Voices from D-Day

by Jon E. Lewis

  Then there came something like a peppering of hail, heavy hail on the front of the ramp. I realized it was enemy machine-gun fire. All hell broke loose from the other side – Germany artillery, rockets and mortars. It was just unbelievable that anyone could have lived under that barrage.

  Our assault boat hit a sandbar. I looked over the ramp and we were at least seventy-five yards from the shore, and we had hoped for a dry landing. I told the coxswain, ‘Try to get in further.’ He screamed he couldn’t. That British seaman had all the guts in the world but couldn’t get off the sandbar. I told him to drop the ramp or we were going to die right there.

  We had been trained for years not to go off the front of the ramp, because the boat might get rocked by a wave and run over you. So we went off the sides. I looked to my right and saw a B Company boat next to us with Lt. Bob Fitzsimmons, a good friend, take a direct hit on the ramp from a mortar or mine. I thought, there goes half of B Company.

  Don Whitehead, Associated Press war correspondent

  The ramp lowered and we waded ashore to the rattle of machine guns and bursting of shells. Bullets cracked over our heads and we flung ourselves on the rocky beach under cover of a gravel embankment.

  The enemy on the right flank was pouring direct fire on the beach. Hundreds of troops, pinned under cover of the embankment, burrowed shallow trenches in the loose ground. No one was moving forward. The congestion was growing dangerous as more troops piled in. Snipers and machine-gunners were picking off our troops as they came ashore … Wounded men, drenched by cold water, lay in the gravel, some with water washing over their legs, shivering, waiting for stretcher-bearers to take them aboard returning small craft. ‘Oh God, lemme aboard the boat,’ whimpered a youth in semi-delirium. Near him a shivering boy dug with bare fingers into the ground. Shells were bursting on all sides of us, some so close that they threw black water and dirt over us in showers.

  Report: 16th Infantry Regiment, 1st Infantry Division

  As the landing craft reached the beach [at Colleville-sur-Mer], they were subjected to heavy artillery, mortar, machine-gun and rifle fire, directed at them from the pill-boxes and from the cliffs above the beach. Men were hit as they came down the ramps of the landing craft, and as they struggled landward through the obstacles, and many more were killed or injured by the mines attached to the beach obstacles. Landing craft kept coming in with their human cargoes despite the heavy fire and continued to disgorge them on to the narrow shale shelf from which no exits had been opened. Several landing craft were either sunk or severely damaged by direct artillery hits or by contact with enemy mines.

  The enemy now began to pour artillery and mortar fire on to the congested beach with deadly precision and effect. Visibility from the enemy strongpoints was such that the assault groups, armed with rocket launchers, flame-throwers, Browning Automatic rifles, and pole charges of TNT could not approach them directly. A few squads and platoons of infantry gradually and slowly crawled forward from the shelf across the minefields between the enemy strongpoints, and made the slope.

  Captain Edward W. McGregor, US 1st Infantry Division

  My impression of the beach when I landed was, ‘This is a rough place to be.’

  Anonymous Pfc, US 1st Infantry Division

  There were men crying with fear, men defecating themselves. I lay there with some others, too petrified to move. No one was doing anything except lay there. It was like a mass paralysis. I couldn’t see an officer. At one point something hit me on the arm. I thought I’d taken a bullet. It was some-body’s hand, taken clean off by something. It was too much.

  Captain Joseph T. Dawson, 16th Infantry Regiment, US 1st Infantry Division, aged 30

  The beach was a total chaos, with men’s bodies everywhere, with wounded men crying, both in the water and on the shingle. We landed at high tide, when the water was right up to the shoreline, which was marked by a sharp-edged crystalline sand, like a small gravel, but very, very sharp. That was the only defilade which was present on the beach to give any protection from the fire above. That was where all the men who had landed earlier were present, except for a handful who had made their way forward, most of them being killed … The beach sounded like a beehive with the bullets flying around. You could hear them hit and you could hear them pass through the air.

  Russell Stover, 116th Infantry Regiment, US 29th Infantry Division

  The boat stopped. We were on an obstacle. Thank God it wasn’t mined. The ramp went down and we leaped out, into waist-deep water and three-foot waves. Some lost their footing, some their weapons. We had more than two hundred yards to go to the high water mark. Some engineers were working to our left. There was only one tank ahead and to the left but it wasn’t firing or moving. There were no ‘instant fox holes’ either; there wasn’t one crater for cover. There wasn’t even one DUKW with artillery firing on the machine-gun placements on top of the bluffs. No Piper Cubs overhead to direct the naval fire. It was very obvious to me that many plans were going wrong. There was a boat burning to our right, heading back out. We waded through the surf and floating debris. I looked back and saw that we were in good formation, well spread out, just as we had practised dozens of times before. Reaching the sand, I tried to run, but found it was very difficult, my impregnated pant legs were filled with water. The extra weight took its toll and about half way in I fell to the sand exhausted. I thanked the Good Lord for the smoke that still covered the bluffs. A shell had started a grass fire. If not for that smoke, we would not have made it in. Recovering, I started running again. The man to my right didn’t follow, I think he was our first casualty.

  Lieutenant Robert Edlin, 2nd Ranger Battalion

  It was cold, miserable cold, even though it was June. The water temperature was probably forty-five or fifty degrees. It was up to my shoulders when I went in, and I saw men sinking all about me. I tried to grab a couple, but my job was to get on in and get to the guns. There were bodies from the 116th floating everywhere. They were facedown in the water with packs still on their backs. They had inflated their life jackets. Fortunately, most of the Rangers did not inflate theirs or they also might have turned over and drowned.

  I began to run with my rifle in front of me. I went directly across the beach to try to get to the seaway. In front of me was part of the 116th Infantry, pinned down and lying behind beach obstacles. They hadn’t made it to the seaway. I kept screaming at them, ‘You have to get up and go! You gotta get up and go!’ But they didn’t. They were worn out and defeated completely. There wasn’t any time to help them.

  I continued across the beach. There were mines and obstacles all up and down the beach. The air corps had missed it entirely. There were no shell holes in which to take cover. The mines had not been detonated. Absolutely nothing that had been planned for that part of the beach had worked. I knew that Vierville-sur-Mer was going to be a hellhole, and it was.

  When I was about twenty yards from the seaway I was hit by what I assume was a sniper bullet. It shattered and broke my right leg. I thought, well, I’ve got a Purple Heart. I fell, and as I did, it was like a searing hot poker rammed into my leg. My rifle fell ten feet or so in front of me. I crawled forward to get to it, picked it up, and as I rose on my left leg, another burst of I think machine gun fire tore the muscles out of that leg, knocking me down again.

  I lay there for seconds, looked ahead, and saw several Rangers lying there. One was Butch Bladorn from Wisconsin. I screamed at Butch, ‘Get up and run!’ Butch, a big, powerful man, just looked back and said, ‘I can’t.’ I got up and hobbled towards him. I was going to kick him in the ass and get him off the beach. He was lying on his stomach, his face in the sand. Then I saw the blood coming out of his back. I realized he had been hit in the stomach and the bullet had come out his spine and he was completely immobilized. Even then I was sorry for screaming at him but I didn’t have time to stop and help him. I thought, well, that’s the end of Butch. Fortunately, it wasn’t. He became a farmer in Wisconsin.<
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  For the GIs waiting to land it was an unedifying scene.

  Sergeant Richard W. Herklotz, US 29th Division

  As we got closer to the beach we saw that casualties were floating in the water just like refuse in a harbour. There was this and that equipment floating, soldiers, sailors – it was very disheartening. For hours off the coast we watched the tide bring out the debris and the bodies of those who had died.

  At one point the battle for Omaha was going so badly that General Bradley, waiting offshore on the Augusta, ‘gained the impression that our forces had suffered an irreversible catastrophe.’ Hundreds of the initial assault waves lay dead – there were to be over 2,000 casualties on the beach that day – and the landing schedule was in turmoil. And yet force of numbers, determination and individual example began to get the GIs off the beach and forcing routes up the hill to the rear.

  Sergeant Mike Rehm, US 5th Rangers

  We were pinned down by heavy fire for about an hour. General Cota, who was the executive officer, came along and saw ‘us crouched behind a wall. He said, “Who are you people?” We said, “Sir, we’re Rangers.” He said, “Goddamit, if you’re Rangers get up there and lead the way.”’

  Captain Joseph T. Dawson, US 1st Infantry Division

  We landed at H + 30 minutes and found … both the assault units rendered ineffective because of the enormous casualties they suffered. Fortunately, when we landed there was some let-up in the defensive fire from the Germans. Even so the boat containing assault unit Company G, which I commanded, took a direct hit from the artillery of the Germans, and I suffered major casualties. I lost about twenty men out of a total complement of 250 from that hit on my boat, and this included my naval officer who was communications link with the Navy, who were to support us with their fire from the battleships and cruisers some 8,000 yards out in the water.

  As soon as we were able to assemble we proceeded off of the beach through a minefield which had been identified by some of the soldiers who had landed earlier. We knew this because two of them were lying there in the path I selected. Both men had been destroyed by the mines. From their position, however, we were able to identify the path and get through the minefield without casualties and proceed up to the crest of the ridge which overlooked the beach. We got about halfway up when we met the remnants of a platoon of E Company, commanded by Lieutenant Spalding. This was the only group – somewhere less than twenty men – we encountered who had gotten off of the beach. They had secured some German prisoners, and these were sent to the beach under escort. Above me, right on top of the ridge, the Germans had a line of defences with an excellent field of fire. I kept the men behind and, along with my communications sergeant and his assistant, worked our way slowly up to the crest of the ridge. Just before the crest was a sharp perpendicular drop, and we were able to get up to the crest without being seen by the enemy. I could now hear the Germans talking in the machine-gun nest immediately above me. I then threw two grenades, which were successful in eliminating the enemy and silencing the machine gun which had been holding up our approach. Fortunately for me this action was done without them having any awareness of my being there, so I was no hero … it was an act of God, I guess.

  …

  I had only one thought and that was to get to the enemy. My feelings at the time were completely subordinate to the moment in hand, where my responsibility was to get off the beach and approach the enemy. That was my main objective, and that was the only thing I could possibly think at that time.

  Don Whitehead, Associated Press war correspondent

  Then the brigadier began working to get troops off the beach. It was jammed with men and vehicles. He sent a group to the right flank to help clean out the enemy firing directly on the beach. Quietly he talked to the men, suggesting next moves. He never raised his voice and he showed not the least excitement. Gradually the troops on the beach thinned out and we could see them moving over the ridge.

  Captain Edward W. McGregor, US 1st Infantry Division

  We hit the sand and found ourselves behind the bodies of the amphibious engineers, who had taken a terrible beating. Eventually we started moving up a draw, where some engineers had been and which was marked with tape. We had several casualties, and I know at least one officer right near me was killed, stepping on a mine. We came up to the top of the ridge and tried to advance a bit, but there was a large German bunker in front of us, and its machine-gun fire hit us every time we tried to move. At this point we didn’t have any communication with the American destroyer behind us because within five minutes of landing on the beach the naval ensign officer had been killed – his driver too – and the radio set destroyed by a shell which landed right on top of them. S0 we planned an assault against the bunker. I volunteered to take some troops with me but before we could get organized there were huge demolitions around the bunker. Thank God we hadn’t moved out yet. An American destroyer had moved in and was firing direct with 4-inch guns into the bunker.

  Captain Albert H. Smith, 16th Infantry Regiment, US 1st Infantry Division, aged 25

  When we were just 500 yards from the shore everything changed. We were now boat to boat, only five inches apart, boats banging side by side. We could see a lot of burning, and a lot of firing from the bluffs. Just as our landing-craft bottom hit the hard sand we took machine-gun fire on the ramp of our LCVP. I yelled to the coxswain, ‘Hold the ramp!’ For one time the Navy obeyed the Army and he held the ramp. When the machine-gun fire switched to the boat which was just to our left, I said ‘Drop the ramp!’ and the coxswain dropped the ramp. Thirty-four of us got into the Channel about waist deep, sometimes chest deep, but the last two who were trying to get out were hit as the machine gun swung back … As we waded through the Channel our clothing, which was impregnated against a German gas attack, became like a board. We were overloaded, all of us. Finally, we made it to the soft sand. We saw people lying down back of the stone wall – not a concrete wall, just a wall of stones which had been rolled by the tide up on to the beach. Shingle. I said to Captain Hangsterfer, who was under me as the adjutant of the battalion, ‘Hank, I think there is some movement off to the left of the beach. I can just see it. We should head left’ – which is where we were supposed to land. That we did with the thirty-four men with us, and we went four or five hundred yards to the left, parallel to the sea. On the way we saw some people we knew, they were still there from the first wave. They were rather dazed, and had taken a lot of fire. As we were going left we saw a column of men going up through the minefield, past the barbed wire and up into the high ground behind the beach. I said to Hank, ‘We’ll follow them and leave the company in a little protection and see what’s going on and then bring them on up.’ So we in fact got into the column which was composed of other soldiers of the 1st battalion, mainly Bravo Company. As soon as we were off the beach the fire we had been taking became less and less. We had no casualties at this time. We followed the column up and we had only one adventure as we were starting to get to the higher ground. I said to Hank, ‘Let’s bypass this column, let’s make a little more headway, let’s go a little faster.’ So we made a sharp right turn and went into an area which turned out to be swamp area, just off of the beach. We sank, and the only way we survived was to pop our life preservers, the Mae West preservers. They popped up, and we made our way back to dry ground. I said, ‘Hank, we’re going to stay here with the column. We’re going to take the slow pace forward.’ At this time we saw, in the edge of the minefield, two US soldiers who had apparently tried to make it earlier in the day and had blown up. We had to pass over these two bodies so as not to disturb the other mines that were there. All this was in a sector called Easy Red. Well, it wasn’t easy, and it was only red with blood. But we still got up out of it.

  Russell Stover, 116th Infantry Regiment, US 29th Infantry Division

  We reached the high-tide mark only to discover that the first and second waves were still on the beach. Some had dug fox holes which gave s
ome protection from the fire coming from the bluff. The barbed-wire had stopped them. There were three rolls of concertina, then a staked fence, then three more rolls of concertina, about twenty feet wide. Sgt Ritter pointed to a location, and we set up our gun and began firing at the top of the bluff. We were in action! Suddenly I recalled advice from veterans of the Africa and Sicily landings – we could expect mortar fire within three minutes of starting to fire a machine gun.

  Our boat load was not equipped with bangalore torpedoes as the wire was to be blown by the first wave of men, but evidently the squad responsible had mislanded or been killed. Word was passed up and down the beach to pass any bangalore torpedoes on to us. After what seemed an eternity, we had four. Sgt Ritter yelled to increase my fire. We were going to try to blow the wire. About this time the Germans fired a rocket from on top of the bluff to my right. I heard the sound of a large gun firing in back of me. I looked back and could not believe what I saw. There was a destroyer, so close I thought it would go aground. Finally we had something larger than a bazooka on our side. But as all our radios had drowned out on the way in, we could not contact the destroyer to coordinate our attack. The fire from the top of the bluffs slackened. I believe that the German machine-gunners up there did not want to disclose their position to the destroyer.

  There was a heavy explosion directly in front of me. We had blown the wire. Our riflemen rushed through the gap. Some didn’t make it.

  Yet, even ‘Bloody Omaha’ had its lighter moments.

  Captain Albert H. Smith, US 1st Infantry Division

  I’m moving along [the beach] to my left and I meet standing there and directing some of the troops, Brigadier-General Bill Wyman. He was the senior commander in that area. He said, ‘Smitty’ – which was my nickname – ‘are you advancing by fire and movement?’ That was the correct way, in any army: to lay down fire and move quickly while you were protected by your own fire. But I looked at him and I kind of smiled, and I said, ‘Yes, sir. They’re firing, and we’re moving.’