I've made a page on Back to Normandy with all the divisions who participated on d-day and beyond. Looking forward to your contributions. http://www.backtonormandy.org/content/divisions.html
Fred neither the 1st nor the 5th Armoured of Canada took part in D Day as they were both in the Liri Valley of Italy at the time - they both joined the other Canadian Divisions in Belgium in February of 1945 along with the 1st Armoured Brigade to make up the whole of the Canadian Army along with 2nd - 3rd and 4th Armoured and 2nd Armoured bde Cheers
If you're going to include the two Canadian Divisions brought up from Italy you should also have the British 5th Infantry Division .
Owen Quite right BUT he did mention that the 2 Cdn divisions were active at D Day - no mention of 5th Globetrotters in the 'BEYOND" aspect … Cheers
A great idea, I think. You have made a good start but I see only one French division, the 2eme DB. By the end of the war in Europe the French had at least ten divisions in the line--1st, 2nd and 5th Armored, 2nd and 4th Moroccan, 3rd Algerian, 1st, 14th, and 27th Infantry, and 9th Colonial. And I may be forgetting a couple.
TTH and four of those French- African Divisions came from Italy via the South of France in August… Cheers
To repeat, I think this is a good idea, so long as it is made clear that the site and the page cover not only Normandy but the whole Northwest Europe campaign. And am I to take it that we can make contributions? If so, I will be happy to contribute something on the 50th Division and maybe the US 28th and 29th, which came from my parents' home states.
TTH If you were to read the initial posting you would read that the author is calling for input- so go ahead with your divisions Cheers
Mammoth task! What about RE and RA units, independent formations? Let us not reinvent the wheel, once more. Wikipedia, fast and the editing of items is supervised. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_divisions_during_World_War_II http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_British_divisions_in_World_War_II http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Canadian_divisions_in_World_War_II http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_French_divisions_in_World_War_II http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Polish_divisions_in_World_War_II Normandy: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Allied_forces_in_the_Normandy_Campaign
Thanks for all your input. Of course I have forgotten things. That is why I ask you here. A little explanation how Back to Normandy is build: On this article of the Divisions you only see the top-level of the hierarchy how a division was formed. See an example here in the database were all the information is stored: http://www.backtonormandy.org/the-history/12-army-group-usa/1-army-/8-infantry-division-usa.html. You can go up: the 8th div was a part of the First Army and higher a part of the 12 Army Group. When you go 'down' you will find the artillery, the regiments, special troops and many other things, etc. This hierarchy is arbitrary because the line of command changed all the time and units were attached to different divisions, regiments during their campaign. There are several websites showing these changes perfectly. In the article of every division you will also find a map with markers. The markers represent the separate records of every Divisions, inclusive all the units in the hierarchy. So every time I add a record, a marker will be added to the map. My go is to add as many as locations/dates to these units as 'low' as possible in the hierarchy. Example: http://www.backtonormandy.org/the-history/12-army-group-usa/1-army-/v-corps-usa/29-infantry-division-usa/special-troops-29-infdiv-usa/headquarters-company-29-infdiv-usa.html. Reason: many veterans tell about their unit, not about their division they were member of. My final go of building this website is to make it possible for everybody to look what happened on a certain location. The advanced search function makes it possible to look for specific data. Hint: when you use the radius-tool, you can check every location (linked with googlemap) in a circle towards maximum of 50 km http://www.backtonormandy.org/advanced-search.html So there is still much to do, because I combine everything: land, sea and air. I will certainly give attention to all the remarks made in this forum. I thank you for that. People who like to help, are very welcome.
Impressive website. Pleasing to see 2nd Infantry Division mentioned regarding their stay in County Armagh. Some other American Units which were based around Northern Ireland and are not included were :- 1st Armoured Division 5th Infantry Division 8th Infantry Division 34th Infantry Division 82nd Airborne Division. You can get more details on my website and also at http://www.history.army.mil/reference/ireland/nistat.htm Keep up the good work! Andy
Fred great offering. I think the Ist Canadian infantry Div became known as the "Red Patch Boys". The Grenadiers on top of Mt Assuro in Sicily and later Albert Kesserling knew them as, "the Red Patch Devils"; after the Prince Edward and Hastings Regiment's stealthy night attack/victory climbing the rearward cliff of the mountain at night. Matt
Update: all the markers on the maps show the badges of their unit. You can see more about the hierarchy of the Divisions.
Just an example of the different markers for the 1 Canadian Div. depending of the information of the specific unit on the location, you will see different markers : http://www.backtonormandy.org/can-1-infantry-division.html
