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

Not sure if this will be of any interest to you ?

OMAHA BEACHHEAD

Regards
Andy

 

Thanks Andy. Lots of detail regarding specific US assault units. No mention of 2nd Tactical Air Force providing air cover and Mobile Signals/Radar Units that the Americans lacked. Site seems to date from 1945, so doubt if it's still open for additional entries. I'll just keep plugging away.
Les

 

Hi Les,

I believe it's a online book that I assume has already been published and no longer has a copyright due to its age.

The site is a US Army historical site-possibly their offical one.

U.S. Army Center Of Military History

Cheers
Andy

 

(I’ve been assured this is already in the public domain, but it's important enough and appropriate for inclusion here as a tribute to a courageous, but self-effacing, true Christian. Remember, he had been accorded the honorary rank of Squadron Leader, and deservedly received the Military Cross. I feel sure that (in these "PC" days) some over-sensitive souls will be offended by what may seem to be inappropriate observations on the American way of life, Swedes, Italians, etc., but please be assured that, from personal contact with him, this man was without guille, the references being good-natured. – DoctorD)



I put this uniform on with some apprehension. Padres in the RAF had no preliminary training. I had to make my way to Cranwell, the old training centre of RAF Aircrew, and I wondered what I should do if anyone attempted to salute me on the way because I had no idea how to respond. I needn’t have worried; nobody did.

Cranwell was an enormous camp of 15,000 people and I gradually got used to local ways. The first night I sat down in the mess and thought I was treated rather rudely because nobody attempted to talk to me. It wasn’t till later that I realised they were all junior officers who were not allowed to address me unless I first addressed them. When I did they were all extremely friendly. But all these things came gradually. I somehow stumbled my way onto a parade and took Morning Prayers and nearly fell over stumbling off again much to the innocent merriment of the troops concerned. But one lives and learns.

I was not allowed to stay there long. After a fortnight I was whisked away to Whitley Bay on the mouth of the Tyne which was an Aircrew reception station. The Aircrew had been sent to train in Canada, then they came back in batches and then we had a feverish 10 days activity sending them off to their appropriate destinations. In between there was very little to do except to fill in all the forms saying that there was a nil return. But we had our moments. We took an organised expedition to Swann Hunter’s shipyard on the Tyne which was quite a revelation; and another to the famous Newcastle Brewery. I’d not realised till then how extremely clean and aseptic beer has to be. It is a very reassuring kind of realisation. I shared an office there with a very charming Dominican colleague in the Roman Catholic Church, and I was always amused that when we met in the office together, I had called at the sick bay to find out if any of my friends had fallen ill, while he as regularly went to the guardroom to find out how many of his flock had been confined for the night.

I was not allowed to remain long at Whitley Bay. I only distinguished myself there, I think, by inadvertently charging into a WAAF medical inspection and rushing out again as fast as possible. I’d never seen before or since such a number of little white bottoms on view.

I was next posted down to Calshott on the tip of Southampton water. It was one of the most delightful places I have ever come across. A delightful situation, Henry VIII’s old castle on Calshott Spit, a nice little railway to take one down there, manned by a driver who earned his full wages as railway driver because the little light railway crossed the main road. And down on the spit there was a hive of activity; the Royal Garrison Artillery defending the fort, the Navy training some of its personnel to use light landing craft, and the RAF was busy fitting out Air Sea Rescue launches, which left us regularly for other destinations. The story went that one commander ran his craft ashore at Bournemouth because he couldn’t find the way to Poole harbour. That may be apocryphal.

Just once in a while we had to land the flying boat which was in difficulties and this meant clearing most of the estuary of all its other activities and this was not popular.

I had a charming Senior Officer Administration, who made great friends and found me a tiny cottage on the edge of the perimeter, where I had a happy time living with my wife for a few months on the edge of the Solent. Every now and then one of my people got into the guardroom and I went down to him and told him what a rogue the young fellow was and how he really ought to be drummed out of the service etc etc., to receive the gratifying reply. “Oh Padre, you don’t understand these things at all! Now give him a really heavy ticking off and then let him go. That’ll be quite enough.”

So the offender got a good deal less than, I suspect, he deserved.

The CO was rather more formidable. He was the oldest Group Captain in the service. He’d been a Cambridge mathematician of repute. In his retirement he’d acquired a hotel in the Scilly Isles and was reputed to be a fairly wealthy man. He should have risen much higher in the service but his temperament was against him. The best story told about him was when he was a Squadron Leader commanding the flying boat base at Calshott at the end of the war and received a message from the C in C Portsmouth to say that he was coming to inspect the station on such and such a date. Whereupon the Squadron Leader sent back a message to say he was coming to inspect the 1st Light Cruiser Sqn on the following day. I think this rather blighted his career. There was certainly, by all accounts, an unholy row. He was reputed also to be an expert on organs and acquired a decidedly ramshackle affair which he played with gusto in our chapel. When I finally took leave of him he was busily making sails for his model yacht. A man of parts who was somehow of other under used.

Life at Calshott was very pleasant and I did what I could with my duties in the chapel. On my way down from the north to Calshott, I got the train at Waterloo with no less a person than C B Fry whom I recognised from his photographs who was dressed as a Commander RNR. He was a compulsive talker and I had a fascinating conversation about Sussex cricket, his life with Ranjit Singi, his work for young males on the Hamble and so on. Unfortunately he also expressed extremely nasty views which shocked the remaining members of the compartment. One lady begged him to stop, saying he was giving her a headache. Unfortunately the train chose to break down. It was a Saturday Bank Holiday afternoon, somewhere between Micheldever and Winchester and this prolonged the journey by about an hour and a half before we were finally shunted into Southampton.

Later on I asked him over to preach not entirely to the pleasure of the Group Captain. He didn’t talk in public as well as he talked in private but at least his coming was an event. Unfortunately so many of our young congregation had never really heard of C B Fry and Sussex cricket.

I also had, talking of cricket, an entertaining visit from A E R Gilligan, who was some sort of welfare officer, who descended on me one day and we had wonderful reminiscences of the days when I used to sit on the edge of the Hove county ground. He also told me a lot about the other side of C B Fry who was, to put it mildly, at times mentally extremely unwell.

I was next attached away from this relatively idyllic existence to be told that I was going to join the invasion of France. I was summoned to a meeting at Uxbridge with my immediate superior old Bill Wilkie, who died not so long ago, and he said he’d chosen me to go with a small RAF Radar unit which had been lent to the Americans because the American unit had not been able to get over from America. I was to go with them, land on Omaha beach on D Day itself at 11 o’clock in the morning by which time the beach would have been completely cleared, and our instructions were to drive 11 miles inland, set up all our apparatus – things called half cheeses which were located on the backs of trucks – and got ready to cover the beach after nightfall from the attacks of German bombers.

Well, it didn’t happen to work out quite like that. In the meantime I joined my unit which was lost in a field somewhere in Hampshire not far from Christchurch and got to know them as well as I could – a very likeable crowd indeed. And we were then hastily sent to a very secret American camp in a wood on an estate not very far away.

That also was a very interesting experience. We were living with the American 1st Division and the Texas Rangers who were due to make the 1st assault on the beach, about seven o’clock in the morning. And they were frankly apprehensive because they knew perfectly well that a German division had been moved into the area and was likely to oppose the landing.

We never quite got used to the American way of life. They breakfasted earlier than we ever used to and their last meal was about half past six in the evening after which we felt a little hungry until we went round to the cooking porters, made friends as everybody else did with the black cooks, and got supplies more or less as we required.

But it was my first introduction to the American way of thinking and this is not at all easy. For example, one afternoon we had an ENSA concert, or the equivalent on the American side, and a friend and I decided we would go and listen to this thing. To our horror we sat for two hours in our stalls watching the entertainments. Everybody around us was convulsed with laughter and falling over themselves with amusement, and we laughed twice in two hours. We simply could not see anything else to laugh at. American humour depends on overstatement, English humour on understatement and I doubt if the twain will ever meet, but it was an instructive experience.

We also had a certain amount of messages given out early in the morning on the tannoy. We made friends with the American officer who did this thing. We imitated him a little, pulled his leg in a way that no Englishman would have resented for one half minute. The poor man at the end of two or three minutes of this he was almost in tears and begging us to stop. He couldn’t understand that we were merely joking with him. He thought we were seriously criticising what he was doing. Again it was an interesting experience.

By far the most moving experience was the joint service in one of their little halls at Whitsuntide where not for the first time I was very glad to throw overboard any problems of bringing together the churches. One of the American officers brought his violin with him and played some simple tunes, and we had a short service followed by a communion service in which almost everybody joined.

A few days later we were packed up again in our lorries making our way to Portland Harbour where we had to embark on landing craft. It was interesting to see the racial diversity of the Americans. The crew of the landing craft were nearly all solid Swedes, the more volatile Italians were not considered suitable for this kind of work. We packed our way in and started to make our way for France. We set off on the Saturday and I was lucky in finding a bunk and being able to retire to bed. When I got up early the next morning, on a sea which I suppose was to be considered slight, but which was upsetting me, I noticed to my surprise we were heading westwards back past the Isle of Wight on our return to Portland Harbour. Apparently the invasion had been cancelled and we were told later it had, we hoped only been postponed. Back in harbour it happened to be Trinity Sunday, our ships were all together so I had an impromptu service on one of them and told my congregation that we should undoubtedly feel extremely frightened, this was entirely normal and nothing to be ashamed about, that we just had to keep our heads. I hoped that what I was saying was the truth. I had, of course, no means of knowing at all but my remarks went down quite well and next evening we sailed again. This time next morning the sea was still unpleasantly high and I’ve never woken up to a stranger spectacle: here we were, I should guess about two miles or three miles off Omaha beach in the weirdest and strangest collection of ships that I’ve ever hoped to see. A few regular warships, the rest were every conceivable kind of auxiliary vessel, large landing craft, small landing craft, the lot: sitting there completely unmolested from the air apparently out of range of the guns on the French coast just waiting for our change to go in and land. It was certainly a sight which I shall never forget. It was of course a miracle of a naval operation that everyone arrived apparently at the right place at the right time. And so we sat down to wait. The RAF officer commanding my unit had suffered very, very badly indeed from seasickness and asked me if I would mind taking his place on the first truck out while he would retire to the forth or fifth. I was quite prepared to do this, but of course it was long past 11 o’clock. As we were to know later, the American forces had an appalling time on Omaha Beach. The first wave of Americans 1st Division lost something like 90% casualties, and the ones that came after did not do very much better. The Texas Rangers performed prodigies of valour scaling the cliffs over on our right to silence the heavy guns only to find later that they were not actually manned. That was why we had not been molested at sea.

We were finally landed I suppose about half past six in the evening. We were fully prepared for this. One of the minor incidents which amused me and my fellows was we’d all been issue with American condoms, or French letters in order to preserve our watches and other valuables and I took the opportunity to seal a box of communion wafers in one of these things which served me well later on. It caused enormous amusement to my officer friends. So we went in. We were landed a fairly long way from the short in fairly deep water. We touch down and went ahead. The exhaust pipe protruded through the roof and somehow the engine kept going. Suddenly we went down into a deep hole – a covered shell hole – and had to get out as fast as we could. I got out and found I could stand on the bottom with the water just up to my chin, while my driver who was rather shorter than myself took my hand and he swam and I waded ashore together. I never think the English Channel is a good place to bath in the best of time but early in June it is still extremely cold and I felt extraordinarily cross.

The reason why the Americans had had such a bad time was almost immediately apparent. The under water defences had been pierced in only two places on our stretch of the beach. We landed opposite the cliff which now contains the enormous American cemetery. We made our way through these gaps in the wire – the wires were still very much in evidence – and collected on the beach wondering what we were supposed to do next. We certainly had no opportunity of proceeding eight miles inland. I managed to change my clothes and put on something dry before we were then picked up by an 88 millimetre firing from somewhere over the cliffs guided I presume by some spotter in a hole in the cliff face. In quarter of an hour we had lost all of our extremely valuable radar equipment and were not left with even a radio set to communicate our troubles to the people still at sea. So we then had to do our best. Just along the high water line was a long line of American wounded who managed to creep up above the high water line. Those who had not been able to do so had presumably been washed away by the tide.

We had with us a young very capable MO who had been plucked away from his honeymoon 3 days after his marriage to come and join us, and a very hard working medical orderly and they gave me one or two things to play with like a tourniquet and one or two little tubes of morphine to inject. Well we were plagued by that 80 88 millimetre. In fact in the end we had 25% casualties. We rushed up and down the beach one way or the other but we couldn’t get out of the range of the beastly thing. I thought we really had had it, I was giving myself up to an early grave and I must admit that most of my remarks on the previous Sunday to the congregation now felt rather thin. But it came to me very strongly indeed, almost as though a voice spoke in my ear that we must off that beach at all costs and take refuge under the shadow of the cliffs. So I went forward, found a suitable site in the 3rd house up on the left where there was an open courtyard. The few Germans ran away and apparently hid themselves in the house next door. This proved to be no trouble to us. And I then waved forward everybody I knew to get off that blasted beach – I use the word in its proper sense – as fast as we could. Technically I think I committed mutiny, though technically I think I made the proper choice. But somehow we got off the beach and got our wounded off too. And our Medical Officer and his orderly worked right on through the night tirelessly patching up our wounded and American wounded. I simply don’t know how they did it. I was of extremely little use. There were a number of people obviously in pain and making a great deal of fuss on the beach. I went to them and comforted them and then found that they were the people who survived whereas the people who were actually dying around me were the people who were not making any sound at all. A second time round I’d have known better what to do, but with no previous experience I don’t think I can be blamed for doing the wrong thing.

Somehow or other we got off the beach – an American bomber did come over us overnight and drop a few bombs and fortunately didn’t succeed in hitting anybody. And then rather like St Paul on a famous occasion we prayed for the dawn. Well when dawn came there wasn’t much relief; the night before an American Colonel and his Aide had come past our post complimenting us on what we were doing. I asked him whether we had much chance of surviving the night. He said he thought we would be alright as they were holding the enemy a quarter of a mile up, at the crossroads. It did not sound extremely reassuring but it was at any rate the best news we had.

Luckily we found a small American truck full of medical supplies that had got stranded in a ditch and we got a lot of valuable stuff for the use of our doctor. But it wasn’t until about 11 o’clock the next morning that a full medical team arrived and took over. Unfortunately through lack of communication the people at sea had no idea what was really going on at our end of the beach. It was a short experience, my own short experience of real warfare. I’ve no desire whatever to repeat it. In our recent Falklands battle I shared to the full the emotions of the people who went ashore. The night before we landed I must admit I spent a few hours of extraordinary disquiet and dismay and I wasn’t so afraid of being killed or even dangerously wounded. I was afraid of showing fear. What would have happened if my nerve had broken and I tried to run away? Of course in practice I needn’t have worried because there was nowhere to run to. I certainly had no intention of dashing back into the English Channel, and as I said before the only thing to do on an invasion beach is to go forward and get as close to the enemy as you possibly can. I say that with the benefit of hindsight.

We then moved next to a convenient field at the top of the cliff. We had of course lost all our possessions; this was my first experience of lying on the hard, hard ground – a situation which I never really got used to. At least you’re not interfered with. And as American and British forces had now joined up on the American left, the doctor decided to borrow a motorbike and give me a lift on the back. So we went over to the British sector to try and find a few essentials like a prayer book for me and some badly needed medical supplies for him. It wasn’t a very good motorcycle. The roads were full of nasty holes and I must admit it was something of a nightmare ride in which I hung on for dear life. But we were warmly welcomed by our British friends. I found I was the first RAF padre to get onto the shore of France beating my colleague Bishop Stanley Betts, as he later became, by half a day. He very kindly supplied me with what I needed and somehow we managed to get back again. And our radar equipment was still of course of no use but we too got another section of our unit to join us and life began in earnest. I never ceased to be surprised by the skill of people who watch a small radar screen in the middle of the night and steer an English night fighter to a German bomber. It was rather illuminating to find that by far the best people at it were the people who’d been trained on the stock exchange because they never look back, they cut their losses immediately. If the German bombers got past they didn’t worry about it, that was the task of the man behind them. They forgot all about it and concentrated entirely on watching for the next arrival. I’ve often found something of a parable in that. It is silly to look over your shoulder or to look back. Gradually as time went on we took up positions round the American sector. The Americans charged up toward Cherbourg attempting to take the port as quickly as possible and we followed them there. Finally as the only English C of E padre in the Cherbourg peninsula I found I had 17 little outposts to visit, most of which had bathing facilities and it was enormous fun to take a bed roll with me, have a nice hot …………. END OF SIDE ONE.

……….. had a very moving quality of their own. It taught me several lessons. It took me right out of the ordinary parish situation where most of the time one is dealing with very kind good natured women and so very rarely has much of an encounter with a man. Now I was dealing, apart from the occasional nurse, almost extremely with men and it was an extremely liberating, extremely interesting experience. I revised my values considerably. I never worried about what form a church service would take. If I erected a table in the middle of the field and laid out the wafers on the paten and the wind blew the wafers away, what did it matter? I just went to gather them up and continued as before. The small units welcomed a church service. There was no compulsion of course about church parades in these circumstances and I don’t know what one was giving, but one was certainly receiving a lot.

Apart from that life now became fairly uneventful as the war swept on and left us behind. We made one spirited attempt to be included. Our advance party rushed to Paris and set up its unit somewhere. They claimed afterwards they’d been kissed by these 300 French women. They were sort that I missed that particular episode. We followed them up later but we had disaster on the way as the oil had entirely leaked out of some vital part of the mechanism of our truck. We had to be rescued and towed to a small roadside American repair unit where we walked up to the first white people we saw only to discover that they were in fact German prisoners. The entire unit was black and I’ve never had a warmer welcome or a more refreshing reception. There was no trouble that they would not take for us. I realised for the first time the quite extraordinary outstanding qualities of some of the inhabitants of the southern states of America.

Then with something else to travel by, we made our way to Paris and I did one thing which I suppose I shouldn’t have done. I persuaded our Signals Officer and his car to make a small journey to the south of Paris to find an old friend of my wife’s who was married to a French Avocat at Melun. We tracked them to 3 separated addresses in the town only to find they’d been dispossessed on each occasion by the occupying Germans, and discovered they’d finally taken refuge at the famous chateau of Vaux Le Vicomte. So we turned up there and knocked lightly at the front door in our rather stained travel clothes only to be told by the butler that they were in fact living in an outbuilding on the edge of a main building. They were of course very glad to see us and said they’d had a very trying and difficult time but somehow they’d managed to survive. We had more of their eggs than we should have done but as I brought 400 cigarettes with me I felt that we had at least done something for them. After that we were recalled to England and disbanded as we were no further use to anybody. And our base defence had no BDS - which most people imagined stood for Bomb Disposal Squad and were inclined to enquire rather acidly why we were not disposing of bombs - was finally forgotten and given up and I was posted temporarily to the home base of our overseas Air Force at Thorney Island from which I made periodical trips to Brussels on the beer run to help out our colleagues in Belgium and Holland. I thought myself that they were extraordinarily well supplied on the cellars which the Germans had already taken over particularly in Brussels but it was nice to fraternise. I was soon summoned out of this retirement to go to another radar unit which was in Holland in a tiny place called Erp where we were settled in a small village. My particular billet was with two very old and very charming Dutch farm labourer and his wife with whom of course I had no real way of communicating except by signs although I persuaded my wife to send over the Dutch English dictionary from home. But at least when Christmas came we could sing O Come all ye Faithful in our respective languages and this at least they enjoyed. I don’t think I distinguished myself much there. I went to visit our Army liaison unit which was co-operating with the Army - which thought the time had come to have a sort of battle. Unfortunately when I got there fog had descended and there was nothing much to do except enjoy a pleasant game of battleships. Then on my way home my car ran into the back of a British tank which was retiring, slightly maimed, from this non battle. I then had to travel to the top of the tank feeling decidedly chilly into the neighbouring town of Helmond, knocked up the town mayor at 2am and demand a bed and was nearly arrested as a spy the next morning as I made my way to the telephone exchange and asked to be put through to my unit and rescued. It was one of the coldest winters that Holland has ever had.

Erp was in fact 4 feet, I believe, above sea level and I must admit that the cold was, I suppose, a bit too much to me. I went down with cystitis, a bug in my bladder. I had to be taken to hospital to Brussels and flew ignominiously home to an RAF hospital outside Swindon, where I was treated with the new wonder drug penicillin which meant a series of 6 injections a day for 18 days. I would have endured this more happily if a medical friend in the next bed had not assured me that to his knowledge it had been proved that penicillin had no effect whatsoever on the bug I from which I was suffering. In the end they took pity on me and set me off on a week’s sick leave with my wife. When I got back, thank God, the bug had gone. But they would not post me overseas again just yet. So I found myself at Fighter Command Bentley priory ?above? Stanmore from which the Battle of Britain had been more or less fought, although I think the chief credit goes to the Operations HQ at Uxbridge of number 11 Group. I enjoyed my time there although, once again, one seemed to be very remote from war. But I arrived there in time for the war in Europe to come to an end and one of my happiest recollections is taking my part in the victory parade of something like 4000 personnel which also coincided with the farewell to the AOC in C. I used the service for victory at sea to which I’d added land and air from the formal thanksgiving in the back of the old prayer book, a few suitable prayers and other prayers from that. I’m rather afraid that modern theologians who don’t like thanksgiving services would not have approved entirely, but we all felt such utter relief and thankfulness it wouldn’t have mattered very much what anybody would have said. But in its way it was a really great occasion.

As the war in the Far East came to an end not very long after, I was not shifted again and left to play out time till my own turn came to be demobbed. Life frankly became rather boring because so many people came and went there was no continuity of ministry that really mattered.

Life of course was full of small pastoral opportunities, from counselling the bereaved to trying to do something about personnel who had misbehaved themselves or started a baby at the wrong moment. It was pathetic to see that the girls that got caught were so often innocent, nice girls who badly needed companionship while the hard baked little so and sos who knew what precautions to take got away with it again and again. That’s just life all over. And so that was my goodbye to the RAF. I often wondered afterwards whether my very short experience of war, for which I was surprisingly awarded a military cross, I’m still not certain whether it was given for what I did not do in the air or failed to achieve on land. I felt that my wading in the English Channel really deserved a naval decoration rather that a military one. I did my best to refuse the gift for which I got very angry remonstrances. But I still maintain it is utterly foolish to award anybody an award for courage when he only does it just once. How was I to know that I should ever have proved to have shown the slightest courage again? Somebody told me at the time I walked up and down the beach as calmly as if I were walking up and down an aisle in a church, but that was simply due to the fact that I’m constitutionally lazy and entirely refuse to be hurried, least of all by the enemy. I don’t think it was right and I still don’t think so. I got my beautiful cross in the end by post because the poor King was now a great many months behind in his awards and I was very disappointed that I never actually went to Buck House.

I wondered sometimes whether I should feel any later repercussions for this very short episode in my life which seemed so extremely odd - it really didn’t seem to belong to me. A little bit of something curious which had been slipped in without my really appreciating that it happened. It only had one repercussion on one occasion about years later when I watched some film of the landings on the French coast and I found to my relief that I could watch it without stirring up any particular feelings at all. Now when I went to bed and was just dozing off to sleep in my old fashioned rectory which had a chimney and a fireplace, just as I was dozing off a shell came down the chimney, exploded in the fireplace. I jumped 2 inches and then had to laugh out loud for nearly five minutes because it was all so funny. But it wasn’t at the time.


Source: Royal Air Force Chaplaincy Services February 2007

 

Les, any idea where you were landed and stationed ?



SOURCE : The D-Day Thread - Military Photos

 

Les, any idea where you were landed and stationed ?



SOURCE : The D-Day Thread - Military Photos
Hi Phil
I was beginning to think I was the only one posting here.
I must apologise to everyone for mine being well in excess of one-liners, but that's the way you get more detail. I hope they're not beyond the concentration span of serious visitors:innocent: . I've another that I've been editing before posting, so need to get the say-so from the Canadian originator, 'cos it's just something he put together for his grandchildren with no intention of publication to a wider audience. And there's a shorter one that I'll post, possibly tomorrow.
But to answer your questions: Using your map, proceed in 10 o'clock direction from Vierville sur Mer beach exit D1. The US National Guard Memorial is sited there on top of the pillbox that commanded the West extremity of Omaha Beach and the exit is now tarmacced, as attachments that I took in 1987. I landed about 150 yds from there, in Sector Dog Green. We then passed up that exit and turned left at the crossroads. In just short of a mile from there we dispersed ourselves in a Calvados apple orchard in RHS of the left fork towards Les Moulins, just about were 'fire' appears above WN70. Shortly after this we returned to proceed West to the St Pere du Mont area, where we stayed for a while before moving up to St Pierre Eglise just before Cherbourg was taken. My Unit had been split into three Echelons (A, B, & C) in UK, for phased sailings and dispersal several weeks apart, as the battlefront developed. There were only about twenty of us in A Echelon, which was the first and only one to land on Omaha Beach. It's all covered on Page712 of Volume Four of 2nd Tactical Air Force, by C. Shores and C. Thomas, mentioned previously on this thread.
Les

 

Here are some reflections from an ex-member of 15082GCI who survived D-day but who, sadly, recently joined his comrades who didn't:-

1. God knows where we went after leaving the beach area, I can remember crawling up a lane with a machine gun pinning us down. Luckily a yank with a bazooka did the job in getting rid of him, we eventually got up to the top of the cliffs and assembled with the yanks on top of the cliffs where the Military Cemetery is now at St Laurent.

2. Re the Padre, I watched him moving from corpse to corpse collecting dog tags and giving the last rites to severely wounded, using with a stubby pencil to jot down the details on a tattered note pad. I’m not religious, but I felt that I was watching God at work. Cpl Middleton lost his life by driving ‘up and down’ the beach until he was shot up by heavy machine gun fire, he and Jock the Medical Orderly were using the jeep to get the wounded back to what little shelter there was, and saw so many of the lads and the yanks killed and wounded, all of our four B.D.S. lads were killed, later that evening while getting off the beach Stan Mallett, another lad took two Jerries, but Stan said that they threw down their rifles, as obviously they had had enough. I found out that Sgt Humble had been blinded and that Flt Lt “Hoppy” Highfields was killed as he landed.

3. The one surprise is what I call the mental distress that surges back to when I recall those harrowing days, it would be reasonable to suppose that after 60 years my attitude of mind of those times would be so deeply buried into my sub conscience, but they do surface occasionally but not as intense as they once were, these feelings of regret and sadness are with me still, there are not many days go by without some reflection of those brutal times.

Brutal times indeed! Those who are familiar with this thread will notice that I had already quoted part of (1), above, in an ealier post. The whole quotation is included here, with my own underscoring and emboldenment to highlight the significance of this part. This refers to the loss of Cpl Middleton and four "BDS lads".

It is certain that Cpl Middlton does not appear in the Geoff's list, that appears in Post 15 of this thread. Could he lie in one of the three Bayeux graves dedicated to "An Unknown Airman"? Checked with CWGC website 30.7.2009. His grave is recorded there.

 

Hi, i would just like to say hello all.
Just been given this website by daughter inlaw caroline. I have been reading DocterD's 1st post regarding unit G15082 unit. I would like to add that i was an LAC Radar Operator in unit G15074, there were 31 members in the unit which also landed on Omaha beach, finally on the 09/06/1944.

 

Hi Pappy and welcome.

Feel free too share any stories or pictures you have-This really has turned into a fascinating thread !

Cheers Andy

 

Hi Pappy and welcome. I was beginning to think that this had become a quiet corner.
Nice to meet another member of the D+3 club! I see that 15074GCI was accompanied by 5227J and 5317P MSU's, as part of 21 Base Defence Sector. Do you remember the significance of the J and P units and how they were equipped? Were they perhaps your transmitter and receiver Units. I have your location as O.363206 on 25 July 1944, but haven't yet worked out the meaningful co-ordinates. Woiuld be interesting if you could remember your locations as the front advanced.
I have recently been gathering and editing first hand testimonies from ex 15082GCI survivors and will soon be ready to post these here, if they are of wider interest.
Kindest regards
Les

 

Hi, i would just like to say hello all.
Just been given this website by daughter inlaw caroline. I have been reading DocterD's 1st post regarding unit G15082 unit. I would like to add that i was an LAC Radar Operator in unit G15074, there were 31 members in the unit which also landed on Omaha beach, finally on the 09/06/1944.

Welcome, Pappy. We look forward to hearing more about your experiences.

 

I am in the process of writing my memoires, and will post parts of these in the near future. These will include all the names of people ranks and places which I can remember.

Eric

 

I was 23 when I joined the RCAF in the spring of 1941. Having been flying light aircraft since 1936 I had offered my services for training as a pilot but, when I failed to meet the stringent eyesight requirements, I admitted that I had been interested making radios in college. The Recruiting Officer then offered me the opportunity of training for the Radio Direction Finding (RDF) Section of the RCAF.

I was then send to the University of Toronto for an intensive cramming course in radio technology which culminated in my passing all of the exams and emerging in the Autumn as a Leading Aircraftsman. Whereupon I found myself posted to England for further training at the RAF Signals School at Cranwell. Here I was introduced to the highly secret mysteries of RDF, which was to become known as RADAR, said to be an acronym for RAdio Direction And Ranging.

Further training was then undertaken in ground radar and the operation of CH (Chain Home) and CHL (Chain Home Low) equipment to qualify fully as a radar mechanic. My first posting was to a CHL site at Lisnaskea in Northern Ireland until the spring of 1942, which I was to find boring since the equipment never broke down. Having now been promoted to Corporal I was then moved to a new CHL Station at Aberleri close to Borth, in Wales. Here we provided cover against incoming enemy aircrafts flying between Liverpool and Birkenhead. Perhaps it is more significant that it was here that I met a young Scottish WAAF whom I subsequently married!

In early to mid 1943 the threat to Liverpool was decreasing and an opportunity came to join the Combined Operations section of the RAF when, as a Sergeant, I joined the newly created 15082 Mobile GCI Radar Unit. With the unit finally worked up operationally, we underwent intensive battle training at a coastal Combined Operations training establishment in the Scottish Highlands.

In 1944 the Americans had neither the technical equipment nor the trained personnel to maintain and operate the sophisticated radar for control of the skies over the landing beaches. It was therefore decided that the Royal Air Force Mobile Ground Control Interception units of the 2nd Tactical Air Force would accompany invasion troops during the initial landings in France to direct 2nd TAF Fighters to intercept and destroy identified hostile targets. It was decreed that 15082 Mobile Ground Control Installation would be attached to the first American assault troops on what historians would later identify as “Bloody Omaha”.

It was, after all, the largest amphibious attack operation ever undertaken, the Allies having landed about 160,000 troops in Normandy that day. Allied aircraft flew a total of 15,000 sorties. 900 gliders and 6,000 vessels were involved. Of the latter, 1,200 were combat ships and 4,000 were landing ships of all kinds. Thousands of merchant vessels provided stand-by. Total allied casualties were estimated to be 10,000, of which 2,500 were killed and the rest either missing or wounded. German casualties have been estimated as high as 9,000.

Several weeks earlier, during one of our briefing sessions, I was told that I would be driving the lead truck off LCT649, the first LCT to land. With this in mind, since my knowledge of trucks was minimal, I had assigned the lead MT Fitter to ride with me. If anything happened to my truck I wanted someone there who knew a lot more about internal combustion engines than I did. About two or three days before D-Day, the CO advised me that a “Boffin” (Scientist), Flight Lieutenant “Ned” Hitchcock, a tall thin New Zealander from 60 Group, would be riding with me it having been decreed that a top level Radar specialist should be with the unit.

I was not happy. Instead of having a knowledgeable mechanic, I was saddled with a “brain” who had no Combined Operations experience, knew nothing about wet landings and probably would have to be babied until I could get rid of him. My dream of having the Lead Fitter with me in the event of an emergency, evaporated. I needn’t have worried, for Ned was to do more than his fair share when the time came. During final briefing in Portland we were advised that there had been no change to our LCT leading the other four onto the beach at 0900 hours on D-Day.

After a false start from Gosport, due to the postponement of D-day for 24 hours, our four LCT’s braved the rough weather to rendez-vous on schedule in sight of Omaha Beach. A navy patrol craft, tossing about in the rough sea, came alongside, asked for our identification code number, and shouted “In you go then”. As we got closer it was evident that the beach was in a shambles. No control had been established, cleared areas had not been identified and exit routes were not marked. We were to learn later that the beach-master and his troops hadn’t even been landed. The beach was littered with debris, burned out vehicles and bodies. Anyone still alive was attempting to take cover behind or under whatever wreckage existed. The sky was lit up with shell bursts and the noise was eardrum shattering. It would have been impossible for us to go operational under such conditions, so we were ordered back to sea to stand by while naval guns pounded the shore.

By mid afternoon, not having heard otherwise, and since no other landings had taken place, we concluded that we probably would not be going ashore until the next day. However, around 4.00pm our coxswain advised us that the Senior Royal Air Force Officer, “Officer Commanding Troops”, had ordered us in. We headed for the beach. It was now low tide and beach obstacles laid by the Germans were fully exposed.

On approaching shore, it became clear that the whole landing area was still a disaster, not just the beach itself. Some vehicles were stranded on sand bars; others simply sank from sight as they drove off the ramp of the LCT’s. Those that were landed on sand bars dropped into shell craters several feet in the water as they moved forward. Others bogged down closer to the shore and, as the tide rose, were also submerged. When our 3-ton Bedford vehicle, housing a Diesel/Electric Generator unit for supplying a Type 11 Radar aerial array, left the landing craft it descended into water that was only two or three feet deep as we moved away from the landing craft. However, instead of the haul to the beach becoming easier, we too, had landed on a sand bar and the water became deeper as we proceeded, eventually flooding our engine even though being fully waterproofed.

All the time there was shelling and we could see the carnage on the beach. It was then we saw on the beach a lorry with a winch, maybe a Diamond T. Ned suggested he should wade ashore to pull out the cable from the winch to attach to the truck and have it towed in. Assuming that I would land without getting too wet, he gave me his camera, an official Leica, with which he had been taking pictures of anything of interest to 60 Group. The tide was now coming in fast and within a few minutes, the cab having filled with water, I forced the door open, still loaded with much of my equipment and the Boffin’s camera.

Although Ned had returned with the winch cable and had succeeded to attach it to our tow chain, by then the tide was rising so quickly that the water had come into the cab and had submerged the steering wheel. I had no alternative but to leave the lorry and swim for it. This was extremely difficult as I am not a great swimmer but am convinced that my life was saved by my gas mask case that combined with the buoyancy aid to provide extra flotation. Nevertheless I was at the absolute limit of my strength when I found myself within my depth and was able to stand. My exhaustion was due to the weight of the equipment I was carrying, including the precious Leica, combined with my sodden uniform. The tide had also swept me some 600 yards East of the original landing place. It was to be two days before I caught up with Ned again.

Upon struggling up the beach, that was being fired upon mainly with 88mm shells, mortars and single rifle fire, I don’t recall hearing or sensing any machine gun fire. The only member of my crew that I could see was a young Radar Operator, his left arm blown off, lying dead on the beach. A few days earlier he had told me that he was planning to open a jewellery store when he got back to Civvy Street. I dodged from one wrecked vehicle to another, working my way off the beach and over loose shingle into the lee of an overlapping earth shelf that provided some cover. The 8 or 9 men there were from the US Navy, US Engineers and US Rangers but mostly they were infantrymen. I looked back and couldn’t believe that, just a few minutes earlier, I had been in the middle of all that chaos. There were shattered trucks, debris of all sorts, German tank obstacles, and bodies – so many bodies! The whole front was being pounded by 88mm guns, heavy artillery and other assorted weaponry. I had lost all passage of time, even what day it was. Luckily, I had sustained no injuries.

Farther down the beach, a moving bulldozer appeared to be pushing some wreckage aside in an attempt to create an exit. The operator took a hit and tumbled off. Another combat engineer climbed up, moved the bulldozer a few feet and also took a hit. The bulldozer stopped. In glancing around at the assorted group of American Rangers and sailors that had hunkered down around me I noted that there didn’t seem to be any NCO’s or officers. In answer to the obvious question, I was told that rank insignia had been removed on board ship as information had been received that German snipers were picking off anyone who appeared to be in command. Nobody had told me about this rather disturbing problem and so, with all my stripes and golden crowns shining out for all to see, and whether I liked it or not, I was apparently in charge.

When a bullet bounced off a rock an inch or so from my right elbow, I scoured around the equipment and debris close at hand for a jacket to camouflage myself enough to hopefully confuse enemy snipers. An 88mm shell burst just behind us, spraying shrapnel in all directions. I jumped to my feet, grabbed a carbine lying nearby (my sten gun was lost in my struggle ashore), shouted “Let’s get out of here”, scrambled across the loose shingle, over the embankment, across some grass, and tumbled into a German slit trench that ran parallel to the beach, my rag tag group following close behind.

There was now considerable machine gun fire seemingly to be coming from farther to the west and, after a few minutes, having rallied my reluctant army, we climbed out of the trench, and zig zagged across gently rising terrain into another trench. It seemed that the Germans had built several connecting trenches between their gun emplacements and other strong points. As we stumbled into the second trench, firing indiscriminately at anything ahead of us, several German soldiers evacuated the far end, firing shots as they disappeared over the top. After a few minutes to get our breath, we climbed out of our second trench, zig-zagged a few more yards, attracting some small arms fire for our trouble, and slid into a third one. To our surprise, there were several more American Rangers in this trench, with their Lieutenant. In the course of our scurrying we had somehow lost four members and had mysteriously gained a medic from somewhere, as well as a Navy Petty Officer. As it was now quite dark and we had no place to go anyhow, the lieutenant suggested that we take a breather and settle down for the night.

Before doing so I took the precaution of sending a couple of the Rangers to explore our trench and they returned to advise that at the eastern end they had found a terrified French mother and her two children cowering in a corner. I immediately went forward, attempted in my broken French to calm them down, gave them some K Rations, that I had salvaged, to munch on and assured them that I would post a soldier to protect them. I’m not too sure whether they understood me or not but the children stopped whimpering when they found chocolate in the rations. I detailed one of the sailors, who, as luck would have it, had spent some time in France, to stay with them. I had no idea of where she had come from; nor any idea of what became or her or the children, as all three of them had gone by morning.

Sometime later we heard American voices nearby and the scout, who had been reconnoitring our trench to the West, returned to say he had come across several more Rangers there, and an American Captain. He said that the captain had received a signal to the effect that consideration was being given to abandoning the beach and suggested that we remain where we were until dawn; at which time, together with his men, we would attempt a break-out, either to make contact with the British on the eastern flank, or with the Americans, to the west on Utah Beach. We settled down where we were and, despite still being soaked, I dropped into an exhausted sleep.

Somebody shook my shoulders at what seemed a moment or two later, saying that it was almost daylight, and that the Captain, with his men had come to join us. I struggled awake and gathered together our group, which now numbered some twenty or so assorted personnel. The US Captain, who obviously knew much more than I did about such matters, detailed us into three platoons; one under the command of the Lieutenant, one under the Petty Officer and the third, despite my arguments over the paucity of my military knowledge, under me. Our task was to try and clear an orchard of snipers and other enemy resistance. Gradually, through fierce fighting and following the tactics directed by the Captain, we were able to advance through the orchard. It was during this advance that I stumbled across the lorries from 15082GCI, that were advancing into a field on the other side of this orchard. I was mightily relieved to see them.

It was only during the night of D+1, when I had a chance to talk with the other members of 15082 about their experiences, that I became aware of the serious casualties that my unit had suffered. These included our Main Control Officer, Flt Lt ‘Hoppy’ Highfield, whom I saw hit, and now learnt that he had subsequently died. Hoppy had acquired his nickname through a disability and it is a sign of his expertise that he should ever have been commissioned for Combined Operations service. Corporal Middleton was killed whilst driving a Jeep up and down the beach ferrying wounded to ‘safety’, as were ten other personnel. Amongst the 36 who were wounded was our Commanding Officer, Wing Commander Trollope and our Padre, with another who was reported as missing.

Fortunately we had an excellent Corporal who was in charge of catering called Tommy Spears and from somewhere, and with what equipment I have no idea, Tommy managed to cook a hot meal for us that night. D+2 was the first night that we actually slept in tents. I really don’t remember l leaving the assorted party of American servicemen with whom I had fought the Germans for the two previous days, nor have I any idea what happened to them; for, once the tents were erected, we had a huge amount of work to keep us occupied.

Although the Type 15 aerial array was basically intact there was still a lot of damage caused by shrapnel, water and other damage to repair. In spite of our drastically reduced resources, with the injured mostly having been shipped back to UK, I was fortunate in still having two very good Corporal Radar technicians. The concentrated mental effort that was needed to restore the equipment to operational condition with the least possible delay took our minds off what had gone on in the immediate past.

Reflecting later, I was struck by the feeling of desperate isolation, solitude and vulnerability I had experienced, during the two days I had been separated from the mutual support of my comrades. This sense of isolation was one of the worst parts of those two days. This was made even worse when the American Captain, on D+1, relayed the news that the overall Commander of the Omaha Beach operation, General Bradley, was considering that they may have to abandon the landings due to the casualties and set backs which the Omaha Beach operation was suffering. He was aware that survival was paramount but so many men had lost their rations, water, ammunition and weapons, and the fact that they were still being constantly shelled, made it a desperate predicament.

Our intended first operational site, close to St Pere du Mont, was originally selected before D-Day as a potentially good location for radar surveillance offering necessary prospect of uninterrupted vistas. However, as with all radar sites the exact spot to set up is very much for the Operations Officer or Technical Officer who, in our case, a Polish Officer called Effenberger. However, events had conspired to deny us this location as it was still in enemy hands; so, at the behest of an American General, our CO had agreed that we should use whatever equipment was to hand to become operational that night on the Point-du-Hoc, at which time we succeeded in directing the downing of two enemy aircraft. For, basically, we were tasked with closely following the advance of the front line to give ground interception cover against incoming enemy aircraft by guiding Allied fighter aircraft to their precise co-ordinates and altitude. Accordingly, following the arrival of replacement equipment on D+4 [depicted in an earlier posting on this thread] we moved off to our intended St Pere du Mont location to follow the advance of the battlefront and, through some mix-up, eventually to enter the suburbs of Paris ahead of the liberating forces, having gained the reputation of being one of the most successful GCI units in the RAF.

[Biographical note by DoctorD: Somewhat to his relief, being an admitted outspoken ‘Colonial’ who didn’t always see eye to eye with his C.O., whom he described as a ‘Regular” RAF Officer, he left 15082GCI around November 1944 and was posted back to UK. He was seconded to the RN to operate Naval ground radar installations in various parts of Scotland. Here, he didn’t like the ‘class distinction’ that prevailed in the RN and was glad to be demobbed for return to Canada in November 1945. He’s now living his retirement in British Columbia following a long and successful high-ranking career with Toronto Metropolitan Police. My researches reveal his award of the French Croix de Guerre!]

 

Continuing the account of the survivors, and of those other personnel of 15082GCI Radar unit who were not so lucky to survive D-day on Omaha Beach, this is an abridged and edited version of a previously confidential report put together one year later by the Chief Technical Officer (then Sqdn Ldr Norman Best) whose gallantry was rewarded with a Military Cross. My additions are in italics – apart from any minor corrections.

On D minus 11 Flight Lieutenant Hitchcock [who was killed] and I were called away from our comparatively peaceful contemplation of the back end of a G.C.I. panel at Headquarters 60 Group, to be told that on D-day we should be needed to go over the landing beaches. T.R.E. [RAF Telecommunications Research Establishment] had built extensive new Centimetre Mobile gear to operate with the Invasion Forces, and a Type 25 (AMES 15082) was already waiting to go over with the first wave. I was to be Technical Adviser of G.C.I. equipment, and Hitchcock on Electrical Engineering matters.

The convoy was forming at Camp D.2. in the American Marshalling Area near Poole, and on D minus 10, slightly out of breath, we reported there to Wing Commander Anderson who was the Senior Controller and Commanding Officer of the party. There were about 150 of us all told, among some 2,000 American invasion troops, and we had been brought in from various formations such as Fighter Command, 60 Group, the old 83 Group of T.A.F. and so on. Our principal task, it appeared, would be to give night cover to the American beach heads, with Mosquitoes coming out from England by way of the F.D.T. [Fighter Direction Tender] pool in mid-channel as described elsewhere.

Down at Portsmouth there was another formation similar to ours, No.24 B.D.S. with 15083 waiting to go over and do the same for the British beach heads about 25 miles from ours. They too were under an 85 Group Controller C.O., and included quite a few T.R.E. enthusiasts who had donned uniforms with Honorary Commissions, to see their job through.

It was now D minus 9, although we did not know it then, of course, and we spent our long working days checking waterproofing, building up spares, getting to know our new colleagues and learning the American language. The Yanks were very decent to us, and a pretty good waiting time was had by all. Once we managed to get a trip to 60 Group where we swanked around the Mess in our then still rather glamorous blue battle dress, and got the WAAF officers to make us detachable rank badges for our epaulettes. Officers did not wear rings for the actual landing -- it would have been inviting the too detailed attention of snipers, so something had to be carried which could easily be slipped on and off.

We got a thorough briefing in this waiting period, too. Maps were issued, and every detail of the job explained, including the precise spot on which we were to land, and the operational site we were to make for -- provided the Hun had been driven out.

On D minus 4, a Thursday afternoon, the whole camp received movement orders. We were not told where we were going or why, but we guessed. Excitement was intense, and there was an unmistakable feeling that this was “it”.
Friday at dawn the trek started, and from three o’clock in the morning troops and lorries, transports and tanks, rumbled away from Camp D.2. The Radar contingent, small by comparison with the rest, went away in three convoys, the first with Hitchcock at about 1000 hours and the last with Wing Commander Anderson and myself bringing up the rear with our Jeep at 1500. At the gate, American police gave us local maps and route forms, and told us to make for Portland, about thirty miles away.

We had to travel very slowly on account of the waterproofing of our vehicles, and even so, after fifteen miles a halt of one full hour was called to allow the engine to cool off. At Portland we scattered on to the beach and got a warm meal with an issue of “candies”, gum, and periodicals. It was a fine sunny evening, the bay was full of craft, among which we picked out several small American L.C.T’s carrying Part I and Part II of our unit, already sea-borne, and further out, in deep water, another of our old friends the Fighter Direction Tender.

The organisation was magnificent, and had been all along. Every move went to timetable and fitted in with every other move. Meals were issued just where and when they were needed; M-T and Waterproofing experts were now moving systematically along vetting every vehicle, and mobile tankers followed them filling up with P.O.L. [Petrol, Oil and Lubricants].

We, the third and final convoy of No. 21 B.D.S. had been allotted to a British L.C.T., and at nine o’clock we started running aboard. We finished at eleven. It was still light, there had been no hitches apart from a spot of obstinacy from the T.21 Ops vehicle – soon overcome with persuasion and a mobile crane, and we were very soon out in deep water, one more indistinguishable microcosm in the vastness of the invasion fleet. Five L.C.T’s were used altogether to take the 15082 convoy plus the first echelon of 21 B.D.S. Types11, 15 and 21 were in different craft. Our L.C.T. had a crew of six, two officers and four ratings, British and Australian. The skipper was Australian. They were all good types.

It seemed as though it must be the last few hours of D minus 1 now, but luck was not wholly with us, and before dawn the weather turned. Sailing was postponed, and for two days we stood out in the harbour rolling about, gossiping, dozing, reading, and denying the existence of such weaknesses as mal-de-mer. There were no sleeping quarters on the L.C.T., but there was a tiny mess and a galley. We fed all right, but slept in, on, or under our vehicles.

At 0300 hours on Monday, 5th June, the real start was made -- D minus 1. Twenty-four hours later we sighted the French coast. It was June 6th 1944 and the trip had been as uneventful as a cross-channel run any night of peace time. No attack had been made upon us from the sea or from the air. It was a tense and exciting moment. All around, as far as the eye could reach, were ships. The sea was alive with the tiny crawling things, like an army of soldier ants following their pre-determined and inviolable path. Quiet behind, a quiet night - but ahead of us was the battle.

Our beach was Omaha Red, and it was already being fiercely contested. German troops were in the low hills surrounding it, and German mortar shells were dropping in well directed patterns along the fringe of the sea. British and American Paratroops and Gliders had gone in some hours earlier and were already fighting for the roads and strategic points behind the German lines - at St. Mère Eglise, for instance, where they seized the road junction and stopped enemy supplies and reinforcements getting down to the beaches. Our air bombardment had been going on for twenty-four hours non stop. Several warships and monitors were pitching shells over us into the enemy lines, and the whole coastline seemed ablaze. But the Hun was hitting back. The beach was already littered with dead and wounded and the wrecked vehicles of our advanced Beach Engineering Party. It was going to be no walk over.

There were two American patrol boats strolling up and down inshore watching all this. Traffic cops afloat, with the unmistakable air of traffic cops, and they were controlling the shipping. We had had “landing tickets” issued to us on the other side; necessary documents no doubt -- no modern war can be fought without documents-- but the prospect of lining up somewhere and solemnly handing over tickets permitting us to invade in that holocaust was grimly funny, and gave rise to some ribaldry.

Nine o’clock, the first low tide was our zero hour, but as we drew in we were met with concentrated machine gun fire, and the patrol boats signalled us back. The beach was still in enemy hands, and we were to stand off about a mile until matters improved.

At five o’clock in the evening we tried again, and this time, with three other craft carrying small tanks and armoured cars, we made it. No one else did. Mortar and shell fire became more intense than ever, and not for another thirty-six hours, when the neighbouring beaches had linked up with us and cleared the Hun right out did anything else come ashore on Omaha Red.

The offloading went smoothly and according to plan. Down the ramp with engine racing, in low gear, a slight thump on the sea bottom and the steady seemingly interminable grind through three feet of water for some forty or fifty yards to dry land. The crane went off first, with a Corporal, an L.A.C. and the Wing Commander. I went next with the Lieutenant AFS in the Jeep and the rest of the convoy followed. We drove standing up remembering, as we had been taught, not to touch any controls except for the steering wheel. The beach obstacles, mostly concrete posts with mines fastened on top, were all exposed by the low tide and were easily avoided, the sea bottom was fairly level, we just prayed hard about the mortar shells and snipers, and eventually by the grace of those supernatural powers that watch over mobile Radar Gear, the entire Type 15 G.C.I. set up arrived safely on the beach, aerial transmitter, two diesels, crane, R-T [receiver and transmitter communication units], one Jeep and four Crossleys.

The Types 11 and 21 had not fared so well. One of their vessels had dropped its ramp on a concealed sandbank and after running out a few yards the vehicles had dropped, one after the other into eight or nine feet of water. The men clambered out and swam ashore, but it was hopeless at that time to try and get the vehicles out. We pulled out two the next day with the bulldozer, but lost the rest. The Type 11 aerial vehicle had to be blown up, as it became a danger to navigation. The Type 13 aerial vehicle went into a very deep hole and was never seen again.

But the Type 15 was ashore, and so were we. Whether we were any better off or were going to be of the slightest use to anybody was a very moot point. Further landings had already been abandoned and the beach was being carefully and systematically plastered square by square by the Hun. He fired accurately and he fired with intelligence. As soon as he had hit a vehicle and set it ablaze he left it. He was not going to waste his time doing the job twice over. The beach was not a healthy place – not by any means, and our immediate concern was to get off it and into the shelter of the little ravine that led away through the cliffs inland.

This was more easily agreed upon than done. The ravine was the only way out of the beach, and I freely admit to a sensation worse than the orthodox “sinking in the pit of the stomach” when we went up to investigate and found it blocked by a solid barrier of earth some five or six feet high.

The very first landing party of battle troops, the Beach Engineering Party, had been supposed to clear this obstacle with a bulldozer, but on account of the unexpectedly heavy opposition they had been wiped out almost to a man with their task unfinished.

What few other landings had been made beside ours now filled the beach. We were in line and good order right in front of the ravine blocked by the earth barrier, and American vehicles, many of them blazing, blocked us on both sides. No one could get away until we did, and the tide was coming in. When it was fully up, only a few yards of shingle would remain dry, and the Germans were still shelling.

We were trapped on Omaha Red in as helpless and desperate a position as any writer of imitation war thrillers could have imagined. Also we were suffering casualties. Our Wing Commander had been hit in the arm and leg, and others had been killed or wounded.

Some of us copied the Americans and dug foxholes. Some of us (myself included) thought that moving about upright was as safe as lying down static, and with our M.O. and one M.N.O. who did the most gallant work that day (ours were the only medicos on the beach – the others had been wiped out and reserves had not been able to land) we began to organise what comfort we could for the wounded and to get some co-operation from our American neighbours on a way out.

After half an hour – a lifetime of nightmare it seemed – we did at last find a working bulldozer with a driver, and got him up to the ravine. Here he bit into our earth barrier as nonchalantly as only a bulldozer can, and in a matter of minutes we were free and on the move. We got our vehicles off and up the valley into the quiet and comparative safety of a deserted village. Here we made an emergency casualty clearing station, and for the rest of the evening and most of the night went backwards and forwards to the beach collecting wounded. We ourselves had lost 12 men dead and 40 seriously injured. The Americans had suffered terribly and the beach, as night drew on, was strewn with dead so thick that it was impossible to move a vehicle without crushing bodies. I think four thousand troops landed altogether on Omaha Red, and that over half became casualties.

After a few hours sleep (we were dive bombed in our village about midnight by ten German planes – two of them were shot down by Ack Ack on the boats) we were about again at first light, and went back to the beach. No further landings were being made, although there were plenty of craft standing out at sea getting ready to come in. Some of our shelling and sniping was still going on, but we did a bit of salvaging and with the aid of our friend the bulldozer managed to pull out two diesel vehicles of the submerged type 11. One of ours had been hit – indeed all our vehicles had been more or less damaged on the beach, and standby diesels seemed very desirable additions to our convoy. We also salvaged the Type 14 aerial vehicle which had stuck in the sands and suffered from sea water damage.

The front line was said to be half a mile ahead of us, but some of the American troops unbottled from the beachhead, had now fought their way round to the West until they had linked up with our neighbouring beachhead. This positively ended our isolation and made us all feel a good deal better.

In the afternoon our convoy lined up and we left our village making East where, by the other beachhead, a transit camp had been formed and the landings were going well to schedule, complete with tickets, permission to invade and all.

We met an American General there, who had the Radar outlook all right. He wanted us to get on the air right away and showed us a flat field on the cliff overlooking the beachhead where we could set up. Our proper site, some six or seven miles inland, was still in German hands.

It was now the evening of D + 1 and that night we slept like logs. Our wounded had been cleared and taken back to England, we had the main part of convoy, safe but battered, a couple of spare diesels (waterlogged) and a site. 50 yards away one of the first emergency runways on what had been enemy territary, was being constructed.

D + 2 saw us lining up. No one knew whether our field was mined or not, so we found out ourselves by the childishly simple method of getting into a 3-ton GP vehicle and driving it furiously backwards and forwards over the field. The theory was that if we did find a mine it would blow the back of the vehicle off but not hurt us in the driving cab. This theory does not appear quite so tenable now as it did in the excitement of the moment, and 21 STU are not advised to take it into their curriculum. After amusing the onlookers in this way for several minutes our intrepid driver declared the field safe, and we ran the vehicles in. It was not a good site operationally and I do not think any of us expected real results there. It served very well as a test site, however, and gave us a chance to take stock, line up, check and mend. The gear and the vehicles were full of shrapnel holes, but with bits of wire, bootlaces and the usual impediment of friggery we got it going. Every now and again a party would break off and go down to our beach salvaging the more scientific pieces of makeshift from the wrecks there.

At 2200 on D + 3 we were on the air, and about the same time we heard from 9th USAAF that our proper site had been cleared and that we could move in.

S/Ldr. Trollope had taken our command of 21 BDS when Wing Commander Andrews got hit on landing, and with him I went out to Cricqueville where after talking to the 9th USAAF people we made a recce of our new site. The British and American fighting areas had met and merged, shelling and sniping around the beaches had ceased and the invasion was well and truly in hand. We had lost our RT but a replacement arrived on D + 4 and by lunch time of the same day our convoy was once more being lined up for duty. By nightfall we were on the air. Before morning we had shot down two Huns – the first GCI controlled interception from the American beach head.

After that, life became routine again – we might almost have been on some remote mobile site in England, except for the embarrassing welcome of the villagers every time we stirred out, and the novelty of American neighbours and American rations. On D + 7 new centimetre gear arrived from England to replace the Types11and 21 which had got drowned, and by D + 9 we were able to report that all was working according to the original plan and timetable. The Hun broke and melted almost before our eyes. 72 Wing arrived. The long trek began across Normandy – France – Germany, following an already beaten foe. But that is another story.

 

Thanks DoctorD. These accounts are very interesting. You're doing a great job collecting and sharing information about this episode.

 

DoctorD
Could this be some of "your lot"?
Noel
Hi Noel
Since my post on 26-06-09 I have found that the truck was a radio comms vehicle that arrived on D+4 to replace the one lost 15082 GCI on D-day.
Les

 

Thanks for that info DoctorD.
I have been researching the vehicles 15082GCI would likely have - were the Aerial vehicles on Austin K6 6x4 like this which I am told is a type 15?
Noel

 

D-Day on Queen’s Beach Red

An Australian's War from the Burma Road Retreat to the Normandy Beaches by Glen McBride, Prof. G McBride Jr., 1994


R.A.F. Beach Units http://www.rafbeachunits.info/

F/Lt Glen McBride RAAF, Landing Officer, 101 Beach Flight No. 1 R.A.F. Beach Squadron

Glen McBride was an Australian who had joined the R.A.F. in 1941. After service in Malaya, the Maldives, Burma, China and India he came to the UK at the end of 1943, hoping to participate in the coming invasion of North West Europe. After taking leave and effecting a transfer to the R.A.A.F. he spent a short period with No. 3 Embarkation Unit in Liverpool and No. 2 Embarkation Unit in Southampton. He was posted to No 1 R.A.F. Beach Unit in early March 1944 and assigned to No 101 Beach Section.

His arrival coincided with that of Flight Lieutenant J. N. Dobbin MC, posted from No. 4 Beach Unit. Dobbin, promoted to Squadron Leader, was placed in command of 101 Beach Section. Glen McBride was promoted to Flight Lieutenant and appointed Landing Officer. When 101 Beach Section commenced ‘Toughening Training’ on 19th April 1944, Glen McBride was given the additional role of Training Officer. Around this time, No. 1 Beach Unit was renamed No. 1 Beach Squadron and 101 Beach Section was renamed 101 Beach Flight.

The following extracts, dated ‘D Day 6.6.44’ are entries from the Operations Record Book of No 1 R.A.F. Beach Squadron:

Time - 0725 ‘H’ Hour D Day.
Summary of Events - Assault on Queen Roger Sector (OUISTREHAM to LION-SUR-MER by 8 Brigade, 3rd British Infantry Division supported by 185 and 9 Brigades and Nos. 5 and 6 Beach Groups. No. 1 R.A.F. Beach Squadron and No. 976 ‘B’ Balloon Squadron landing concurrently with Nos. 5 and 6 Beach Groups.

0925 - No. 101 R.A.F. Beach Flight and Nos. 50 and 53 ‘B’ Balloon Flights began to touch down at H plus 120 minutes.

Strong opposition from shore encountered, shell and mortar fire being heavy in addition to all types of small arms fire.

1055 - No. 287435 F/Lt G. McBride, RAAF, Landing Officer and 8 airmen touched down at H plus 210 minutes.

1115 - S/Ldr J. N. Dobbin MC and party in LCI touched down at H plus 230 minutes. The craft carrying this party was hit just below the water-line as it touched down on the beach - no R.A.F. casualties.

Glen McBride described in his memoirs what he did immediately after his landing:
"Our first job was to dig slit trenches, and it was only a matter of minutes before we had holes for ourselves in the soft sand. With me were my batman, Little, a W.O. from the Transport Section, one of the Squadron Leader's sergeants, and five Service police.

Once the slit trenches were dug I sent the W.O. to reccy a place where he could set up workshops, and told the Service Police and the sergeant to stay put while I reported to the Colonel. The Colonel told me that there was little I could do because the assaulting troops had not advanced far enough inland to allow a reconnaissance to be made for the Beach Maintenance Area."

The Colonel was Lieutenant-Colonel D. H. V. Board of the 5th Battalion, The King’s Regiment who was the commanding officer of No 5 Beach Group to which 101 Beach Flight were attached. Glen wrote, "This was the last time I saw Colonel Board. An hour later he was reported missing; his body was not found till next day." (Lieutenant-Colonel Board was killed by a German sniper.)

"I put my Service Police on traffic duty and looked around to see what I could do myself. Still lying on the beach, and as far back as the second lateral road, were hundreds of our wounded. A P.O.W. cage had been put up on the beach and a lot of Jerries had been herded into this. I borrowed eight of the Jerries and went in search of stretchers."

Glen and his group of German prisoners worked to recover the wounded for the best part of two hours and then he "handed the Jerries back to their guards and went in search of the Squadron Leader".

"The Jerries were a willing team," he said, "and hastened about their work, although I wasn’t even armed; I’d handed over all my packs and equipment to Little."

Part of a longer entry in the Squadron Operations Record Book timed at 1230 on D Day reads as follows:

Time 1230

Summary of Events

The M.T. Repair Section ‘A’ Echelon under No.364056 W/O T Hughes established an emergency Drowned Vehicle Park almost immediately and rendered great assistance to the Army Recovery Sections of REME.

The Landing Section under F/Lt G. McBride RAAF was fully occupied in assisting to restore order on the beaches and assisting the Army Beach Companies in clearing the beaches. F/Lt G. McBride and No. 644472 A/F/Sgt Fry H.C. being examples to all.

The R.A.F. Police Section under No. 510810 Sgt Frost F.J. took up traffic control duties immediately on the beach and road laterals, rendering invaluable service. No. 1007284 Cpl Thorman H.L. displaying great devotion to duty during this period.


Glen McBride was 43 years old when he landed in Normandy. When No 1 R.A.F. Beach Squadron returned to the UK at the end of August 1944 it was the end of Glen’s active service with the R.A.F. He returned to Australia via the USA early in 1945. (His son was also serving - as aircrew with the RAF)

SUPPLEMENT TO THE LONDON GAZETTE, 1 JANUARY, 1945

Air Ministry,1st January, 1945.

The KING has been graciously pleased to give orders for the publication of the names of the following personnel who have been mentioned in despatches:-

ROYAL AUSTRALIAN AIR FORCE

Acting Flight Lieutenant - G. McBRIDE (Aus.287435)



(As far as I can ascertain he was the first, or maybe second, Aussie serviceman to come ashore on D-Day)

 

Very interesting, Dave, and welcome to the forum

The Sectors, Queen and Roger, referred to were the most easterly of Sword which, itself, was the eastmost of the landing beaches, terminating at the west bank of the River Orme at Ouistreham, that provided canal access to Caen. The British 3rd Division, as well as the 1st East Riding Yeomanry of the 27th Armoured Brigade are mentioned on P.519 of Vol 2 of "D-day Then and Now", as being scheduled to arrive at 1255 hrs, but were delayed by an hour.
I can't vouch for McBride being the first Aussie serviceman to come ashore on D-day as there were quite a few "Colonials" amongst the RAF mobile signals and radar units that were spread amongst the various landing beaches. But does it really matter who was first? After all we were not entered for a race and the order of battle was dictated to follow the strategic plan, which was rather impersonal. They were all brave lads who, for the most part, were a bit apprehensive at being there anyway.

Noel: Glad to hear you're interested in researching the Radar vehicles. But sorry I can't be of much help. 3-ton QL Bedfords, 3-ton Austins, 3-ton Crossleys, 5-ton Thorneycrofts, and the odd Diamond T as well as 15 cwt Boxed Bedfords were about as far as my own unit's transport went. Not forgetting a water bowser, of course!

Les

 

As one who has spent much time posting on another forum and mostly garnering information over actively posting here, let me add to the praise of others here, a great personal and informative thread on a well sourced and informative site that never fails to surprise me.