The Pittsburgh Press (July 23, 1944)
Allies battling in morasses of French mud
British take half of Troarn stronghold
By Phil Ault, United Press staff writer
Fighting through morasses of mud, British forces have seized commanding heights in Troarn (1) as torrential rains slowed fighting in Normandy. Two Nazi counterattacks were repulsed, by the British south of André-sur-Orne (2) and by the Americans on the Saint-Lô–Périers highway (3). The Yanks were two miles from Périers.
SHAEF, London, England – (July 22)
British troops, fighting through morasses of mud like those in the last war, have won commanding heights inside Troarn, German stronghold seven miles east of Caen, and 14 enemy tanks have been knocked out in scattered actions across the wind- and rain-swept front, it was disclosed today.
British troops ironed out the Nazi salient south of Caen by capturing Maltot and Etavaux. Maltot is three miles west of Saint-André-sur-Orne on the Caen–Aunay highway. Etavaux is one mile northwest of Saint-André. A number of Nazi counterattacks were turned back, Saturday night’s communiqué said, with the promising British offensive of last week bogged down in the worst weather of invasion.
Lone air attack
Bumping their way through storm clouds, a force of about 200 U.S. Marauder and Havoc bombers and RAF Billy Mitchells bombed three fuel dumps and one railway target south of the battle zone in the lone major air operation of the day.
The Germans launched two limited counterattacks Friday despite the soggy weather, one south of Saint-André-sur-Orne on the Caen front and the other on the Saint-Lô–Périers highway in the American sector. Both were thrown back with severe enemy losses.
Third time in Troarn
The British entered Troarn for the third time Saturday and won the western half of the town before a torrential downpour caused a half-hour suspension of fighting. Smashing across the wooded rise just outside Troarn against fierce machine-gun and light arms opposition, they won high ground dominating the remaining German positions in the eastern half of the town.
Otherwise, the battle had bogged down, but German broadcasts said that Allied guns in the Caen area were drumming out a preparatory barrage for “a large-scale attack in the near future.”
For nearly eight hours, the weather had clamped a stalemate on the battlefields and there was no prospect of its lifting.
British rush stopped
The first great rush of British armor through the Caen gap had ended, because the Germans were once more in wooded terrain after being driven across the rolling farms just east of Caen. The infantry now faced the job of digging them out of one strongpoint after another.
Behind every grove, the Germans had concealed 88mm guns which pinned down the infantry until Allied infantry could get a bearing on the enemy batteries. Rocket-firing Typhoon fighters gave invaluable support Friday until the weather forced them down.
Two miles from Périers
On the American sector, doughboys huddled in foxholes where water was up to their armpits and their supply traffic was interrupted by the impassibility of all except the hardest surfaced roads.
Before the mud made further advances impossible, the Yanks had driven within two miles of Périers, strongpoint of the broken Saint-Lô–Lessay line, and taken positions 1,500 yards west of the Vire southwest of Saint-Lô.
Allied headquarters reversed itself on three towns reported captured Friday – raids on the Carentan–Périers highway, Berigny on the Saint-Lô–Bayeux highway, and Saint-Martin-de-Fontenay, just below Saint-André-sur-Orne. All three are still in German hands, the report of their capture being due to “mistaken map-reading.”
Hill 112, key height just northeast of Esquay in the Caen sector, is still in British hands, although the Germans are once more in possession of Esquay itself as well as Maltot to the north.
German broadcasts again asserted that strong reserves of an Allied army group commanded by Lt. Gen. George S. Patton Jr. had been observed in the Caen area and that a new Allied offensive will not long be delayed. More than 10 British divisions are concentrated in the area, the Germans said.
A Berlin broadcast of a German communiqué said that the British launched “major attacks” Friday and broke into the main German line at several points, but were thrown back by counterattacks. An entire Allied battalion was wiped out, the communiqué asserted.
