Operation 'TITANIC' - 6 June 1944 - Harfleur

this is great news to finally know where CN45 landed...

 

Hi,

What has come to light thanks to caiilard, Ludo and his contacts is that CN 45 sits in a field near the Chemin de Buglise just north of Montivilliers in the valley below. Like many cities Montivilliers has expanded and the site where the glider came down is now covered in postwar housing.

There are many photos and stills of CN 45 in varying quality. Here are a few of the glider collected by brithm and other forum members. Also included a few stills from German newsreels. I chose these as they show the surrounding landscape with identifiable background features such as houses.



Regards ...

 

Hi

the member "brithm" talk about CN 45 North of Montivilliers. in 2012 :

6th Airborne Division - Prisoners of War

 

Chalk 45 Landing Site

Included here are a few marked illustrations to show where CN 45 came down above Montivilliers. There was only a small sized aerial to work with unfortunately and it doesn't show the glider clearly. In the photos it lies parallel to Chemin de Buglise with nose to the north. So very likely the glider swooped in low over the Dupont property where it struck a tree before skidding to a rapid halt. There is also a line running in from the Chemin de Buglise which may be the track created by vehicles going to and from crashed craft? If I am wrong in any way let me know and I'll try to fix. Hopefully not too confusing ...



The section from Sgt. John Potts' account where he describes their landing:

"As I recall, we should have had about eight minutes flying before we got near to the area that had been selected, but after about ten minutes, and by now Bill was taking timings on his stopwatch, nothing could be seen whatsoever—no indications of lights. There was a pall of blackness hanging under the cloud, which was the residue of the bombings. It was the after-bombing dust that was congregating. We were now down to 2500 feet and nothing could be seen, even though we were in our twelfth minute inland. As we passed one belt of anti-aircraft fire there seemed to be another, just waiting in readiness for us. We saw the tug struck and the next second, we were in free flight. We don’t know if the tug cast us off or the rope had been severed, but we were in free flight and could see nothing.

Bill (Jones), being on the port side, took the controls and just went straight forward and at about 700-800 feet, there in front of us, was an open expanse. We should have known then that we were in some additional form of trouble, because the field was actually bare. There were no anti-glider poles in it and I can recall, although by now I was searching desperately for a field dressing to try and put on my face, that Bill had turned slightly to starboard and he was going to come round for some sort of a landing when we obviously struck some trees with our undercart, because you could feel the shudder as we went in and by some miracle the glider came to a very sudden, immediate and sharp stop. We certainly needed to, because by this time, the port wing was almost completely on fire from one end to another. We talk about speedy departures from gliders. This must have been an all-time British, European and all comers record, because we were out!"

A German unit was on to them almost immediately and as they approached noisily they were fired on by the glider troops. To escape the pilots ran back to the clump of trees they struck on their way in, however, they didn't offer much in the way of protection. John Potts somehow ended up in a ditch that led him back unknowingly to his glider where he was knocked unconscious by a mortar bomb exploding nearby.

Regards ...

 

You are in the good way

 

Thank to Geo, Ludo, the papers that I've kept and the uncles, aunt and my work since years I'm very hapy to share the following documents plans of sharing donation of Georges Caillard father of Marie-Thérèse Dupont Caillard, Jean Caillard and Odette Jullien-caillard + P/R of the 11/09 with all the details of the german defenses thanks to a mission of intelligences; Infod transmittedat Hallamshires rec after the seine crossing at Vieux-Port (lt-col Dyke) . One mission can hide another missions. "In wartime, truth is so precious that she should always be attended by a bodyguard of lies." but it was not just the only mission to do. So important was Le Havre.
I dont think the CN45 has landed thanks to the Patron Saint of glider plots (inteview of John Potts)

 

Hi caillard,

Thank you for all the extra information on CN 45 and your Family's history as it adds a new dimension to the story. The postwar family photos are quite lovely.

Regards ...