The Free Lance-Star (June 17, 1944)
YANKS MAY CUT OFF GERMANS IN CHERBOURG
Americans push onward across peninsula
Heavy artillery hits escape road
By Wes Gallagher
Bulletin
SHAEF, London, England (AP) –
U.S. troops punched forward two to three miles today in the developing drive to choke off Cherbourg Peninsula.
SHAEF, London, England (AP) –
U.S. troops driving to punch off the top of the Cherbourg Peninsula brought the Germans’ last escape road under hammering artillery fire today, and a U.S. fighter pilot reported signs of German flight from the cape and its great port.
One U.S. column beating west of Carentan fought within four miles of La Haye-du-Puits, the Nazis’ last main road junction at the shortest neck of the peninsula, and forces farther north had cut Cherbourg’s western railway by seizing Saint-Sauveur-le-Vicomte. Still other Americans had recaptured Montebourg, 14 miles southeast of Cherbourg.
Even as artillery blasted the Germans’ last road on their dwindling western strip of the peninsula, an American pilot said he saw enemy trucks and staff cars moving south, and declared he believed the Germans “want to get out of there, but our troops are moving in fast as hell.”
‘Another Sevastopol’
Cherbourg threatened to become another Sevastopol for the Germans, with their escape cut off except by sea, as happened in the Crimea.
Lt. Gen. Omar N. Bradley, commanding six U.S. divisions fighting in two Army corps, said 3,283 Americans were killed and 12,600 wounded in the first 11 days of the invasion. These 15,883 casualties included reports up to last midnight, he told a press conference in France.
U.S. losses are expected to be higher than those of the British and Canadians – figures as yet undisclosed – because the U.S. 1st and 29th Infantry Divisions met the heaviest fighting on landing. Going ashore in the center, these units ran into a Nazi division holding maneuvers on a difficult beach. Both the British and Canadians made their original landings comparatively easily – as did other Americans on the west flank – although they have been engaged in heavy fighting since then.
Counterblows beaten
On the eastern end of the battlefront, Supreme Headquarters declared strong German attacks were beaten off east of Caen, and a headquarters officer said two unsuccessful Nazi counterblows in the Troarn area, seven miles beyond Caen were “extremely costly” to the enemy.
Toward the center, the Allies punched out local advances despite heavy opposition between Caumont and Tilly-sur-Seulles, the communiqué said.
The German High Command said Nazi counterattacks had regained the greater part of the forest area south of Bavent, three and a half miles north of Troarn, and east of the Orne River.
The biggest news of the day was the weather, which again blew at “force four” from the north. Any wind from “force three” or above delays unloading on the beachhead, Supreme Headquarters said.
It was officially disclosed that Lt. Gen. Omar N. Bradley, U.S. ground commander, has two Army corps under his command, the Fifth and the Seventh. The Fifth is composed of the 1st, 2nd and 29th Infantry Divisions while the Seventh includes the 82nd and 101st Airborne Divisions and the 4th Infantry Divisions.
It was these forces which registered the only new advances along the bridgehead front.