D-Day: The Battle for Normandy

Almost everyone at every level was acutely conscious of taking part in a great historical event. Headquarters of the American V Corps heading for Omaha beach recorded in its war diary, ‘The attempt to do what had been contemplated by all the great military leaders of modern European History — a cross channel invasion — was about to commence.’

The main question in most minds was whether the Germans already knew what was afoot and would be waiting for them. Planners of Operation Neptune, the cross-Channel phase of Overlord, had spent months considering possible threats to the invasion fleets: submarines, mines, E-boats, radar and the Luftwaffe. Every precaution was taken.

Mosquito squadrons were patrolling the French coast all night, ready to down any German aircraft which might sight the approaching fleets. Aircraft equipped for radio counter-measures were also aloft to jam the frequencies used by German night-fighters. Large-scale radar-jamming operations were carried out by British and American aircraft over the Channel. And for several weeks, rocket-firing Typhoons had attacked German radar sites all along the Channel coast from the Netherlands to Brittany.

In Operation Taxable, Lancaster bombers of 617 Squadron dropped ‘window’, aluminium strips to simulate on radar screens an invasion convoy approaching the coast at Cap d’Antifer, north-east of Le Havre. This was assisted by a naval deception using motor launches and torpedo boats towing reflector balloons, which would look like large ships on radar. A similar deception plan, Operation Glimmer, consisted of Stirling bombers dropping ‘window’ opposite Boulogne. Mines were also dropped round Cap d’Antifer.

One of Admiral Ramsay’s greatest concerns was a mass attack on the invasion fleet by German U-boats from their bases in Brittany. Naval anti-submarine forces were deployed, but the main task of covering the south-western approaches fell to 19 Group of Coastal Command mainly flying B-24 Liberators and Sunderland flying boats. The group included one Czech, one Polish, one New Zealander, two Australian and three Canadian squadrons. Even the RAF’s own 224 Squadron was a mixed bag of nationalities, with 137 Britons, forty-four Canadians, thirty-three Anzacs, two Americans, a Swiss, a Chilean, a South African and a Brazilian.

Their crews faced long missions day and night, constantly patrolling the western Channel in box patterns from southern Ireland down to the Brest peninsula. When their radar picked out any submarine on the surface, the aircraft would dive, the front gunner trying to kill and wound as many as possible on the conning tower to impede a crash dive, then the aimer would release the depth charges. In Operation Cork, aircraft from 19 Group attacked forty submarines. One of 224 Squadron’s Liberators piloted by the twenty-one-year-old Canadian, Flying Officer Ken Moore, made naval history by sinking two U-boats within twenty-two minutes on the night of 7 June. To the embarrassment of Gro?admiral Karl Donitz and the high command of the Kriegsmarine, not a single U-boat penetrated the English Channel. Other Allied aircraft attacked German destroyers to prevent them from engaging the invasion fleet. Only fast German E-boats and later midget submarines managed to inflict any losses.

On board the landing ships, soldiers whiled away the time. Some tried to sleep, some attempted to learn a little French from their phrase books, some read their Bibles. Many attended improvised church services, finding comfort in religion. On the British ship Princess Ingrid, however, God had appeared to be in a less reassuring mood when the bosun piped ‘Hands to church’ the previous afternoon. ‘Although attendance was entirely voluntary,’ wrote a forward observer with the 50th Division, ‘every soldier on board seemed to be at the service which was held on the upper boat deck. In the bows stood an Army chaplain behind a table covered by a table cloth on which stood a small silver cross. As we waited for the service to begin, the wind started to increase in vigor. A sudden gust flipped up the table cloth, the cross slipped to the deck and broke in two. Utter consternation in the congregation. What an omen! For the first time I realized what “fear of God” really was. All around, men were looking absolutely shattered.’

On American landing ships, dice and poker games began, with bets made mostly in the new Allied occupation currency which General de Gaulle so abhorred. Aboard the USS Samuel Chase, war correspondents, including the photographer Robert Capa and Don Whitehead, joined in enthusiastically. ‘All are tense and all are pretending to be casual,’ remarked one soldier. ‘Bravado helps.’

In contrast to the riotous gambling parties, there were many who said little. ‘Even though huddled together and cramped,’ noted Lieutenant Gardner Botsford with the 1st Infantry Division, ‘one felt very private.’ A number had discussed ‘who was going to make it once we landed and who wasn’t’. ‘My thoughts turned to home and family,’ one soldier recounted, ‘and I wondered how they would take the news of my death. I consoled myself with the fact that I was insured for the maximum amount of the GI insurance plan, and that my parents would at least have ten thousand dollars to compensate them for my death.’

The men of the 116th Infantry Regiment heading for Omaha found it hard to forget the address of their commanding officer, Colonel Charles D. Canham. He had predicted that two out of three of them would never return home. He finished off his warning in a pronounced southern drawl: ‘Anyone who has butterflize in the bellah, speak up now.’ A senior British officer on the Empire Broadsword provided an equally discouraging envoi when he finished his pep talk with the words: ‘Don’t worry if you do not survive the assault as we have plenty of back-up troops who will just go in over you.’

On the USS Bayfield, a young officer wrote in his diary of his sense of ‘approaching a great abyss — not knowing whether we are sailing into one of the world’s greatest military traps or whether we have caught the enemy completely off guard’. Another man observed that there was little hatred of the Germans, but everyone sensed that it would develop after the first casualties.

The captain of the USS Shubrick ordered his crew to shave, shower and dress in clean clothes to reduce the chance of infection if they were wounded. Soldiers of the 4th Infantry Division headed for Utah beach also shaved their heads, some leaving a V of hair, but more opted for the Mohican fashion like the paratroopers. The sobering thoughts prompted by these precautions were offset when ships’ captains read Eisenhower’s message to the invasion troops over the public address system: ‘Soldiers, sailors and airmen of the Allied Expeditionary Force! You are about to embark upon the Great Crusade, towards which we have striven these many months. The eyes of the world are upon you. The hope and prayers of liberty-loving people everywhere march with you. In company with our brave allies and brothers in arms on the other fronts, you will bring about the destruction of the German war machine, the elimination of Nazi tyranny over the oppressed peoples of Europe, and security for ourselves in a free world.’ Many admitted to getting ‘goose bumps’ on listening to the stirring words. Before midnight, US Navy ships went to ‘general quarters’ and the Royal Navy to ‘action stations’.

On more than 100 airfields in England, bomber pilots from both the RAF and the USAAC were being roused from their beds for breakfast and an early briefing. Most guessed that something big was up, but they were not sure what. The pilots of the American 388th Bomber Group at Thetford were apparently unprepared for the ‘dramatic announcement’ of the briefing officer on the platform. ‘As he drew back the white sheet that covered the operational map, he said, “Gentlemen, today the Allies invade the Continent”. Pandemonium broke loose as the briefing room exploded with cheers and whistles and shouts.’ He then went on to tell them that ‘everything in the Eighth Air Force that could fly’ would be taking off that morning. The bomb groups, once assembled in the air, would stretch for miles and miles as they streamed over towards their targets on the Normandy coast. Formation and fire discipline was vital. ‘Any individual plane flying in the opposite direction, that is, against traffic, once we left the coast of England, would be shot down.’

The reaction at British briefings appears to have been more subdued, mainly out of awe at the magnitude of the whole operation. ‘The preparations were staggering,’ wrote Desmond Scott, a New Zealander who commanded a wing of four Typhoon squadrons. ‘The airborne assaults, the quantity and variety of shipping, the number of army divisions, the tremendous weight of the air offensive. The scale and the precision of it all made our past efforts look insignificant. When the briefing was over there was no conversation, no laughter. No one lingered and we filed out as though we were leaving church. Expressions remained solemn. The task ahead outweighed all our previous experiences and sent a shiver down the spine.’

The RAF was putting up a maximum effort that night. Apart from the aircraft on deception and airborne missions, 1,000 bombers took off to attack ten coastal batteries during darkness with more than 5,000 tons of bombs. Spitfire squadrons scrambled to provide air cover over the beaches, along with American P-38 Lightnings. Their task was to prevent any Luftwaffe incursions over the invasion area, while the longer-range Mustangs would