Symphony in B-Flak

Second Movement: FRANCE

I. NORMANDY

ISIGNY

ON the 12th France was sighted and we weighed anchor at 1900 hours. It was D + 6. Somewhere ashore we presumed Capt. Beer (then Lt.) was waiting for us. He had left us at Stonehenge, and together with the Battalion Executive and other Battery Executives he had landed on D + 3 to make arrangements to facilitate our landing. On this night Lt. Schneider, S/Sgt. Eirich, T/3 Crouse and Pvts. Calabro and Williams with the assistance of an Engineer Shore Battalion took the Radar ashore at Omaha Beach, between Vierville-sur-Mer and St. Laurent-sur-Mer. They then proceeded to Transit Area No. 2 and contacted Capt. Beer. Because it was getting dark and the tide was rising fast, the remainder of us did not disembark until the following morning, D + 7.

Under cover of darkness Jerry came strafing and bombing. Shore antiaircraft batteries threw up a terrific barrage, recalling our own London action. Machine guns from the ships spoke with their sharp staccato, punctuated at intervals by the roar of their larger guns. Jerry was there again when dawn was just breaking, and we saw strafing planes for the first time. With the approach of light, however, the raiders left hurriedly.

Then we had an opportunity to study the most famous beach in the world. A fleet stretching to the horizon and beyond lay on all sides of us. Barrage balloons dotted the sky, lending a bizarre touch to the whole effect. Water obstacles such as mines, logs, and wreckage could be seen everywhere. Already the engineers had built a steel breakwater, and a graveyard of ships sunk with precision effectively served the same end.

The shoreline was seething with activity as men, bulldozers, and vehicles moved with a singleness of purpose. On shore we could see an occasionial explosion and the smoke arising from burning houses. It was truly in the most literal sense an unforgettable scene.

Morning brought with it the difficult task of unloading our equipiment without benefit of a dock. We were ordered to go ashore on Omaha Beach, just below Colieville-sur-Mer. We could now see clearly the appalling destruction wrought on the beach, although some semblance of order was being introduced. We saw our first French civilians, dazed and feebly waving. It was midafternoon when all the vehicles were unloaded and safely accounted for in one of the five Transit Areas.

In the transit Areas we had de-waterproofed our vehicles and guns as much as possible, and when all vehicles were assembled, we set forth on our 16-mile journey to our first position south of Isigny.

On this date Montebourg was captured and Carentan had just been taken. The Germans were still counter-attacking and the Allies were landing equipment by sky-trains of gliders on advance Normandy airstrips. The territory southeast of Isigny for several miles was firmly in our hands, but to the west the Germans were between us and the Vire River, scarcely two miles away.

We had just emplaced our equipment and were in the process of orientation when the unexpected happened. Artillery was pouring shells in our direction, and the command quickly came down, "March Order". Our position was untenable. Wisdom put a premium on haste, and within half an hour we were well on our way. We spent the night on the side of the road.

CARDONVILLE

We arose at daybreak and after a short delay were on our way to our new position north of Isigny near Cardonville. Fortunately it was a prepared position, so all the equipment was emplaced and completely revetted well before evening. In the late evening Col. Hopper told us that our mission was a pattern defense of the battle area, and he gave us a short "pep talk". His words were interrupted by an order to man the equipment. A few minutes later we saw smoke shells bursting in the air. The Germans used this method of guiding the Luftwaffe pilots. Many of us were apprehensive lest they be gas shells, until we were informed of their real purpose.

The firing that first night was light although numerous targets were picked up by the radar. Nevertheless the realization had finally come that this was IT, in no uncertain terms. The flak-torn sky, the steady drone of hostile aircraft, the intermittent flashes of dropped bombs or our own guns, the smell of gun powder -- all these vivified the imagination, and our emotions ran the gamut of surprise, courage, anger, and action. By morning we were tired physically as well as emotionally, and sleep was sweet indeed.

The next night firing was considerably heavier, but it was on the 16th that we reached our peak with 247 rounds fired. During our entire stay at Isigny, a total of 853 rounds was fired. On June 20 we were almost positive that we had our first kill. We submitted a formal claim, but we could not locate the wreckage, though we searched for hours between hedgerows and among the trees.

Life in the field was simple, almost crude. We lived in pup-tents pitched over fox holes. We ate either "C" or "1O-in-1" rations. For a good while there were no bathing or washing facilities except our general-purpose steel helmets and canteen water. Danger lurked everywhere with paratrooper-warnings circulating, snipers hidden everywhere, and fields on both sides of the roads loaded with mines. It was Ist Sgt. Guthrie who captured our first POW, an arrogant German flier. Consequently we were ever watchful, and several machine guns were placed between the hedgerows that are so numerous in Normandy.

Already the French civilians were eager to manifest their friendliness by offering us milk, eggs, and fruit. Those of us who never saw a word of French before soon learned to say, "Avez vous des oeufs?" and to many of us 'berets' and 'sabots' became a familiar sight.

CHERBOURG

On June 25 we left Cardonville in the evening. We travelled until early morning, but could not cover the 47 miles to our assigned posiition on account of the pockets of resistance which we encountered. We passed through Valognes which our troops had captured on the 19th and Montebourg which had fallen 6 days earlier. These towns had been battered into heaps of rubble, and what we could discern in total blackout presented an eerie picture. For the first time we were in territory so recently captured that dead cattle had not been disposed of, and human corpses had not received decent burial. Our stopping point was a German "88" position which had been shelled and bombed. We emplaced our equipment and spent a few hours "in the sack". Everything, including the paths and barracks, were built below the surface of the ground. It was a well-fortified position, and it certainly must have been hotly contested.

Before noon Capt. Klatte had reconnoitered a route around the pocket of German resistance, and we made our way towards our assigned position. The rain which had begun during the night was still falling. Sounds of artillery and machine gun fire were distinctly audible, and the further we travelled, the louder they became. We were in a zone of intense battle -- the battle for the port of Cherbourg. At this time our forces were fighting in the streets in the outskirts of the city, and not 1/3 of the city had been captured. It was June 26th, and by midnight our forces had captured the port and 2/3 of the city. The port and the entire city formally surrendered the following day. Our site was a very impressive one, since we were situated near Bretteville and Pte. du Heu on a high hill overlooking the port and the city of Cherbourg which we were to protect. In the bay were small, well fortified islets connected to the mainland by narrow bridge~paths - Fort de l'Ouest, Fort Central, Fort de l'Est, and the Ile Pelee with its fort. From our grandstand seat with its unexcelled view we could see the fires raging in the city itself and the heavy shelling and bombing which our artillery and divebombing Thunderbolts were giving these forts. We had requested permission to fire on these forts ourselves, but when we saw that heavier equipment than ours was being employed against them, we understood why we were refused.

The forts put up stubborn resistance, and their 88's returned the artillery fire and gave our ships a shelling. As a daring gesture a number of German E-boats even speeded out into the Channel to torpedo our ships, but our destroyers and torpedo boats were on hand to repulse them. Finally, the action on the islets gradually died off, and this led us to believe that they were surrendering. The city itself, however, continued to flame for several days, and the fierce machine gun and artillery action around us did not cease for some time.

Probably on account of the overcast the Luftwaffe did not put in a strong appearance. The big guns expended 80 rounds at this position.

ST. HONORINE

At 0800 hours on June 29th, before our pits were completely revetted, we received March Order. The 217th, whose landing on the beach had been delayed, had finally arrived to assume their proper mission. We were assigned to protect our ships and the beach installations, and set out for St. Honorine, 53 miles distant. Fortunately, setting up the Battery there was relatively easy, since the revetments had already been built by the outfit we were relieving.

The atmosphere of the position was quite depressing at first on account of the constant rain, but when the sunshine reappeared, our spirits rose. On the 4th of July the Allies had a special celebration. General Bradley ordered every piece of artillery to fire a shell at its specific target at precisely 1200 hours. We pleaded to fire but were reminded that our specific target was German planes, and none were in sight.

The most heartening news for us, however, was the arrival of the "Residue" on July 5th. At Stonehenge the Battery had been divided into two sections. To obtain maximum economy in shipping space only the personnel and materiel absolutely essential for successful operation of the Battery left Stonehenge on June 8. The rest of the men, called the Residue, left with their equipment on June 30 for a place two miles north of Falmouth via Exeter. Eventually they boarded the Liberty Ship "James B. Weaver" at the Falmouth POE. On July 2nd they sailed. Corvettes of the Royal Navy staved off two submarine attacks on their way to Omaha Beach. On July 5th they disembarked and came directly to the Battery. It was indeed a warm reunion.

At this time we received an indication of the intensity of the battle for Caen. From the ocean came the thunder of the 16-inch guns of the HMS Rodney shelling the city. A fleet of Lancasters also flew over in staggered formation, and for the first time we saw the German ack-ack open up. Caen fell on July 9th. It was said that German troop concentration in the Caen sector was the densest that had been hitherto experienced either in World War I or in this war. Our own Battery's firing was rather light during our stay, only 178 rounds being expended by the big guns. It was here, though, that the machine gunners had their first opportunity to fire, and 138 rounds were spent on a low-flying German fighter one morning.

Since we were close to the beach, our stay was, in the main, uneventful. The shelling, ack-ack, and the bobbing barrage balloons served as a constant reminder of our confined situation. Some men from another battery were injured by a mine; this increased our caution.

CARENTAN

Finally March Order was given to us on the 12th of July. We were replaced by a semi-mobile outfit which had just arrived from shooting down "buzz" bombs in England. Our destination was Carentan, 27 miles, and we took up our position west of the city. We set up in pits dug by our advance party with the help of some engineers and a bull-dozer. It was a pleasant position with green fields all around us and the mud conspicuously missing. In fact, to characterise our stay in this position as the most enjoyable thus far in France would not be wrong.

For the first time the kitchen was preparing class B rations daily, a welcome relief from all the C's and K's we had been receiving. We saw our first movie in France at the small barn next to our position. The laundry service was made available to us through a French woman who lived nearby, and the price was quite low considering the amount of clothes we had, although we had to furnish the soap, which the French valued very highly. For the first time we were able to spend the French invasion currency, and it was not very difficult to learn how to use it, because the franc had been stabilized at 2c.

There was sufficient activity at this time to keep us on our toes. The Germans were pouring artillery intermittently on the Carentan bridge. For 90mm AA fire we fired only 107 rounds, but this small amount was off-set by the 334 rounds we fired in support of the field artillery.

Our target was the town of Periers, and the road leading from Periers to St. Lo. Reports indicated that the mission was successful, and later when we passed through the city on convoy, we could see the effects of our shelling. It was encouraging to know that we were aiding the doughboys directly. It was here too that we saw our first daylight raiders. Some ME-109's flew over one day and the machine guns and 90's opened up on them. The gunners fired several rounds by independent gun commander's action, and this alone served to ward the planes off. The machine gunners had their first real firing experience here and 1063 rounds were expended.

Many little incidents stand out to remind us of Carentan. Those games of "Ghost" at night in which the loser went to get the coffee turned out to be hilarious sessions. Once some of the fellows were caught firing their rifles and duly punished. Then too the irrepressible "chow-hounds" pilfered all the emergency rations little by little, to everyone else's discomfort (as the argument goes, a stomach has no conscience). Here also we encountered the dreaded inspections on a moderate scale. Latrine boxes were built, and we had paths staked out with white markers. Mutterings about "chicken" were frequent, but there was neither insurrection nor mutiny. A B-24, manned by British personnel, crashed one evening in a swampy area nearby, and, fortunately, several of the crew members survived.

Then came what may be considered the turning point of the war on the Peninsula. On the 25th was the famous 2500-plane saturation raid on a small sector of German held territory, and a segment of the St. Lo-Periers road. The German AA fire was plainly visible. Later we heard that the great American breakthrough had begun to roll. On the 28th Coutances was captured. On July 31st Avranches was occupied. On Aug. 2nd we were in Avranches.