Commandos and Rangers of World War II

by James D. Ladd

  East to west the beaches were code-names ‘Sword’, ‘Juno’, and ‘Gold’ for British sectors, ‘Omaha’ and ‘Utah’ for American. The British landed initially at five points, each about a mile (1.6km) wide and spaced across a 24-mile (38km) front, its westerly edge 10 miles (16km) from the American ‘Omaha’ beach. Most of the points open to counter-attack on the flanks or between landing-points were allocated to the Special Forces. Airborne landings were made on the night of 5-6 June outside the beachhead, and German communications and key coast batteries were disrupted if not neutralised. German resistance, especially by their 352 Infantry Division defending Omaha, delayed consolidation of the 50-mile beachhead until D + 2. Bayeaux, some six miles (10km) from the beaches was taken on D + 1, but Caen—eight miles from the landings—was not taken for more than a month. Here the British held German forces, while the Americans invested Cherbourg, captured on D + 19, before they swept eastward in a rapid advance that brought them to Orleans by 16 August. That week, two German armies were caught in the Falaise pocket by Canadian, British and American armies, and by 1 September the Allies had crossed the Seine, liberated Paris, and were 85 miles (136km) from Antwerp.

  Early in September the British and Canadians reached this major Belgian port, but an attempt later that month to set an airborne bridgehead across the Rhine failed at Arnhem. The same month the Americans reached the central sectors of the Siegfried line along the German border and were in the Vosges mountains further south.

  CHAPTER 11

  D-Day in Normandy

  and North West

  Europe

  The coast of France seemed strangely quiet from a distance as the sappers had their rum tot, but the thunder of gunfire increased as the LCTs carrying in the beach-clearance parties approached Jig Green West, the right-hand sector of the western landing-point on Gold beach. The onshore wind had given a higher tide than expected, for it was flooding some 30 minutes ahead of the almanac time, but after their rough crossing many soldiers were so seasick they were glad to land anywhere. Coming into Jig beach ahead of the sappers and AVREs should have been the DD swimming tanks, but the rough seas had forced their LCTs to carry them inshore and they were late. When the AVREs’ craft came in at 0725 hours they were under fire, although the leading platoons of the 1st Hampshires had crossed the beach with few casualties. However, the enemy strongpoint at Le Hamel had been little affected by bombing or bombardment, and raked the beach with fire that knocked out most of the Royal Marine tanks landing to cover the beach clearance.

  One AVRE craft, grounded in 6ft (2m) or more of water, got her first tank drowned on the ramp. Unable to clear her tank, this LCT broachd to and took several hits as the mines on beach obstacles blew holes in her hull. This craft partially blocked the second LCT’s landing but one sapper Section came ashore riding their AVRE. The third craft got the AVREs off but the sappers’ canvas boat’s tow broke—this landing in surf from six feet of water was rougher than any rehearsal—and they then paddled their way ashore, others being ferried in by an LCA.

  On the east side of the Jig landing-point, a fourth LCT got her sappers off but one canvas boat was holed on a obstacle and this Section swam to the beach. Those on the next LCT were towed so fast through the water that only five men managed to get in each boat, the rest swimming ashore. The sixth LCT beached in 7ft (2 + m) of water and the armoured bulldozer towed off the canvas boats so ruthlessly they had their bottoms ripped out. After transferring to other craft, only one Section landed hours later. With so few men to cut the obstacles, not surprisingly something less than the 200-yard wide gaps were cut at both landing-points. The LCOCU swimmers when above the water ‘wearing tin hats that seem somehow slightly ludicrous’, cleared the seaward gap, but the hedgehogs here were of heavier metal than expected and the tetrahedra were of reinforced concrete, not metal as used in practice. In the hectic minutes after landing, demolition parties were firing their charges—double charges on the hedgehogs—within a few yards of each other as the assault infantry passed through. However, this enforced disregard of safety rules seems to have caused no casualties in the urgency to clear obstacles before the tide covered them, although observed fire from Le Hemmel and behind the beach caused some losses among the clearance parties. Not all beach clearance followed the same sequence, for the Americans had only armoured bulldozers and not the so-called ‘funnies’ of the AVRE with their great, concrete-busting mortars, their mine-destroying flails, the fascines for filling smaller tank-traps and the scissor bridges placed by their tanks across larger gaps.

  As the tide rose, however, there were still many uncleared lanes in the British sector, and on the American beach of Omaha—more exposed than their Utah beach—many amphibious vehicles were lost, including DUKWs bringing ashore the field artillery. As for the swimming tanks, at points all along the 50-mile stretch of coast many were lost or late ashore—as at the Jig landing-points—with the seas breaking over their canvas flotation jackets.

  The Special Service Group, commanded by Major-General Robert G. Sturges with Brigadier John Durnford-Slater as his second-in-command, were to land in two Brigades with 47(RM) Commando in an independent role on the extreme west flank of the British sector. From there, they would swing further west, capturing Port en Bessin between the British and American sectors. Like all the Special Forces on this D-day, they had flank or linking roles as the Allies came ashore at a series of separated landings within each beach area. The 3,4,6 and 45(RM) Commandos, with two French Troops from 10 Commando attached to ‘No.4’, would clear Ouistreham at the mouth of the Orne before pushing quickly inland. Reaching the bridges at Blouville and Ranville they would join the elements of the 6 Airborne Division dropped just after midnight. 1 Brigade, with the Airborne, would then form the eastern flank guard of the beachhead, along the line east of the Orne river, on higher ground among the orchards, woods, and small fields with their thick banked hedges (the bocage). 4 Brigade’s Commandos formed two sides of the hinge between Sword and Juno, with ‘No.41(RM)’ landing west of Lion-sur-Mer on the right of Sword beach and five miles (8km) from ‘No.48(RM)’ landing at St Aubin-sur-Mer on the left of Juno beach. The Brigade, having cleared the fortified points allotted to them, were to move inland and invest the heavily fortified Douvres radar station; where intelligence engineers of 30 Commando hoped to gather codes and other documents, as they would in other German positions they raided on the heels of assault infantry.

  The 2nd of 5th Rangers were to land at Pointe du Hoc—misspelt on many other orders as ‘du Hoe’—destroying the battery above this chalk and clay cliff, which was between the initial landing-points on Omaha and Utah, being the most westerly landing-point on Omaha. Should the assault companies fail to take the cliff, then the remainder of the battalions would land to the east at Vierville-sur-Mer and fight their way to the battery. Its guns were thought to cover the approaches to both American beaches; and to the west were the inshore islands of St Marcouf, with casements for heavy naval guns and a system of defence strongpoints.

  The Bay of Seine—Special Forces’ landings and actions—D-day 6 June 1944.

  The first ‘Rangers’ ashore swam on to St Marcouf beaches at 0430 hours, two hours before H-hour for the American landings. Whether or not ‘they came ashore with knives between their teeth’, as one report suggests, these men—from a division’s squad of ‘Rangers’—found these islands undefended.

  4 Commando’s LCAs came ashore from HMS Queen Astrid at 0820 (H + 55 mins) to find the British 8th Infantry Brigade pinned to the shore line; mortar fire among the LCAs caused 40 casualties, the CO—Lieutenant-Colonel R.W.P. Dawson—being wounded in the leg. Passing through the lines of assault infantry, many wounded, some dead, and others firing from the water’s edge, kneeling in two feet or more of surging waves, the leading commando Troop came up to a mound surrounded by wire and with a machine-gun turret enfilading the beach. This armoured turret was set in a concrete strongpoint which the commandos worked their way aroun
d. Captain Knyvet Carr—known as ‘Muscles’ since the days of Dieppe—threw a grenade, but as he stood up after it burst, his heavy rucksack toppled him backwards down a bank. As he rolled over, a shower of stick-grenades fell around him, his own Troop’s bren fire flew past his head, yet he remained unhurt. Two Germans dashing for the post were shot and the pill-box taken. It was one of a series about 100 yards apart, many with their 75mm or other guns facing diagonally across the beach so their slits were not exposed to incoming fire unless it was a difficult enfilade (diagonal) shot. Behind this post was an open machine-gun position that the commandos had overrun, just as others would do along the beach, often blowing in an emplacement’s steel door, despite the larger defence complexes’ better protection to the rear.

  Once through the enemy’s line of beach pill-boxes, the commandos reached their assembly area in the dunes, which baffled the noise of battle and made this a strangely quiet place. The two French Troops led off the column towards Quistreham to take the Casino, a fortified point overlooking the left flank of the British landings: 4 Commando were to repeat their Dieppe success, taking a battery that flanked the landing. The men had taken the few minutes at the assembly area to clean sand from their weapons, reload magazines, and gather in their Sections, which then moved the mile or so along the coast road into the southern (inland) outskirts of this seaside town. Major R.P Menday took charge of the attack, for the Colonel had been wounded a second time and would not catch up with his Commando until after they left the town. He would then stay with them until ordered to hospital by a senior medical officer.

  The French Troops, who had taken casualties when their LCIs were repeatedly hit, met a M. Lefevre, from the town, who had gone out during the pre-landing barrage and cut the power-lines crossing the dunes to electrically fired flame-throwers protecting both the Casino and the battery. He went on to help the commandos that morning, showing them where the enemy positions were strongest, and guiding them to a successful assault on the Casino.

  C Troop led the Commando up the road, dodging across the road junctions and passing a solitary rifleman, whose window firing-position was taken out when a tank of the RM Armoured Support Group blew off the house’s gable end. The commandos dropped their rucksacks, each with two fins protruding from the pouch -3- inch mortar reserve ammunition for the Heavy Weapons Troop—at the arranged point before crossing the main road, where two trams lay drunkenly together. A jubilant Frenchman in front of the café danced here in his pyjamas: ‘C’est le jour! Le jour de la liberation.’ Captain Murdoch C. McDougall, the 6 foot 5 inch Scot leading a Section of F Troop, has described this action in his book Swiftly They Struck[*]. They were now nearing the battery, having turned towards the beach, and there was an open space to cross before reaching the start line for this attack. The leading Section of F Troop were across, but Murdoch McDougall’s two leading riflemen dived for cover as flakes of whitewash, stone, and sand spattered around from bullets hitting a wall behind them. The Section officer dived to join them and got his bren gunner up, ‘joined a second later in a whirl of white dust and sand by the gunner’s Number Two’. The men spotted the German machine-gun, and steady bursts of bren fire at this window 250 yards (225 + m) away enabled the riflemen of the sub-Section to cross the 80 yards (70 + m) of open ground. They in turn covered the bren gun teams’ crossing, and the second sub-Section followed this drill. The whole Section together—they were three or four minutes late at the start line—ran to follow the lead Section and F Troop HQ over the planks laid across an anti-tank ditch, passing through C Troop who had led to this point. Murdock McDougall could see the blank wall of the white observation tower that D Troop were attacking. E Troop had swung right towards the easterly three emplacements, and F Troop made for the three on the left. A steady stream of German grenades was falling down the face of the tower, but over the commandos’ heads the Vickers-K machine-guns of A Troop gave covering fire.

  Ground churned up from the pre-landing bombardment and earlier air strikes gave the commandos some cover as they bobbed and weaved under enemy small-arms fire from houses overlooking the battery, and they arrived seaward of the tower to find a machine-gun firing down on them from a slit two-thirds of the way up its face. Murdock McDougall’s Glaswegian bren gunner silenced it with a stream of fire—tracer every fifth round showing him exactly where the bullets were striking. A few moments later the gunner, Commando McDermott, appeared at a crater’s edge, wanting to swap his bren for a rifle because his shoulder was shattered by a bullet: blood was running down his side. No guns were mounted in the battery and as the leading Sections were coming back towards the town three heavy shells landed—possibly from Allied naval guns. The Commando formed column after leaving the town and headed for the bridges across the Orne and the canal.

  6 Commando and advanced Brigade headquarters, ‘every man washed and shaved’ as were all commandos landing that day, took some casualties as they came ashore from LCIs at 0840 hours behind ‘No.4’. In those few minutes the beach had cleared, but the dead remained, and for this commando, as for so many other troops that day, the landing appeared more like a nightmare on some lonely road than charging along in a football crowd. As they passed though the 2nd East Yorkshires mopping up resistance, they came across ‘bodies sprawled all over the beach, some with heads, arms and legs missing, the blood clotting the wet sand’. A signaller picked up the Airborne’s message confirming they held the bridges, and ‘No.6’ were urged on as they infiltrated through the enemy’s second lines of defence. They crossed a swamp, attacking four strongpoints and a four-gun battery that was shelling the beach, and covered the 6.5 miles (10km) from the landing to the bridges in three and a half hours, arriving two minutes behind their schedule. They had relatively few casualties, but their second-in-command, Major Coade, was one.

  ‘No.3’ and ‘No.45(RM)’ followed them to the Orne where a cycle Troop of ‘No.6’ had crossed the bridges, and by this time, 1400 hours, their Commando had joined the 9th Parachute Battalion in taking the village of Le Plein. That evening, 1 SS Brigade dug-in on the high ground above a flat coastal plain eastward of the beachhead and were joined by the remainder of 6 Airborne Division flying in at dusk. The Brigade’s landings had proved an old adage of combined operations: coming in in the third wave can be as dangerous as, if not more dangerous than, being in the first. ‘No.3’ had lost two craft through direct hits and all the Commandos had suffered casualties on the beach, even though they landed 50 minutes or more after H-hour.

  The 4 SS Brigade in many respects had an even rougher landing. 41(RM) Commando, at the western limit of the initial landings on Sword, were put ashore 300 yards (270m) west of their intended beach near Lion-sur-Mer. ‘Everything appeared the same grey’, a few houses and a litter of tanks with blobs of men taking cover behind them. Within the hour the Commando were across the beach and one Section reached Lion to find its strongpoint deserted. The rest of the Commando went further west to attack a chateau beyond the village but their Colonel and two Troop officers were killed, along with both FOOs (the artillery’s forward observation officers). They lost contact with their RM tanks, and as the FOOs’ signallers were wounded no covering fire could be coordinated for an attack. The commandos had to content themselves with neutralising the position, and it was captured next day by the 5th Lincolnshires.

  48(RM) Commando—formed only 16 weeks before D-day from volunteers in the 7th RM Battalion—landed at St Aubin from shore-to shore LCI(S), wooden landing craft built on the lines of coastal forces boats. These craft were caught because the tide covered much of ‘Rommel’s asparagus’ of anti-boat obstacles, and H-hour had been delayed 45 minutes on this part of Sword beach. It seemed a confusion of activity to their CO, Lieutenant-Colonel James L. Moulton RM, as he scanned the shore with his glasses seeing a black line across it: his craft was checked by an obstacle and the adjutant, Captain Daniel J. Flunder, was flung into the sea 100 yards from the shore as he prepared to lead the men off the catwalk bo
w gangways. The Belgian skipper worked the craft clear and Dan Flunder only remembers the wall of her side towering over him.

  The LCI beached with two others, but the craft further east were held off shore: Y Troop’s being 150 yards (135 + m) out and Z’s a little closer to the shore. Enemy fire had caused casualties as they ran in, shell and mortar fragments ripping through the sides of the wooden craft. No voice commands could be heard over the din of the sailors’ 20mm cannon answering the shore guns, and the Colonel had to go forward to get his 2-inch mortarmen firing smoke as they had dismounted their two mortars from the bow on preparing to land. The other craft followed this lead as planned and a smokescreen soon forced the enemy gunners to fire blind. The craft ashore were not square on to the beach, their catwalks rising and plunging on the swell into waist-deep water, causing the marines to take longer getting ashore than they did in rehearsals. As they came up the beach the black line turned out to be ‘the human debris of the assault: some dead, many wounded, some bewildered, some—like the stretcher bearers—with work to do’. The Colonel was joined by Dan Flunder, who has no recollection of how he reached the beach after being hit by the landing craft as she surged past him. They crossed the beach, the Colonel was hit but went on, and gradually collected as many men as they could. A line of LCTs followed the Commando in and disgorged their tanks, one running over wounded men until Dan Flunder knocked off its track with a grenade; the other tanks bogged down in the shingle.

  Z and Y Troops with the stand-by HQ—every command had a stand-by, from the headquarters’ ships to battalion commands—were too far out for wading and were taking further hits until an LCA ran a ferry service to put Z Troop ashore. The mine on an obstacle exploded under Y Troop’s LCI before a tank landing craft came alongside and took off the Troop. Those who tried to swim ashore were caught in a strong current, but Y Troop’s commander, Major D.R.W. de Stacpoole, managed to swim to the beach. Lieutenant Yates was drowned trying to swim with a line, and casualties were high. Sensibly, the Heavy Weapons Troop’s mortars were spread between the craft; and although one crew were killed on the beach, Marine Thornton made several trips around a dangerously exposed position to bring their mortar to the assembly area. Jim Moulton too, was wounded, spatterd by mortar fragments, but he continued to move along the beach, directing his men towards the assembly area.