Falaise!

Discussion in 'Veteran Accounts' started by sapper, Nov 9, 2012.

  1. sapper

    sapper WW2 Veteran WW2 Veteran

    What better time in the year to remind ourselves of the horrors of war, and the bloody stupid futility of it. Here is an example.....

    Falaise. Blood soaked Falaise.
    Carnage! Bloody carnage.
    For here is war at it's most evil, this is where all the press reports and tales of courage in war, are stripped naked of any kind of veneer of patriotism, or humanity. For this was the real horror of war, and at its bloodiest. Destruction, utter and complete destruction, it is very hard to describe the scene in words. The roads blocked with dead horses still harnessed to the carts they were pulling, swollen with feet stuck up in the air. German soldiers dead, sometimes one on top of the other, further on, groups of German dead lying in twisted and grotesque positions. Tanks that finished tilted in crazy angles against the side of buildings, mobile guns and armoured troop carriers destroyed. Artillery twisted and abandoned. The whole paraphernalia of war turned into a massive mangled mess and covered with Normandy dust. Some soldiers burned as their vehicles caught fire.
    Religious statues destroyed, one very poignant sight was that of a life size statue of Christ with his hands spread wide in supplication. But, with both hands blow off. This went on for miles as we chased the fleeing Enemy towards the hell that awaited them at the neck of the Falaise gap. The Germans used any method to try and escape, in some areas it was not possible to cross the road for German dead. The mighty Tiger tanks blown to smithereens and scattered in every direction. Wall to wall death, smashed houses and buildings with the roads between with so many dead it was difficult to walk, men half out of tanks and cars, burned alive before they could get out, blackened figures fixed in the position of trying to get out their vehicles, some even had their hand on the car door handles and fixed in that position as the flames overtook them. The stench of death hung over everything like a sickening pall, the sun had already begun to cause early decay. An inferno beyond comprehension! Covering everything was a thick layer of grey dust, almost as though the scene had been sprayed with grey emulsion.
     
    gash hand likes this.
  2. Tom Canning

    Tom Canning WW2 Veteran WW2 Veteran

    Brian
    not a lot to be said after reading that - wasn't any different anywhere else - El Alamein -
    Catania - Salerno - Anzio - Cassino - Liri Valley - Gothic Line - it just went on and on

    Cheers
     
    gash hand likes this.
  3. Groundhugger

    Groundhugger Senior Member

    What happened to all the bodies of these fallen German Soldiers , is there a collection of mass graves or cemeteries in the Falais area ,
    we know of the British and commonwealth cemeteries , but Germans ! to me it's a grey area , What is the French attitude to the remains of the German Invaders .
     
    Dave55 likes this.
  4. son of a rat

    son of a rat Senior Member

    I believe Falaise was so badly contaminated the inhabitants had there water delivered in bowsers for years.
     
  5. 17thDYRCH

    17thDYRCH Senior Member

    The German Cemetery in Normandy at La Cambe, only a few kilometers from the main US Cemetery, contains the graves of some 21,000 German soldiers buried as a result of the battles for Caen and Falaise.
    As one very wise British Veteran told me..." the whole purpose of the war was to build as many cemeteries as possible and fill them full of Germans"
     
  6. Owen

    Owen -- --- -.. MOD

    Probably buried in either of these 2.
    cemeteries of normandy battle

    [​IMG] La Cambe
    German cemetery :21 400 graves


    [​IMG] Lisieux (Saint-Désir)
    German cemetery :
    3 735 graves
     
    Dave55 likes this.
  7. Glenn68

    Glenn68 New Member

    Wasn’t it 10,000 German dead in Falais Gap when closed and 50,000 captured ?
     

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