Yet another thread where I pull some scraps of information from around the Internet and add a crudely marked map... This adventure started when I came across this page at oldhickory30th.com. I found the sketch of German positions fascinating and yet it contained few surprises. The sketch shows a battalion of three companies defending a sector just east of the Vire sometime between 18 June 1944 to 11 July 1944. Link: http://www.oldhickory30th.com/BocageXIXCorpsReport.htm Captured sketch: http://www.oldhickory30th.com/Bocage8.jpg Oddly the company CP's are numbered 2., 3., and 4. What happen to 1. company? and 4. company is usually the weapons company of heavy MG's and 81mm mortars. This position was attacked on 11 July 1944 by the 137th Infantry of the 35th Infantry Division -- its first battle. Link here: http://www.coulthart.com/134/137chapter-2.htm Based on that identification, the "879th" is probably a typographical error and should be 897th or Grenadier Regiment 897. These were elements of 266.ID that sent a battle group to Normandy from Brittany. Link here: http://home.swipnet.se/normandy/gerob/gerob.html A surprise find was the After Action Report of the 654th Tank Destroyer Battalion that entered the battle on 12 July 1944 and directly supported the rifle companies on the 13th. A fairly detailed description of action; small sample below. Link here: http://654th.com/1944_july_13.htm I love how the infantry started bird dogging for the TD's when they arrive. Screw fighting fair or anything like equal. And finally the attached map is from a 1952 US Army map of the area. Yet the village of la Meauffe is still mis-marked. Somehow the Germans got it right. EDIT: Fixed link
