 7^th June; Rommel, now in charge of ‘The Western Wall’ defences, returned to Germany for his wife’s birthday and the Kriegsmarine (German Navy) even cancelled their shore patrols of the Channel.

Meanwhile in Operation Neptune almost 7,000 ships, led by the minesweepers, had set sail from ports all along the south coast of England, coalescing in a ‘spout’ between the Isle of Wight and Normandy.  From midnight thousands of paratroopers were dropped behind enemy lines to seize critical bridges and guard the invaders’ routes inland.  A coded BBC message had alerted the French Resistance.  While the Navy policed the Channel either side of the spout the RAF and US Army Air Force had bombed road and rail infrastructure over much of northern France to interfere with German troop and tank movements and keep them guessing where the landings would occur.  Now, just before dawn, the Naval bombardment of the beach defences began and the Germans on the coast (units of 7^th Army west of the River Orne and 15^th Army to the east) beheld the largest invasion force in military history.

On ‘Utah’ beach, on the east side of the Cherbourg peninsula, the 4^th Infantry Division of US VII Corps landed with far fewer casualties than expected and began to move inland to relieve the paratroopers of the US 82^nd and 101^st Airborne.  To the east the defences around Vierville and St. Laurent somehow escaped the naval and air bombardments and the legendary ‘bloodbath’ of ‘Omaha’ beach began.  The 1^st and 29^th Infantry Divisions of US V Corps lost more than 2,000 and the American Rangers, who were to take the cliffs of Pointe de Hoc were decimated.  Survivors reaching the beach from their landing craft amid heavy fire found their way to the shelter of sandy bluffs or sea walls and eventually moved inland, the Rangers scaling 100 foot cliffs.

North-west of Caen on ‘Sword’, the easternmost of the beaches, the landing of British 3^rd Division was a ‘remarkable success’ but ‘they were slow pushing forward’ and, encountering 21^st Panzer later in the day, they failed to seize Caen.  The city, soon heavily defended, was not to fall to the Allies until several weeks later.

British 6^th Airborne Division had landed on their flank securing the critical connecting bridge over the Orne (now named ‘Pegasus’ in their honour) and blowing bridges on the River Dives to foil German attacks from the east.

The Canadian 3^rd Division, landing on ‘Juno’ beach, faced heavily fortified seaside villages and defences networked by tunnels but their follow-up units were able to move inland quickly through the fierce fighting of the first waves.   41 and 48 Commando, landing at the facing edges of ‘Sword’ and ‘Juno’ succeeded in connecting the beaches despite a determined advance by 21^st Panzer between the bridgeheads.

 

From 60th Anniversary - The D-Day Landings Northern France.

Our friends in 61^st Reconnaissance Regiment were destined to land on ‘Gold’ beach, between the Canadians on ‘Juno’ and the Americans on ‘Omaha’.  Eric Postles, Sandy Handley and Don Aiken boarded Tank Landing Ships (LSTs) with their vehicles at Southampton docks on 1^st June and spent the next three days in the Solent, north of the Isle of Wight.  On Sunday 4^th June they received final briefings on their landing beaches and targets inland and found out their destination was Normandy.  Eric Brewer boarded his ship on the Sunday but, though all were now prepared for action, they were delayed for another day.  The rough weather meant many were seasick and although the food was good all they were given to sleep on was a couple of burial bags as blankets!

To get inshore they had to drive onto flat-bottomed ferry-like landing craft called Rhinos.  Don’s ship lost one of the two Rhinos it was towing somewhere in the Channel.

“The 50^th Division attacking ‘Gold’, the most westerly of the British beaches, ran into their first serious difficulty in front of the fortified German positions at Le Hamel.  The 1^st Hampshires and 1^st Dorsets landed under furious fire from bunkers scarcely scarred by the bombardment and manned by the German 1^st Battalion of 716^th Division.  The British supporting tanks arrived too late to give the infantry immediate support and …very few of the Royal Marine Centaurs arrived at all” (having capsized in their landing craft).  “Three of the five landing craft bringing 47 Commando ashore struck mines…the survivors swam to the beach and regrouped to begin their advance on Port-en-Bessin” (the critical port east of Omaha beach defended by the experienced 316^th Division). “46 men and almost every wireless set had been lost.” (From ‘Overlord’ by Max Hastings, Macmillan 2016 edition)

61st Recce fared even worse:

"Nearly half the contact patrols with the assaulting infantry were killed or wounded on D-Day, either on the beaches or before reaching them.  Nevertheless, they justified themselves by getting much information back to divisional Headquarters before it arrived by the normal channels and some of the patrols, whose sets had been shot-up, did great work with their weapons.”  (From ‘A Reconnaissance Regiment in the B.L.A.’ by Lt-Col P.H.A.Brownrigg, D.S.O.)

By 9.30am the beach was secured against determined enemy resistance and during the rest of the morning the forces of 50th Division pushed inland four miles towards the town of Creully.  The battle for Le Hamel itself raged on until afternoon. (From 60th Anniversary - The D-Day Landings Northern France.)

Eric Brewer of B Squadron’s Assault Troop landed near Port-en-Bessin at 7.30 am with a bicycle (this soon got a puncture and he threw it away).  Pushing inland they got lost and seem to have ended up far behind enemy lines in the Caumont-l'Éventé area, about 20 miles from the coast, near Briquessard.  A machine gun opened up from behind a hedge, killing their carrier driver.  Eric finally found the rest of his Squadron in France on 8^th June.

Extract from Eric Brewer's diary copyright of Derek Brewer and family

 

By the time Don Aiken’s ship arrived in late morning the 1^st Hampshire’s had cleared the beach near Arromanches.  When his armoured car drove off the remaining Rhino he sank into a bomb hole leaving only the turret exposed but the Humber armoured car kept moving.  All the vehicles had been carefully waterproofed in preparation for an amphibious landing with a compound of grease, lime and asbestos fibres.  Moving to the de-waterproofing area, Don accidentally sent a smoke bomb into one of the nearby German minefields; luckily it didn’t trigger an incident – except with the British officer in charge of the beach! 

The Regiment was meant to reach a wooded hill about 15 miles inland to ‘seize and hold’ with the 8th Armoured Brigade but all the delays meant most didn’t reach it.  Don spent the night standing in pitch blackness next to his vehicle, wondering where the nearest Germans were.

Eric Postles also encountered issues with getting ashore: “The heavy seas caused problems for the ships towing Rhinos and we were late arriving at the beach.  After much effort our Rhino was linked to the ship’s ramp and my carrier was first on the ramp when the Rhino broke away.  We jumped off the vehicle and waited for the reconnection before finally getting onto the Rhino next to a bulldozer which was intended to lead us off.  We got near the water’s edge and the bulldozer which was intended to destroy obstacles drove off but disappeared under the water and we did not see the driver again.  The Rhino moved further along the beach and we all got ashore.  It was late afternoon.

There were beached ships and landing craft everywhere and we were directed to a track which led off the beach and through the sand hills.  There was a lot of enemy shelling activity and our heavy warship and rocket ships were firing over us.  There were groups of prisoners and we passed a line of British dead lying side by side.” 

Eric spent the night at the edge of a cornfield where there were a number of dead Germans.  “It was an uncomfortable night”.  (Extract from ‘My War Years’ by John Eric Postles ISO used by kind permission of the author.)

By nightfall 50^th Division’s 231st (Dorsets, Devons and Hampshires) and 151st (Durham Light Infantry) Brigades were just two miles short of Bayeux while the 69th (East Yorks & Green Howards) had linked up with the Canadians from Juno beach.

With the roughness of the sea and many Rhinos breaking away from their parent ships only half the 61st Reconnaissance contingent got ashore on D-day.  Sandy Handley’s ship lost a Rhino so not everyone could be taken to the shore.  He was still floating offshore near Arromanches overnight, grateful not to be one of the 50% casualties among the Recce who landed first on D Day.

Major Brownrigg, commander of ‘A’ Squadron, was also not able to land until 7^th June but the Regiment’s Commander Colonel William Mount was ashore and arranged a new rendez-vous well within the bridgehead. He was held up  reaching there by heavy machine gun fire and when Major Brownrigg called on the wireless he was told “Get off the air, I’m shooting Boches.”

All the 61^st Recce invasion squad had landed by the end of 7^th June.  Coming off the Rhino into about 4 feet of water, 50 yards from the beach, was nerve-wracking enough, even without heavy fire.  Engineers were still dealing with the underwater beach obstacles, many with mines attached.  Among the British dead the biggest Union Jack Sandy had ever seen was flying in a gentle breeze.  Later when Sandy saw a dead German by the side of the road he thought “A man the same as me doing what I was told to do.”

Despite the Humber’s engine catching fire as they drove away from the beach Sandy reached the 61^st Recce rendez-vous between Brécy and Rucqueville for the night of 7^th June and heard that 50^th Division had succeeded in taking Bayeux, the first city in France to be liberated after D-day.

 

Sources include ‘The Second World War’ by Antony Beevor (published by Weidenfield and Nicolson 2012), ‘Overlord’ by Max Hastings (Macmillan 2016 edition) and accounts by veterans of the 61st Reconnaissance Regiment.