R.A.F. Units in D-Day landings on Omaha Beach

Discussion in 'NW Europe' started by DoctorD, Mar 21, 2009.

  1. chick42-46

    chick42-46 Senior Member

    For those looking for this excellent booklet, see here - http://www.therafatomahabeach.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/THE-D-DAY-STORY-THAT-NEVER-MADE-THE-HEADLINES-Updated-Minimum-Size.pdf

    A truly excellent website and a great tribute to the men, like DoctorD, who landed on D-Day and suffered so much.

    On page 83 of the booklet, there is a link to the Order of Battle, mentioning (at page 21) the RAF units that landed on Omaha Beach on D-Day. As often happens, the link is broken. So I tracked down the ORB and here is an up-to-date link to it - http://www.da.mod.uk/Research-Publications/the-assault-landings-in-normandy-order-of-battle-20392/category/52

    Hopefully it will work (for a time at least). In any event, I've downloaded the ORB in .pdf format and if anyone wants it I'll be happy to email it to them.

    Cheers

    Ian
     
  2. DoctorD

    DoctorD WW2 Veteran WW2 Veteran

    Still creaking around. Only came here for a laugh at the Jokes thread. How kind you all are! I thought I reported back on my visit when Commanding General of 12th Infantry Div of USNG paid his respects to our memorial (Gosh! It can't be two years ago, can it?!). Will have to look out some photos of the visit if anybody is interested. But don't hold your breath. Reason I couldn't make it for this year's 6th June anniversary was due to being scheduled for some investigative head surgery two days later. They retrieved some extraneous matter, through a hole in my skull, that seems to be replacing the grey matter - but nice to know there's still some of that there LOL. But just as it's all nicely healed up they dropped a note on the doormat yesterday calling me back for them to dig a bit deeper next Wednesday as the greedy buggers want some more!. Should have kept my head down in the first place, I suppose, so don't expect the pickies just yet. BTW re Jokes thread, liked the one about Starbucks. Keep remembering the good times. CU soon, Les.
     
  3. dbf

    dbf Moderatrix MOD

    All the best Les, good luck on Wednesday.
     
  4. chick42-46

    chick42-46 Senior Member

    Best wishes and good luck, Les.
     
  5. Robbozinoz

    Robbozinoz Member

    Hi all

    I am looking for some help and useful links about Grandfather - John (Jack) Robertson time in the war. He only spoke once about the war as many did I am sure

    After Malta He than came back and was stationed at Chigwell. He saidhe was on the American Omaha beach at DDay as part of the Mechanical team. He mentioned also that he was early into Paris but he mentioned it so little we are not sure.

    His service record says 4/6/44 - 5276 D Unit 85 Group (G&J) before being moved to 83 G.C.C on New Years Eve of 45.

    He talked about his landing craft being driven being under the command of an American with a huge cigar in his mouth and that there landing craft beached itself and all of there gear went straight to the bottom of the sea when they left the craft. I think he was on Omaha and may have been in one of the RAF Beach Squadrons

    He was definitely RAF (Mechanical trade - LAC))and that his role was to look after communications - setup/maintenance. I noticed in the book by Leslie Robinson on RAF Beach Units that many of the those units were under Group 85 but on the day were listed under 83 Group because it had the ability to manage them on the beach.

    The recount by Corporal Heathcote (http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ww2peop...a1947567.shtml) - where a landing craft gets beached on a sandbank and all the gear sinks to the bottom of the sea followed by the crew struggling to shore and using whatever they could to dig a foxhole is exactly the story my Grandfather to me (he actually said they also uncovered a landmine - which the promptly covered marked and moved away from.

    He also mentioned being on a side street watching the Allies march down the Champs Elysee having already been there for 3 days I think - is it possible to track down the GCI he was part of and where it went?

    Alot of things tie up but I cannot find his name anywhere - am I heading up the wrong path.

    Cheers
     

    Attached Files:

  6. chick42-46

    chick42-46 Senior Member

    Hi Robbozinoz

    Welcome to the forum! As well as this thread by Dr D, see also this website - The D-Day Fighter Control Story - Association of RAF Fighter Control Officers - which I've only just found. It certainly does look like your grandfather was at Omaha - most likely in a unit attached somehow to 15082 CGI. The story here mentions that a LWS and a MSU were attached to each CGI. I'll see if I can dig anything more up.

    You should probably post this to a new thread as well - that way it might attract more attention.

    Cheers and god luck

    Ian
     
  7. chick42-46

    chick42-46 Senior Member

    Hi again
    The link to the Order of Battle doesn't seem to be working but I've checked my copy and 5276 is listed as a Mobile Signals Unit which landed during the asault phase of the D Day invasion. It doesn't say which CGI unit it relates to but it is definitely listed!
    Also, digging around, I've found this - Timeline for the RAF at Omaha Beach : The RAF at Omaha Beach - someone seems to have done a really thorough job of putting the story of what happened together based on official records and eyewitness accounts. It's a cracking read! Interestingly, it records 5276 MSU moving to a concentration area on or about 8 June 1944 and lists it as follows:

    14038 A.M.E.S. 5276 ‘D’ 585 ‘Q’

    I don't want to read too much into that but it suggests that 5276 was - at least at that stage - associated with 14038 AMES (a radar unit of some sort - AMES standing for Air Ministry Experimental Station).
    National Archives will have the records of these units.
    Cheers
    Ian
     
  8. Trux

    Trux 21 AG

    Ian,

    Thanks for the link. Very interesting and very timely since I was just looking (again) at this subject. I recently read an account by a US Naval officer who said that the US beaches were without land based radar coverage because the British radar unit failed to arrive. According to him the unit was later found in Scotland, having never been loaded!!!!

    Mike
     
  9. Robbozinoz

    Robbozinoz Member

    Hi Mike

    That would ring true a my grandfather told me that when the landing craft stopped and the landing craft commander told then to get to the beach, he had stuck the landing craft on a sand embankment and when they all got off all their equipment went straight to the bottom of the see.

    Cheers

    John
     
  10. Robbozinoz

    Robbozinoz Member

    Ian

    Thanks for this link

    I will give it a read

    Cheers

    John
     
  11. Robbozinoz

    Robbozinoz Member


    Ian

    Quick question I am quite keen to track the unit you identified (particularly between Omaha and Paris)what subject would you suggest me posting as a new thread? New to this forum!!!

    Cheers

    John
     
  12. chick42-46

    chick42-46 Senior Member

    Hi John

    Assuming you mean 15082 CGI, this site seems to have a good amount of info - Timeline for the RAF at Omaha Beach : The RAF at Omaha Beach - sourced from various places, including the National Archives and a number of publications and interviews. This thread by Dr D also has a lot of info, as well as the other links from it to other sites especially - http://www.therafatomahabeach.com/w...R-MADE-THE-HEADLINES-Updated-Minimum-Size.pdf - Dr D's own account, all in one place. Not sure if posting a new thread will yield a whole lot more.

    Cheers

    Ian
     
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  13. DoctorD

    DoctorD WW2 Veteran WW2 Veteran

    Hi Robozinoz (Aussi?) and chick 42-46
    Owen just repaired my hyperlink to this thread (Thanks, Owen) which I haven't visited for some time for which I apologise to all interested parties.
    John, if you look at Pages 79&80 in the second hyperlink in Ian's last post you will see the account of the guy who's pictured earlier riding the Unit's bike in Paris with a popsy on the crossbar, whilst AWOL there before the Yanks arrived.
    Sadly, Muir, my old friend Chiefie (Flt Sgt) Adair (RCAF), rejoined our old comrades nearly two years ago just before his 96th birthday, leaving just me to spread the tale.
    A snapshot taken on 25th July 1944 (D+49 or thereabouts) of the location of allegedly all mobile units in 2nd TAF appears on pp704-711 of Vol 4 of 2nd Tactical Air Force by Christopher Shears & Chris Thomas published 2008 ISBN 978 1 906537 01 2. Unfortunately I believe it's out of print but if you'll just remind me of the number of the MSU you're interested in I'll look it up on my copy.
    However, I'm a bit pushed for time at present in making arrangements for a farewell return there on 3rd June for a wreath laying ceremony at the 15082GCI memorial I had erected on Omaha Beach, as referred to elsewhere on this thread.
    BTW if you just Google "Fulton Muir Adair" there's some good links to Fighter Direction Tenders, GCI's etc., from the Canadian point of view, that may be of interest. Nevertheless, there's not too much to add to the wealth of information contained on Peter Best's excellent web site,of which you're already aware.
    CU soon
    Les
     
    Last edited: May 3, 2017
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  14. DoctorD

    DoctorD WW2 Veteran WW2 Veteran

    Hi Robbozinoz
    John, unbelieveable!
    Just had a quick look at the "snapshot of locations" in Vol 4, as I was eating lunch. It shows 5276 at same map reference as 309MSSU on that date. Problem is that we never shared a site with any other unit at any time throughout the Battle of Normandy.
    At that time only Echelon A of 309MSSU was in Normandy, the rest of 309MSSU (Echgs B & C) were still camped in UK at Chesham, Bucks., whilst its establishment was being strengthened by the inclusion of other "trades" e.g.Tinsmith, Cobbler, MT Fitter, Cooks and ACH(GD)'s and many more technical NCO's. The snapshot doesn't show their existence.
    Echelon A comprised a dozen or so Wireless/Radar Mechanics of various ranks, of which I was one, and with two MT Drivers, a Despatch Rider, a Cook, a Medic and Flt Lt C.O., were camped in the orchard of Chateau de la Bréhoule which is situated about 2 miles North of St Pierre Église on the road to Barfleur. We used the ground floor just for Cookhouse and Mess, and Wehrmacht hut for ablutions.
    However, there was a group of GCI's and MSU's located a short distance away us, my visit to one of which, for a Type X machine breakdown is already documented elsewhere. Hope this helps.
    Must go now. CU
    Les
     
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  15. Robbozinoz

    Robbozinoz Member

    Hi Les

    Can you direct me to the link for the Vol 4 you referred to

    That is certainly uncanny, I am not sure if my Grandfather embellished anything as it took such an effort for him to talk about it at all. Is it likely that the fact their landing craft beached, lost their equipment and were dispersed across the beach be a reason? He like you was a Wirless/Rader mechanic.

    Best regards

    John
     
  16. DoctorD

    DoctorD WW2 Veteran WW2 Veteran

    Sorry John, I don't know of any 'link' to Vol 4. You could try your local library perhaps. I know that soon after it was published my local library purchased a copy to which I referred local enquirers. I also purchased a copy myself to present to my local ATC Squadron. My own copy came complimentarily for the ten-page chapter of material that Christopher Shores asked me to provide. Apart from the "snapshot" of locations 2ndTAF MSU's, it doesn't include much that isn't already available to you; apart from some excellent photos of aircraft flown by 2nd TAF, the Squadrons and lists of their C.O's, Also some information on camouflage etc.

    Your Grandpa may well have been the guy I talked to whist at St Pierre Église (or Tocville) who told me that my former roommate was killed during the landings and who later on operated an eavesdropping Q Unit with the Yanks in the Ardennes and fled back to 309MSSU in Brussels when the Battle of the Bulge started.

    I'm pretty sure that there was no need for embelishment. The first sight of dead or dismembered bodies when you're just 19 yrs old doesn't leave many people unaffected by the experience.
    Regards
    Les
    .
     
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  17. Robbozinoz

    Robbozinoz Member

    Thanks Les, for all your time on this, it really has helped us all as family understand things better

    Sorry to be a pest. But it is a small world, was he by any chance Glaswegian?

    Best regards

    John
     
    Last edited: May 7, 2017
  18. DoctorD

    DoctorD WW2 Veteran WW2 Veteran

    Hi John
    Has anybody in the family still got his RAF Release Book? If not, have you applied to the RAF Records Office for a copy of his service record? It may not tell you too much though. For instance, only my Release Book shows the date of my overseas service. But even that just says "Germany 9/6/44 to 11/10/47" with no mention of France, Belgium Holland etc.. However some of my various admission and discharge dates from military hospital are shown.
    I remember on that particular service visit taking a few lovely eating apples from 'our' orchard to swap for some from theirs - only to find that theirs were Calvados apples which were small and sour like crab apples. But where there's Calvados apples there's also Scrumpy and Calvados! We found the Calvados very useful for priming our Primus stoves, as there was no Methylated Spirit available. Their farmer was also an occasional source for eggs, and his two daughters visited our site to take away and launder our shirts and underwear in exchange for cigs, choc bars, bully beef and gum. Since there were a hundred or so MSU's eventually deployed throughout the American Sector that demanded the attention of our dozen or so Radar/Wireless Mechs, my memory doesn't stretch to ethnic origins; but I never came across a fellow W/Mech on any MSU, although GCI's would warrant a couple as residents. Sorry I can't be of more help. Les
     
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  19. DoctorD

    DoctorD WW2 Veteran WW2 Veteran

    Just noticed Trux contribution! 15082 GCI guys were busy burying own and American dead on Omaha Beach on the evening of D-day, Coverage of the beach at that time was provided by RAF Fighter Protection Tenders (floating GCI's). With many dozens of RAF MSU's and GCI's deployed throughout the american sector to provide widespread air defence of American military installations,15082 continued to give air defence for US battlefront all the way to Paris, where they were set up on Longchamps Racecourse 2 days before Paris was liberated. Operational Record Books for MSU's and MSSU deployed in the American Sector are missing from National Archives; seemingly to hide the fact that they were unable to provide these assets from their own resources. . This GCI returned to Cherbourg on liberation of Paris, when an American Radar Unit came on the scene, and was disbanded. Some technical personnel, including Canadian Flt Sgt Radar Mech Adair were then posted to Scotland.
    It was to counter such stupid uninformed sensation-seeking printed propaganda by individuals of the US Military that I had the 15082GCI 2nd TAF memorial erected at the steps leading down to Omaha Beach at Vierville sur Mer for all visitors to learn the truth.
    Les .
     
    Last edited: May 8, 2017
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  20. Clive Wiley

    Clive Wiley Member

     
    Last edited: Oct 15, 2017

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