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Details of a U.S. military map of the D-Day plans.
Full resolution available at Wikipedia.
We continued visiting sites toward the east, along the British and Canadian landing beaches of Gold, Juno, and Sword, and inland toward the city of Caen. It meant for full days, but there excellent highways south from Sainte-Mère-Église and then an east-west freeway making it easy to keep our base in Sainte-Mère-Église and do all this as day trips.
While the U.S. 82nd and 101st Airborne divisions were landing along the west flank, and the Free French paratroopers operating with the British Special Air Service were landing in Brittany to prevent reinforcement from German forces there, British and Canadian airborne infantry parachuted and landed gliders in this eastern flank area. This eastern airborne operation was designated Operation Tonga.
The area east of the landing beaches was an open flat plain between the Orne River and the Dives River. The terrain plus the transportation infrastructure would allow counterattacks all along the landing zones by German armored forces, unless the river crossings could be captured or destroyed. Ideally captured and held, so they could be used by the Allied forces to break out of the landing zones and advance inland.
Between the city of Caen and the coast, just one pair of bridges crossed the closely parallel Orne River and Caen Canal. This was near Bénouville and Ranville, about 7 km from the coast. Elements of the British 6th Airborne Division, accompanied by the 1st Canadian Parachute Battalion, was tasked with capturing that bridge across the Ornes, destroying five bridges across the Dives River, and destroying a German artillery battery at Merville.
While German counterattacks led to continued fighting and casualties, the landings started just after midnight on 5/6 June and all objectives were accomplished by the end of the 6th.
In the days following the 6th, enormous temporary harbors were constructed from prefabricated units towed across the Channel and assembled into artificial ports.
Arromanches-les-Bains, or simply Arromanches, is roughly north of Bayeux and on Gold Beach. It was the site of one of the "Mulberry" artificial harbors, eventually known as Port Winston, and the one of the two Mulberry harbors used the longest. It was constructed and in operation by 9 June, just the third day after the landing started. While it was only designed for three months of operation, it remained in operation for ten months, eight of those seeing very heavy use. 2,500,000 men, 500,000 vehicles, and 4,000,000 tons of supplies were landed at Port Winston.
A similar artificial harbor was built at Omaha Beach, but it was not securely anchored and was destroyed in storms in late June after just a few weeks of operation.
The bay and harbor at Arromanches. Mulberry harbor components are visible in the bay. |
Two Mulberry artificial harbor components at Arromanches. |
The Mulberries were prefabricated in large sections in Britain. 600,000 tons of concrete were needed to build one harbor, producing 33 jetties with 15 kilometers of floating roadway for trucks to transport men and materiel onto shore and inland. They had an unusual nomenclature.
Breakwaters were also needed. Some of these were constructed from "Corn Cobs", ships that were scuttled after crossing the Channel under tow or under their own power. An assembly of these Corn Cobs and the sheltered water they enclosed was called a "Gooseberry".
An entire Mulberry harbor consisted of:
The resulting structure was a harbor similar to that of Dover, one of Britain's major ports. "Mulberry A" was partially constructed at Omaha Beach but heavily damaged in the storms of late June. "Mulberry B" was constructed at Arromanches, initially intended for use by British and Canadian forces but also used by the Americans.
See the Wikipedia page for more details and pictures from when they were in use.
Longues-sur-Mer is a small village near the edge of the very high bluffs just west of Arromanches. The high of the bluffs there make it a poor place for a landing, it was between the American Omaha Beach and the British Gold Beach. But that height makes it an excellent place for artillery and gun control observation posts, and that is what the Germans had placed there.
Clifftop German battery overlooking Arromanches, near Longues-sur-Mer.
There were four 150 mm naval guns in large reinforced concrete casemates, a fortified observation bunker near the edge of the bluff, plus command and logistical fortifications.
Allied bombing missions dropped a lot of ordnance on the site overnight on 5/6 June, and then the French cruiser Georges Lygues and the U.S. battleship Arkansas opened fire on it with their heavy guns at 0537. The German battery opened fire at 0605, 25 minutes before H-Hour. The British cruisers Ajax and Argonaut disabled three of the four guns, although the remaining one operated intermittently until that evening. The British 231st Infantry Brigade captured the site on the 7th.
Breech and damaged controls of 150 mm gun.
Muzzle of 150 mm gun.
A relatively undamaged casemate.
Observation bunker with two horizontal viewing slits.
The view east toward Arromanches.
The view west toward Omaha Beach.
The observation post at Longues-sur-Mer looks down on the bay at Arromanches, and from that high vantage point you can see more of the surviving Mulberry harbor components. Omaha Beach is visible in the other direction.
German military graffiti.
American military graffiti.
Some German military graffiti has been been preserved, where the Germans had cast decorative patterns into the surface of some of their fortifications.
I couldn't help noticing that the theme differed significantly from the American graffiti found in the concrete hanger at Écausseville.
I think that the French had also noticed and appreciated the difference, and maybe that's why they preserved both.
Menhir near Colombiers-sur-Seulles.
After several days in Normandy it was time to move toward Belgium. East from Sainte-Mère-Église one last time, through Bayeux and its commemoration of the Norman Invasion of Britain in 1066. Along the way we saw a few things from long before 1944 or 1066.
Tim points at a megalith as the cows say meuh.
France has a lot of megalithic structures surviving from the Neolithic and Chalcolithic eras, so 4500-1500 BC. This one above is a simple menhir or single standing stone, just outside the village of Colombiers-sur-Seulles along the D12/D176/D35 road from Bayeux to Douvres-la-Délivrande.
Megalithic era dwelling near Reviers. |
Megalithic passage grave structure near Reviers. |
Art Nouveau architecture in Douvres-la-Délivrande.
Just a little further east, near Reviers, is a small roadside park around remains of larger megalithic structures. There is the lower stone section of a dwelling, similar in some ways but smaller and simpler than those at the settlement of Skara Brae in the Orkney Islands. Also, what might be a passage grave. We happened to stop there while a local group was preparing for "Megalithic Weekend", when sites throughout France host special displays.
I have a page with other megalithic travel ideas if you're interested in really old things.
Tim inspects the reconstruction of a megalithic era shelter.
We continued to Douvres-la-Délivrande and got lunch, then continued on toward Pegasus Bridge.
British cemetery.
We visited a small British cemetery near Douvres-la-Délivrande. The Allied cemeteries are clearly indicated on the Michelin 1:150,000 maps and also on the finer-scale IGN maps.
The grave stones are of uniform shape, but the design and inscription on each is unique. The families have also planted various flowering plants and small shrubs around each stone, and local committees proudly maintain the graves.
Pegasus Bridge, over the Caen Canal. The tower is staffed by operators who open the bridge for canal traffic.
Operation Tonga was the British and Canadian airborne operations just inland along the eastern flank of the landing beaches. One of its main objectives was the capture of a pair of bridges over the Orne River and the parallel Caen Canal, near the village of Bénouville. This was called the Bénouville Bridge at the time, but it has since been known as Pegasus Bridge after the winged horse insignia of the British forces.
Pegasus Bridge and the former home of the Gondrée family, the first home liberated in the D-Day landings. A young daughter at the time now runs the café in the house.
The bridge now known as Pegasus is a rolling bascule bridge. It spans the narrow Caen Canal, and so it must be easily opened to allow canal traffic to pass.
The bridge now known as Horsa Bridge, named for the Horsa gliders in which the men arrived, spans the Orne River a few hundred meters to the east.
This pair of bridges was crucial — if not captured, the Germans could use them to counter-attack the Allied forces. But destroying them would deny their use in an Allied break-out from the landing areas.
Traffic on the Pegasus Bridge.
At 22:56 on the night of 5/6 June, six Handley Page Halifax heavy bombers took off from a British airfield towing one Horsa glider each. An assault force of 181 men were in those gliders. At 00:16 on the morning of 6 June, these Horsa gliders landed in a swampy area just 40 meters away from one end of Pegasus bridge.
The landings were more like barely-controlled crashes. The gliders were released from their towing bombers and descended for about eight minutes, deploying a parachute from the rear of the glider shortly before landing to slow its speed. The first glider struck an earthen bank, throwing the pilot and co-pilot through the windscreen and stunning their passengers. The second glider landed sixty seconds later, swerving at the last second to avoid the first and breaking in two as a result. The third landed another sixty seconds later, skidding into a pond.
The Germans thought that the noise came from a bomber crashing in the distance, and they were surprised when the British had formed up and attacked. Meanwhile two other gliders had landed near the other bridge. The sixth glider had been released off-target after the pilot of its towing bomber mistook the River Dives for the River Orne, and it landed 13 kilometers from its target. Despite the reduced force, the British captured both bridges within 15 minutes, in the process losing the first two men killed in the D-Day landings.
Pegasus Bridge mechanism.
Pegasus Bridge mechanism.
You can see why it's called a rolling bascule bridge. A large partial wheel engages a cog strip to pivot the bridge up out of the way of canal traffic. A large concrete-filled counterweight box above helps to lift the spen.
Pegasus Bridge.
The picture at left shows the bridge from the area where the Horsa gliders landed.
Pegasus Bridge as seen on a postcard.
That's what happened at Pegasus Bridge in June 1944. As for the bridge itself....
The original bridge was replaced in 1994 with one about 50% larger, in order to handle the increased traffic. This was controversial, as the local people needed better infrastructure but they didn't want to lose the memorial to the events of 1944. So the replacement was built to the same design, just scaled up. And the original bridge was moved to a nearby memorial park, seen from above in this scan of a postcard.
There's a museum, in the red-roofed building, and a fenced in park where you can walk across the original bridge and see a restored Horsa glider.
The Gondrée family home is at upper right, just beyond the lifting end of the new bridge. The gliders crash-landed in the swampy area between the bridge mechanism and the small pond at upper left.
The original Pegasus Bridge. |
A restored Horsa glider, with the original Pegasus Bridge in the background. |
Normandy — Visiting the D-Day Sites
Are you interested in using any of my pictures? I have high-resolution versions of all of the pictures on these pages. Contact me if you are interested in using any. The answer is generally "yes" as long as I get credit and a copy of the result.
Other Related Pages
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