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The Battle of Mortain by Keith Rocco
As the Allied forces worked to break out of Normandy, the 2d Battalion, 120th Infantry, dug in north of Mortain near Hill 314, found themselves surrounded by the German counteroffensive Operation Lüttich on August 7th. Suffering serious casualties, the Battalion held off attempts to break their position until relieved on the 12th, sustained by resupply by air through the week.
(National Guard)
With barrage balloons against enemy aircraft flying overhead, a long line of LCts is crossing the English Channel, bringing men and material to the beachheads in France, during the Allied invasion of the Normandy, June 13, 1944. (AP Photo/Irvin Bede)
Portulan de la portion de la côte du Brésil entre l’Amazone et le Rio San Francisco - Jacques de Vau de Claye
Jacques de Vau de Claye was a cartograph from the Renaissance. He worked with the cartography school of Dieppe. He’s known for his very detailed maps of Brazil’s coasts
Dégâts causés par une mine à l’est de Saint-Lô, le 20 juillet 1944.
13 millions of mines were destroyed or taken away in France between 1944 and 1946. In Normandy, two months after the Allies landing, a unity from the Gendarmerie was already working on cleaning the region from the mines (they dealt with more than 60 000 mines between Septembre 1944 and October 1945
Plan du Havre de 1530
The name Le Havre simply means the harbour or the port. Le Havre was founded as a new port by royal command, partly to replace the historic harbours of Harfleur and Honfleur which had become increasingly impractical due to silting-up. The city was founded in 1517, when it was named Franciscopolis after Francis I of France, and subsequently named Le Havre-de-Grâce (“Harbour of Grace”) after an existing chapel of Notre-Dame-de-Grâce (“our Lady of Grace”).
Eight decorated servicemen died when the MK III Lancaster was attacked by a Luftwaffe ace during a dawn raid on German gun emplacements in Normandy on June 6, 1944.
None of their bodies were found and the plane lay undiscovered for nearly 70 years until the wreckage was pinpointed by British aviation archaeologist Tony Graves.
He was first taken to the site by a group of French locals who had seen a wheel sticking out of the earth.
A local metal detector later found a mangled ring in a nearby marsh which bore the initials ‘AC’ and the engraved inscription ‘Love Vera’.
Mr Graves later discovered the AC referred to ‘Albert Chambers’ who wed Vera Grubb, 21, at St Giles’ Church, Normanton near Derby, in October 1943, eight months before he died on D-Day. Read more.
Check out what I did today! - I still don’t know what her name is… her call is LST-325.
CLARKSVILLE, TENN. — History buffs and military enthusiasts alike will be flocking to McGregor Park this September for a rare opportunity to see a unique World War II relic and experience a piece of military history firsthand. On Sept. 26-30, the LST-325 will be docked in Clarksville and available for tours.
An LST (Landing Ship, Tank) is an amphibious vessel with roots dating back to the Second World War. Its one-of-a-kind design allows the ship to land battle-ready tanks, troops and supplies directly onto enemy shores. LSTs were extremely useful during times of war and peace. LST-325 was used in Operation HUSKY; D-Day Invasion, Omaha Beach, France; Belfast, Ireland, and arctic operations in the 1950s. After decades of service, this ship was transferred to Greece and served in the Greek Navy as well. In 2000, the USS LST Ship Memorial Inc. acquired the vessel, bringing her eventually to her current home in Evansville, Ind.
Currently, the ship serves as a museum and memorial ship for the men who bravely served their country aboard LSTs. While in Clarksville Sept. 26-30, the LST-325 will be open for self-guided tours. Each tour will take approximately 45 minutes and will include a walk around the entire ship (including areas with stairs). Ship personnel will be on hand to answer questions. Photographs are welcome and encouraged.
The ship will be open at 9 a.m. on Sept. 26, and the last tour will begin at 5 p.m. Admission prices are $10 for adults, $5 for children 6-17 and 5 and under are free. Families can get a pass for $20, good for two adults and two minor children.
Parking is available north of the boat ramp at the River Center. However, handicap parking will be available at the boat ramp. School groups may unload their buses at the ramp. The McGregor Park boat ramp will be closed to other boaters for the duration of the LST’s stay.
School groups interested in visiting are strongly encouraged to contact Doug Barber for information on special rates and to reserve a time slot. All school groups will receive a guided tour throughout the ship. Group leaders can contact Barber at 931-245-4343 or email[email protected]. This would be a great field trip opportunity for JROTC programs, homeschool groups and Boy Scouts or Girl Scouts too.
For more information on the LST memorial program, please visitwww.lstmemorial.org. For more information on the LST-325’s visit to Clarksville Sept. 26-30, please contact Barber at 931-245-4346 or email [email protected].
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/2012/08/18/dieppe-macmillan.html
Veterans remember the horror of a botched invasion 70 years later
By Ann MacMillan, CBC News
Posted: Aug 19, 2012 5:48 AM ET
Last Updated: Aug 19, 2012 5:19 PM ET
Canada Memorial Square Dieppe (Ann MacMillan/CBC)
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When Sgt. David Hart of the Royal Canadian Corps Second Divisional Signals was told he was going on another exercise on Aug. 18, 1942, he was not impressed.
He had been in Britain for two years waiting to go into action, but all he and a lot of other Canadians had done to date was training and exercises.
Hart left his camp at Slindon in Surrey on a bus that took a circuitous route to Newhaven on the south coast of England. When the commanding officer told him and his fellow soldiers they were headed on an important mission to France, they cheered: At last, a chance to fight.
Canadian veteran Roy Wosniak, who attended ceremonies in Dieppe, witnessed the carnage from above 70 years ago as pilot who flew two sorties over the area. (Ann MacMillan/CBC)
They crossed the channel on Royal Navy ships under cover of darkness and arrived off the German occupied port of Dieppe around 4 a.m. on Aug. 19. Hart was put on a landing craft with a radio set, ready to handle communications. Sitting a few metres from shore he witnessed the carnage as tanks and Canadian soldiers tried to carry out the raid on the heavily fortified port.
The statistics are horrifying.
Of the nearly 5,000 Canadians who participated in the raid, 913 were killed, while about 3,300 others were wounded or taken prisoner. The Royal Armoured Corps and Royal Canadian Air Force lost 119 aircraft with 62 casualities.
Hart remembered seeing soldiers huddled under a sea wall being cut down by German gunfire from the surrounding cliffs. He said the stones on the beach turned red with blood.
He saw bodies floating past his craft and tanks, unable to move up the stony beach, erupt in flames.
Raymond Gilbert, a gunner in one of the tanks, remembers stones jamming the tank’s tracks and being “a sitting duck.” He was forced to surrender and ended up in a POW camp.
The Canadian War Cemetery near Dieppe (Ann MacMillan/CBC)
Roy Wozniak witnessed the carnage from above. The pilot with RCAF 16 Squadron who flew two sorties over Dieppe remains haunted by the fact he was not told to attack the German gun positions that were causing such mayhem to Canadians on the beach.
Wozniak said his orders came from England, not from the men on the ground, and they were to protect the Royal Navy ships that would carry the troops back to England.
The attack was supposed to be a top secret invasion, but the Germans had noticed increased British radio signals around the time of the raid and French double agents had warned them of a likely invasion.
Air surveillance by the Allies failed to notice German gun positions dug into the cliffs around the port. The stony beach was deemed suitable to land tanks. That intelligence was gleaned from photographs taken by British holiday makers before the war.
Canadian military personnel commemorate the 70th anniversary of the Dieppe raid in northern France. (Ann MacMillan/CBC)
Naval destroyers tried to support the troops with their guns but it was not adequate.
Major-General J.H. Roberts, commander of the 2nd Canadian Infantry Division, led the invasion, but his view was obscured by a smoke screen laid down to protect the landings. Signals were misinterpreted and two reserve units were sent in by mistake.
Hart remembers shouting into his radio that the reserves should not be sent in, but he said he was told it was too late.
The debate about whom to blame for the disaster at Dieppe and the goal of the invasion continues to this day.
After the war, Winston Churchill, the British prime minister, said “the results justified the heavy cost” and that “it was a Canadian contribution of greatest significance to final victory.”
Lessons learned put to use in Normandy
Lord Louis Mountbatten, Churchill’s chief of combined operations who was in overall charge of the raid, said the lessons learned were put to good use later in war, particularly in the planning for the D-Day landings. He later said: “I have no doubt that the Battle of Normandy was won on the beaches of Dieppe. For every man who died in Dieppe at least 10 more must have been spared in Normandy in 1944.”
Hart, now 95, knows things went terribly wrong at Dieppe, but refuses to blame anyone. He says he was proud to be part of the first major Canadian operation in the Second World War and felt obliged to return to Dieppe this year for the 70th anniversary of the raid.
Memorials to mark the anniversary were planned both in France and at the National War Memorial in Ottawa.
In Dieppe, Veterans Affairs Minister Steven Blaney, Gov. Gen. David Johnston and seven Canadian vets joined French officials for the ceremonies.
At the Canadian War Cemetery just outside Dieppe, hundreds of local people came to pay tribute to the nearly 3,400 Canadians who died, were wounded or taken prisoner during the raid.
A single rose had been placed on each of the 707 graves, and people were crying as a bugler played the Last Post. The Canadian veterans who fought at Dieppe also laid wreaths in memory of their comrades there.
Corpses on the beach next to two Churchill tanks of the 14th Armoured Regiment (Calgary) stuck in pebbles. Behind them, thick smoke coming from LCT 5.
Department of National Defence / National Archives of Canada C-014160.
In 1942, the Combined Operations Headquarters had good reasons for attempting a raid on Dieppe: on the eastern front a decisive battle was pitching the advancing German troops against the resistance of the Red Army and the Russian people. Stalin asked Churchill and Eisenhower to help the USSR by opening up a Western front in continental Europe, to prevent Hitler from throwing all the might of his armies against the Soviets. As a result, Great Britain planned a series of major raids against German defence installations along the Channel. Only one such operation was actually conducted: Dieppe.
The Allies’ long-term goal was to get a foothold on the continent and set up a bridgehead from where ground forces could move into Europe. But before it could attempt a large-scale landing, the Combined Operations Headquarters had to test some of its assumptions in real action. Would it be possible to capture a fortified seaport large enough to be used afterwards by invading troops, and that, without destroying its infrastructures? Amphibious landing techniques had been successfully tested in previous operations but how would the new barges designed to carry tanks and heavy artillery behave? There was a need to test the complex combination of land, naval and air manoeuvres required by a large-scale invasion in real action conditions, in order to check the efficiency of new equipment, communication lines and chains of command. The August 19th, 1942, raid was to answer all those questions.
Dieppe was a seaside resort in Normandy, built along a long cliff that overlooked the Channel. The cliffs are cut by gaps through which the Scie and Arques rivers flow to the sea. The city boasted a medium-sized harbour that carried a special significance for French Canadians as it was a departure point for ships sailing off to New France. In 1942, the casino on the boardwalk had been partially demolished by the Germans to facilitate the defence of the coast. They had set up two large artillery batteries in Berneval and Varengeville. For the British Commanders, Dieppe was also within the range of the RAF’s
On August 19th, 1942, the ground forces that were taking part in the raid included 4,963 men and officers from the 2nd Canadian Division, 1,005 British commandos, 50 US rangers and 15 Frenchmen. A fleet of 237 ships and landing barges, including 6 destroyers, brought them near the seashore. In the air, Royal Air Force and Royal Canadian Air Force bombers and fighters took part in the operation. Although some questioned the very concept of a full frontal assault on a fortified position, the British and Canadian strategists were in agreement with the military doctrines that prevailed at the time and success was likely.
At Dieppe, 907 Canadians, including 56 officers, lost their lives in a battle that lasted for only nine hours. A total of 3,369 men were killed or wounded. At Dieppe, the Canadian Army lost more prisoners than in the whole eleven months of the later campaign in North-West Europe, or the twenty months during which Canadians fought in Italy. 6,108 men took part in the raid (from the Land Forces), 1,946 were taken prisoner, 2,460 were wounded. 4,963 were Canadians (907 fatalities), 1,075 were British Commandoes (52 fatalities), 50 were American Rangers (3 fatalities), with 20 others. In addition, the Royal Navy suffered 75 killed, with 269 missing or prisoners. Overhead the RAF and RCAF lost 119 aircraft - the highest single-day total of the war (62 fatalities) while the Luftwaffe lost just 46.
Dieppe was a pathetic failure. Sixty years later, it seems obvious that Jubilee was a bizarre operation with no chance of success whatsoever and likely to result in a huge number of casualties. In August 1942, British and Allied officers did not have yet the knowledge and combat experience to make a proper assessment of the risks of such an operation. This catastrophe was useful precisely in providing that knowledge which was later to make victory possible.
The Dieppe fiasco demonstrated that it was imperative to improve communications at all levels: on the battlefield, between the HQs of each unit, between air, naval and ground forces. The idea of capturing a well-defended seaport to use as a bridgehead was dropped after August 19th, 1942. In addition, the raid on Dieppe showed how important it was to use prior air bombings to destroy enemy defences as much as possible, to support assault troops with artillery fire from ships and landing crafts, to improve techniques and equipment to remove obstacles to men and tanks.
Astrolabe planisphère
Asne Michel (2e moitié 16e siècle-début 17e siècle) orfèvre à Caen
(C) RMN / René-Gabriel Ojéda
An astrolabe (Greek: ἀστρολάβον astrolabon, “star-taker”) is an elaborate inclinometer, historically used by astronomers, navigators, and astrologers. Its many uses include locating and predicting the positions of the Sun, Moon, planets, and stars, determining local time given local latitude and vice-versa, surveying, triangulation, and to cast horoscopes. It was used in classical antiquity, through the Islamic Golden Age, the European Middle Ages and Renaissance for all these purposes
Jeanne d’Arc au bûcher (1484, Bibliothèque nationale de Paris)
Joan of Arc was burnt as a heretic on the 30th of May 1431.
Two of the few surviving photos that Robert Capa took when he landed with US troops at Omaha Beach on D-Day. Most of the film from that day was accidentally ruined during development by a lab assistant at LIFE Magazine.
(Source.)
