Operation OVERLORD (1944)

570

Supreme HQ Allied Expeditionary Force (July 27, 1944)

Communiqué No. 103

In the area west of SAINT-LÔ, Allied forces have made good gains through enemy positions. One armored column has driven south some five miles from the PÉRIERS–SAINT-LÔ road to take MARIGNY. Another armored prong thrust across the SAINT-LÔ–COUTANCES road through SAINT-GILLES. The advance is continuing. Elsewhere in the western sector local gains have been made.

South of CAEN, there has been heavy fighting, with the enemy continuing a stubborn defense. All attacks by our forces in this sector have met strong concentrations of enemy tanks, artillery and mortars. Several enemy counterattacks have been repulsed.

Yesterday afternoon and evening, fighter-bombers attacked enemy gun positions, strong points, tank and troop concentrations in and around the battle area.

Other fighter-bombers and fighters kept up the attack on transportation targets over a wide area from DOUAI to VENDOME, cutting railway tracks and strafing locomotives, rolling stock and vehicles.

Sixteen enemy aircraft were shot down. Thirteen of ours are missing.

Fuel dumps at FONTAINEBLEAU and SENONCHES and railway bridges at EPERNON and L’AIGLE were attacked early yesterday evening by medium bombers.

Heavy bombers, six of which are missing, attacked the railway center of GIVORS–BADAN, 12 miles south of LYONS, last night.

Three enemy aircraft were shot down during the night, two over NORMANDY and one by INTRUDERS.

Periodical Communiqué No. 2

271700b July

Since 15 July, the French Forces of the Interior have repelled further attempts by the Germans to liquidate Marquis areas. German attacks have now taken the form of raids carried out by armored columns. In many instances these new tactics have been frustrated by ambushes.

In the SAÔNE-ET-LOIRE Department, resistance forces have succeeded in annihilating an enemy convoy of 116 lorries. In the PYRENEES, resistance forces attacked a column of armored cars and artillery with such success that the enemy was forced to bring up reinforcements in order to avoid complete defeat. Engagements have also taken place in MORVAN and in BRITTANY. In the RHÔNE Valley, resistance forces which have withdrawn from towns captured by the enemy have now regrouped in the woods.

In NORMANDY and elsewhere, attacks against the railway system continue to disorganize the enemy’s lines of communication. In the LOIRET, 30 trucks of war material have been destroyed. In the HÉRAULT, attacks on railway lines have caused several derailments, including the wrecking of an ammunition train. Interruptions of traffic in this area lasted from 18 to 36 hours.

The destruction of locks on important canals has continued, particularly in the north and in the east, thereby interfering with the transport of fuel. Barges carrying 100,000 gallons of oil fuel have been blown up, and petrol depots and convoys have been destroyed in the NIÈVRE.

Communiqué No. 104

Allied armored thrusts in the western sector continue to make rapid progress.

One column has cut the road from SAINT-LÔ to PERCY in the neighborhood of LE MESNIL-HERMAN, while another has advanced for miles to the southwest of CANISY. A third has driven some distance west form MARIGNY down the COUTANCES road.

Between the SEVES and the AY rivers, an advance of some 2,000 yards has cut the PÉRIERS–LESSAY road.

Between SAINT-LÔ and CAUMONT, the enemy salient is being steadily eliminated and advanced troops after occupying BERIGNY have reached the outskirts of NOTRE-DAME-D’ELLE. Other forces moving west from the CAUMONT area have reached the village of MOUFFET.

A strong enemy counterattack towards VERRIÈRES was repulsed last night. The enemy has made no further effort in the CAEN sector.

Fighter-bombers, supporting advancing ground forces in the SAINT-LÔ sector, attacked enemy guns and transport.

Military targets at BRUSSELS and GHENT were attacked by small forces of heavy bombers this morning. Escorting fighters strafed roads and railway facilities in the same area.

Enemy shipping off the PAS-DE-CALAIS coast was attacked by coastal aircraft early today.

571

The Pittsburgh Press (July 27, 1944)

Yanks drive seven more miles

U.S. column racing toward sea to trap seven German divisions
By Virgil Pinkley, United Press staff writer

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Yank drive of seven miles into Nazi defenses for a total thrust of 12 miles in three days highlights news from France. The British were forced back in the Caen sector, withdrawing from Esquay and Tilly-la-Campagne (1). The Yanks captured Canisy and drove to Le Mesnil-Herman (2). Other U.S. forces thrust into Périers (3).

Bulletin

SHAEF, London, England –
The German defense line in Normandy cracked wide open today and a U.S. armored column raced southwestward toward the sea in a fast-breaking bid to shear off the Nazi left wing and trap the enemy’s 84th Army Corps of seven badly mauled divisions.

SHAEF, London, England –
U.S. armored columns raced forward up to seven miles today in their Normandy breakthrough drive, fanning out on a broad arc which overran the road junctions of Canisy and Le Mesnil-Herman and reached points 4¼ miles from Coutances and six miles south of Saint-Lô.

Field dispatches reported the capture of fire-ravaged Canisy, three miles southeast of Marigny, and said Lt. Gen. Omar N. Bradley’s tanks had spurted another five miles in the same direction to seize Le Mesnil-Herman on the Saint-Lô–Percy highway and reach Saint-Samson-de-Bonfossé.

The whirlwind advances through groggy German defenses expanded the breakthrough by U.S. armor to a depth of nearly 12 miles in less than three days of fighting. They also set the stage for flanking pushes to the east and west which, if successful, would collapse the whole southern rim of the German arc around the Normandy beachhead.

The main spearheads of the breakthrough forces were swinging southeastward below Saint-Lô and southwestward toward Coutances, the capture of which would undermine the Atlantic coastal wing of the German Army.

The German line between the Saint-Lô gap and the Atlantic was buckling under the U.S. 1st Army’s blows. U.S. patrols thrust into Périers, central hinge of the German defenses fronting Gen. Bradley’s troops, and the Lessay–Périers highway was cut in a gain of more than a mile.

The Nazi plight was reflected in a DNB News Agency estimate that Gen. Sir Bernard L. Montgomery can now send into the field “about 50 divisions, including very strong fresh tank formations.”

Gen. Bradley’s men generally were on the move from just west of Caumont to the sea, and were consolidating their armored gains as fast as infantry and artillery could be moved up.

Henry T. Gorrell, United Press writer who witnessed the breakthrough in its crucial phase yesterday, reported in a dispatch filed at 3:30 p.m. (local time) that by afternoon the foremost elements of the U.S. armor were at Saint-Samson-de-Bonfossé.

From another sector, United Press writer James McGlincy reported the capture of Le Mesnil-Herman, one of the biggest road hubs south of Saint-Lô.

The first field dispatches of the day reported the capture of Canisy. They said it burned all night after being set afire by the explosions which cracked German resistance.

Littered with Nazi dead

Mr. Gorrell reported:

A driver of a tank outfit said there was not much left of Canisy. The streets are littered with German dead, cut down by automatic weapons fired from halftracks as the Americans passed through. There was a brief street fight, which cost the Americans only a few casualties.

As the tank columns fanned out far beyond Marigny, dispatches reported that in some sectors Adolf Hitler’s famous SS regiments had pulled out and left the rearguard fighting to Polish conscripts, hundreds of whom were captured.

The weather had cleared, and wave upon wave of fighter-bombers battered all day at the German positions.

Mr. Gorrell reported:

As I write this, our fighter-bombers are returning from the front and executing victory rolls en masse. It is quite a sight to see as many as 40 of them do it simultaneously.

Eyewitnesses told Mr. Gorrell they had seen many German tanks knocked out along the Saint-Gilles–Canisy road. Big German Tiger tanks were battling U.S. Shermans in the advanced areas.

Terrific cannonade

The chief German resistance had been from mortars. Our infantry was fast cleaning up the corridors laid out by the tanks, and “such was the state of German demoralization at the sight of the U.S. armor that very few snipers stuck around,” Mr. Gorrell said.

Since yesterday afternoon, there has been a terrific cannonade as our mobile guns, supported by hundreds of other cannon in the rear, picked off observed targets. Our Piper Cubs now are flying over by dozens, spotting for the artillery.

Roads in the path of the advance are strewn with knocked-out German vehicles and German bodies. Our engineers are keeping pace with the advance, filling in the bomb and shell craters.

The east end of the American line was also rolling up slow but steady gains. Infantry reached Mouffet, five miles west of Caumont, in a two-mile advance from Montrabot. They took Bérigny and on the Saint-Lô–Caumont highway and pushed forward to the vicinity of Notre-Dame-d’Elle, three miles south of Bérigny and six miles east of Saint-Lô.

Farther to the east, the British and Canadians were forced to yield some ground both south and southwest of Caen in the face of increasingly heavy enemy counterattacks.

The British and Canadians withdrew completely from Tilly-la-Campagne, four and a half miles southeast of Caen, and also abandoned Esquay, six and a half miles southwest of Caen, and nearby Hill 112 on the bank of the Orne River. Both the Exchange Telegraph Agency and the London Daily Sketch said the withdrawals constituted a “serious setback” for Lt. Gen. Miles C. Dempsey’s 2nd Army.

Planes hit three ships

Allied fighter-bombers continued to give close support to the ground forces last night and boosted their toll for the day to 20 enemy tanks destroyed, 19 probably destroyed and 58 damaged. Fourteen gun positions were hit.

Planes also hit the three ship unloading supplies at Granville, 15 miles south of Coutances, as well as railway yards, fuel dumps, bridges and road junctions behind the battle line.

Front dispatches said the British and Canadians were regrouping south and southwest of Caen after their offensive push down the highway toward Falaise broke down in the face of strenuous opposition and counterattacks by four German panzer divisions.

Rocket-firing RAF Typhoons stopped one German counterattack yesterday evening before its infantry and supporting ranks could reach forward Canadian positions. Five tanks were destroyed and eight others damaged.

572

Lt. Gen. McNair, 61, killed at front line in Normandy

Led training of ground forces

Washington (UP) –
Lt. Gen. Lesley J. McNair, the man who directed training of this country’s mammoth new ground forces for the battles they are now fighting around the world, was killed in the front line of the current U.S. offensive in Normandy, the War Department announced today. He was 61.

Before he fell, Gen. McNair saw the start of an offensive which has already smashed through the German lines and carried deeper into the enemy’s territory the doughboys whose training he directed.

Gen. McNair stood high in the small group of military leaders who, under Gen. George C. Marshall, Chief of Staff, built the U.S. Army from 1½ million men to its present size of 7,700,000.

Had narrow escape

Gen. McNair had some narrow escapes in other wars and had come close to death once before in this one. On April 23, 1943, while visiting the Tunisian front, a splinter from a German four-inch shell pierced his steel helmet and lodged a quarter of an inch from his brain.

He survived that experience, however, and shrugged it off with a tribute to the quality of steel in his helmet.

From March 1942 until recently, Gen. McNair was commanding general of the Army Ground Forces, a post which ranked him with Gen. H. H. Arnold, commander of the Army Air Forces, and Lt. Gen. Brehon B. Somervell, commander of the Army Supply Forces.

On July 14, the War Department announced that he had been succeeded by Lt. Gen. Ben Lear and had been given an “important overseas assignment.” What that assignment was has not yet been disclosed. It appeared possible that it might have been the command of an Army corps.

Second of rank killed

The War Department announcement said merely that Gen. McNair “was killed by enemy fire while observing the action of our frontline units in the recent offensive.”

Gen. McNair was the second officer of his rank to meet death in this war. The first was Lt. Gen. Frank M. Andrews, commander of U.S. forces in the European Theater, who was killed in a plane crash in Iceland on May 3, 1943.

Gen. McNair was credited with possessing one of the best brains in the Army. He used to be known as “the GHQ Sparkplug” and there are many stories around the Pentagon concerning the effect of his visits to Army units. One engineering unit which had taken pride in its ability to build a pontoon bridge in something over an hour pared by the time to 39 minutes shortly after a visit by Gen. McNair.

Gen. Marshall, on hearing of his death, described Gen. McNair as “an inspiring example to the forces of our great ground army which he organized and trained.”

The notable success of U.S. combat troops going into action for the first time against battle-hardened enemy troops was accredited in considerable degree to the effectiveness of this training program.

Gen. McNair was born in Verndale, Minnesota, May 25, 1883.

Gen. McNair was the sixth Army general officer to be killed in action in this war, not counting seven who died in airplane crashes and two who died from illnesses resulting from combat experience.

Others killed

Generals killed in action to date include:

  • Maj. Gen. Clarence L. Tinker: Missing in action off Midway June 7, 1942, and listed as presumed dead a year later.

  • Brig. Gen. Asa N. Duncan: Missing off the European coast Nov. 17, 1942, and declared dead a year later.

  • Brig. Gen. Nathan B. Forrest: Missing after a raid on Kiel, Germany, June 13, 1943, and now considered dead.

  • Brig. Gen. Donald F. Pratt: Killed in action June 6, 1944, in France.

  • Brig. Gen. Nelson M. Walker: Died of wounds July 10 in France.

Gen. McNair graduated from West Point in 1904. He went through the last war in France without a scratch but he had some close calls.

Gen. McNair served with the 1st Infantry Division of the AEF in France during the last war and also at general headquarters of the AEF. He won the Distinguished Service Medal for his work in gunnery.

In 1940, he was assigned as Chief of Staff of General Headquarters, Washington. When the War Department General Staff was reorganized in March 1942, he was made head of the Army Ground Forces.

Gen. McNair is survived by his widow, who lives at the Army War College here where Gen. McNair had his headquarters as head of the Ground Forces.

573

Pinkley: Hitler stakes everything on Norman battle

Nazis countermand strategy of generals
By Virgil Pinkley, United Press staff writer

SHAEF, London, England –
I have been informed by credible authority that the Nazis have countermanded the strategy of top generals of the general staff and have staked virtually their entire future on halting the Americans and British at the present line in Normandy.

They’ve made it an “all or nothing” affair.

This decision is at wide variance with the determination of Field Marshal Karl Gerd von Rundstedt – now reported a victim of the blood purge of German generals opposing Hitler – to fall back behind the Seine and Loire Rivers should the Allies establish a bridgehead in Normandy.

Would force detour

Von Rundstedt’s view was that such a move would have compelled the Allies to go the long way around south of Paris to get at the German Army. With all the main bridges on the Seine and Loire down and transportation hamstrung by months of Allied bombardment, this would have left the Allies a difficult supply problem.

Simultaneously the Germans would have been fighting from shortened supply lines.

The Nazis countered this argument according to my informant, with the assertion that the prestige value of a do-or-die stand at the base of the Normandy Peninsula outweighed practical military factors.

Rush divisions

So Adolf Hitler and his party generals rushed most of the crack panzer divisions in Europe into Normandy to grind themselves against the Allied force. Elite SS and grenadier outfits were placed in the frontlines. In one sector near Caen, 15 to 20 divisions were crammed into a 12-mile front to greatest concentration of manpower in military history.

Repeatedly they threw these crack troops into limited counterattack hoping to gain time in which to patch up the crumbling Eastern and Italian fronts; time in which to achieve a stalemate and a negotiated peace; time in which frantically to push scientific experiments on novel weapons such as the flying bombs.

Slows Allies

The result of this German resistance has been to slow Allied progress down to a backbreaking and frequently disheartening task of grinding down the German men and material. It is difficult to measure these Allied gains hour by hour and day by day, but Allied officers here believe that once the hard crust is broken, they will roll rapidly toward Paris and the Reich frontier.

Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower’s forces are tearing at the vitals of the German Army in the Battle of Normandy and achieving at an unexpectedly early phase the ambition to meet and defeat the German Army in the field.

574

U.S. thrust has makings of beachhead breakout

British reverse, which puts Montgomery on the spot, may be serious, writer says
By William H. Stoneman

SHAEF, London, England –
The American advance west of Saint-Lô has definitely broken through the Germans’ main positions in that area and has produced the first real promise of “something interesting” which the Allies have enjoyed since the fall of Cherbourg.

For the time being, it is not wise to speculate on the extent and direction of the American advance, but nobody can deny that it has the makings of that breakout from the beachhead which we have been waiting all these weeks.

Unpleasant British reverse

Meanwhile, the British have suffered an unpleasant and perhaps serious reverse in the area southwest of Caen, across the Orne River from the scene of the British-Canadian offensive which was launched Tuesday.

While the British-Canadian offensive was fading out against furious opposition, the Germans west of the river suddenly staged a little offensive of their own capturing the town of Esquay and nearby Hill 112, which is seven miles southwest of Caen.

Commands triangle

Hill 112 commands a large part of the triangle between the rivers Orne and Odon, southwest of Caen, and unless it can be recaptured the British forces at Maltot and Éterville will be embarrassed. The triangle must be held or the Germans can threaten the flank of the British and Canadian forces, south of Caen, on the other bank of the Orne.

The British-Canadian offensive south of Caen was bogged down and stopped due largely to the excellent defensive nature of the ground held by the Germans. Gen. Sir Bernard L. Montgomery must now be in a considerable quandary; he has simply got to break the stalemate south of Caen and it just does not look as if he could.

Somebody must do it

If he cannot, then they will have to find somebody who can.

If Gen. Montgomery should go – and we have no reason to believe he will at this juncture – his logical successor would be the Allied commander-in-chief in Italy, Gen. Sir Harold H. L. G. Alexander, his former chief during the Libyan desert campaign.

Alexander’s success in Italy and his great personal popularity have combined with our lack of progress in France to put him in the spotlight. Montgomery certainly cannot stand much more delay on the British front.

575

Yanks turn to thoughts of home as they ‘sweat out’ Nazi barrage

Here’s what 12 facing death said
By Tom Wolf

On the Normandy front, France – (special)
This is a near stenographic report of the conversation of 12 men pinned down for two hours by as vicious an artillery barrage as the Germans have yet loosed in Normandy.

The men are part of a company of combat engineers who were sent in to a recently captured town only a few hours after the first infantry units. When the barrage started, they dived behind a partially wrecked building. All are sweating despite the ground dampness. Conversation comes in gulps followed by long, uneasy silences which are usually ended by profanity after an especially heavy barrage.

This, then, is what men talk about at the front when their lives hang on the trajectory of the next shell:

¶ “Why the hell isn’t the Air Corps up there today bombing those gun positions?”

¶ “The fliers probably are lapping up mild and bitter in London and saying, ‘Oh, those poor, poor boys in the infantry!’ I’ll stand any one of them a drink any place any time.”

¶ “My old man was in the trenches in the last war.”

¶ “The Colonel says we’ll be here for Christmas.”

¶ “Who said this town’s been taken?”
“The Major.”

“Well, this is the last time they’ll get me up here just because the Major says the place is taken. There’s only one way to tell if a place is taken. When you see the Major in the town, then it’s taken.

¶ “Where’s our artillery we hear so much about? Why aren’t they giving those Hun guns a working over?”

¶ “After this war is over, I’m going to have a six months’ drunk.”
“Only six months?”

Afraid of firecrackers

¶ “Man, back where I live there was a fellow who used to go fishing every Fourth of July. He was afraid of firecrackers. Now I know how he feels. I’ll never shoot another cracked in all my life.”

¶ “You volunteered, Jim. You should be the last to kick.”
“Yeah, you volunteered. For what?”
“Yes, what are we fighting for?”
“Well, if we weren’t fighting them over here, we’d have to be fighting them over there sooner or later.”

¶ “Wonder if this building will take it!”

“Well, it’s been okay all morning. They probably have an observer right on the roof here. No one’s been up there to look.”

“I hope they have. They wouldn’t try to hit him.”

¶ “Before we left England, they got to us to make out our wills. Had to say who we wanted to collect our insurance. Now I know why.”

“Bet my old man would be tickled to death to get the money. I never was any use to him anyway.”

If they get back home

¶ “Boy, if I ever get back to my little old town, I’ll never leave its city limits again as long as I live.”

“Yes, someone ought to tell Roosevelt that he just calls us back home, we’ll police up his place for the rest of our lives.”

“Yeah, even after that Easter egg roll.”

¶ “How long have we been in line?”
“Forty-three days.”
“Forty-three, baloney. Forty-four.”

A soldier, covered with sweat, jumps behind the protection of the wall, too. He swears, slumps to the ground in frightened exhaustion. Someone asks him.

¶ “Where are they falling?”
“About five inches away. all over that damn road. Got lots of our boys. The medics sure are sweating it out back there.”

“Man, my hat’s off to those medics. Nothing scares them.”

Yanks draw fire

¶ “This is a pretty rugged building.”
“Yeah, and I always thought I was pretty rugged, too, but this is too damned rugged for me.”

¶ “What’s that noise coming this way?”
“Tanks.”
“Well, get those things away from here. They draw more fire than anything.”

¶ “Boy, look at all those bottles in the cellar. All empty.”
“I sure would like to drink.”

¶ “I sure would like to be home.”
“When I get home, I’m going to stay drunk.”

And the conversational cycle began all over again.

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576

Doolittle periled by own bombers

General over France on D-Day

London, England –
The North American Newspaper Alliance has just learned that Lt. Gen. James H. Doolittle piloted a P-38 Lightning up and down the French invasion coast on D-Day to see how the bombing was going.

He remained in the air observing the operations on the coast until he suddenly realized that it was only five minutes before zero hour, when the terrific bombing attack in support of our invading forces was to have begun. This first massed bombing, it is said, approximated 5,000 tons of explosives unloaded on the enemy.

Gen. Doolittle was obliged to get of the way with all possible speed, since the bombing attack was to be delivered from above the clouds on account of the thick weather. Had he not left the area promptly there was great danger that because of the nature and weight of the attack of bombers flying above him out of sight, his plane might have been destroyed by a descending missile.

He remained over the invasion coast, however, long enough to examine the line, and on his return to a British base stated that not a single bomb fell on our troops. Gen. Doolittle described the air attack as a magnificent piece of work.

577

Wolfert: Going slowly past fallen comrades, infantry trudges into jaws of death

Each of them knows somebody in crowd will get it, but not him
By Ira Wolfert

With the U.S. infantry west of Saint-Lô, France – (delayed)
The infantry they still say is Queen of Battles. When the infantry wants to cross a road here, it goes like this:

Airplanes and artillery take them by the hand, a big, dull upheaving thump of bombs gets in its way among the bat-like crack of shells, then the infantry grunts itself up onto its two legs and the fellows put their legs in front of them, one after the other and they walk, dragging behind them a train weightier than a train on a queen’s dress. Radio stud and telephone wires, wire layers and spreaders, lance poles, heavier guns, vehicles for all this and for ammunition, rations, ambulances, blood plasma, bulldozers, trucks full of crushed rocks and cots of officers and the typewriters of war correspondents.

The road the fellows went across today was the main road running east from Périers down to Saint-Lô, a hard surfaced country road, twisting and narrow, but first class all the same and the kind a country boy could really spank his auto along. There is a lump of high ground just north of it that the Germans held this morning and then a few miles southeast of it down in that part of the Cherbourg Peninsula they call French Switzerland, there is commanding ground that the Germans hold in force with plenty of howitzers there that can go into the deepest hole after a man and blow him out of there in pieces.

Gray morning at front

It was gray this morning at the front. The infantry and artillery had taken some of the murder out of their promenade and it didn’t look as if the airplanes could work today. Rain which had been dripping down greasily from the skies for days had stopped finally but the sky still hung low and wet-looking over the countryside.

Then the sky began to lift, very slowly, but all in one piece like the curtain of a show and the infantry watched it go up and watched the sun wear at it with its light and heat and wear it thinner and thinner until at last the gray was the color of threadbare cloth and they could see the pale-yellow overlay of the sun through it.

There were miles of people watching in silence the slow inch by inch lift of their ceiling of sky, from 6 o’clock in the morning on. At 6 o’clock, the sky’s ceiling seemed to lay on your face, then at 7 o’clock your face was clear of it and was clinging like with gray fingers to trees and so on and on, lifting higher and higher until at 11:40 the first airplanes came over and the infantry knew for sure that its legs were going to get a workout.

Artillery gets answer

The artillery was pounding good by this time and there was some answer from the Germans. The Nazis were searching the roads and back areas. Searching is a word artillery people like to use but it’s more like clawing. Four of five shells come down on you like a paw and rake you. Then a swift clawing paw rakes alongside of you and in back. It’s a flurry of swift-clawing paws like an animal striking out because you’ve come too close and you hug where you are and stay still and then when its quiet crawl closer. You can’t see the animal and he can’t see you, but there is the feeling in you that you can hear his frightened, dangerous breathing as you crawl closer.

The bombers ran across the sky like girls and vapor blew behind them as if there were skirts blowing in the wind. Then they swooped down and the sound of their bombs dropping all in a packet drummed across the fields and drummed beating wildly up and down the silent country lanes.

Bombs take long time to fall

Flying Fortresses came after them, they sailed with the silvery, gleaming like ships in line each formation of 12 shooting a white smoke flare that dropped the rough skies of foaming yarn. Their bombs took a long time to fall. They came from very high up and the sound of them took a long time to reach us. When it came it was like drumming again, a very wild, drunken, unmusical drumming with an upheaving effect to it like a buried multitude beating up against the surface of the earth. The blasts were ironed out by the two or three miles between us and the bombs so that all they did was to fill our ears a little bit and flap out trousers against our legs.

The infantry now stepped off against the German hedges. They walked erect and they went about a hundred yards every three minutes. There were some fellows killed, a few more wounded but not many.

Pulled our when planes came

Most of the Germans had pulled out when the airplanes came over. They knew we meant business and that arithmetic was against them. They knew that if they stayed, they must inevitably be killed and that was the arithmetic of it. The only thing they could gain by dying was time.

The German command had to decide whether that time was worth buying with the lives of their men there or wherever it would be more useful to pull them out and open a little hole in the line, then ring the hole with big guns and blow men down who ventured into it.

Decide to open hole

The German command decided to open the hole. They made it like a giant maw there and the infantry, knowing exactly what it was, walked steadily into it, going at about 100 yards every three minutes, standing erect and pausing to fire only when fired upon by small arms, not stopping for howitzer shells or mortars but going through the dust and pelting dirt of that opening with white faces and eyes running from side to side as though gripped in their sockets and bodies standing straight up. That part of it at least was the way men would walk.

The queen of battles pulled its train along through the muddy, dirty country lands. You couldn’t see anything of it before the battle, it was hidden in all the fields.

Slowly comes out

Then slowly it began coming out into the lanes, big snorting trucks, spewing squelches of mud from their massive wheels and skittering little jeeps, motorcycles and columns of men stopped under the loads of radios and bundles of wire and heavy mortars and bazookas all covered with green flowering twigs, filling the lanes, coming like a ghost army out of their invisible hiding and going slowly past the dead, looking slowly at the silent wounded coming back, wrinkling their noses over the stink of killed cattle rotting in the fields, watching a wounded cow limp past a herd that had fallen in a row, followed in his limping by a calf that nuzzled her mutely and going along, going along all this time past the broken teeth of the mouth the Germans had opened for them.

Weren’t firing much

Everybody knew he was going into the German mouth. The Germans weren’t firing much today, they were afraid to give away their positions to our artillery planes circling as slowly as falling leaves overhead. But planes come down at night and then the German guns rimming the mouth like jaws will try to clamp down.

The job is to break off those jaws from inside the mouth. The infantry filled the mouth by late this afternoon. They crossed the road and got in beyond in it, then they waited for the jaws to clamp down so that they could break them off there. In the outpost line beyond the infantry those fellows knew that tonight, while the German artillery was firing, German patrols would come out and try to capture some of them so that their intelligence could find out just what kind of an attack this was.

Some will wind up dead

In the moonless darkness tonight, the attempt will surely have some success, some of those fellows out there tonight are going to wind up dead and some are going to become prisoners. There will be German dead too. The outpost sit very quietly in their holes. Each of them knows someone or two or a half dozen of them are not going to be there by the time you read this. Each thinks it’s the other fellow who is going to get it and the Germans assembling for their patrol now somewhere behind the hedges think the same thing. Somebody in the crowd is going to get it but not him.

578

Völkischer Beobachter (July 28, 1944)

Seibert: Wir schaffen es!

Es hat keinen Deutschen, der diesen Namen verdient, in den letzten Wochen und Tagen gegeben, der nicht von schweren Sorgen erfüllt gewesen ist. Ernste Nachrichten von allen Seiten: In der Normandie die Landung der westlichen Invasionsmassen – die Landung als solche geglückt. In Italien ein verhältnismäßig rasches, wenn auch weit hinter den feindlichen Erwartungen bleibendes Zurückfallen. Im Osten ein titanisches, auch für uns verlustreiches Ringen mit umfangreichen Gebietsaufgaben. Und schließlich am 20. Juli jener heimtückische Schlag aus dem Dunkel, der uns um Haaresbreite des Führers beraubt hätte. Sprechen wir es offen und klar aus: Niemals seit Beginn dieses Krieges sind unsere Nerven und Herzen einer schwereren Belastungsprobe ausgesetzt gewesen wie in diesem Juli 1944.

Nichts zeugt stärker von der unverwüstlichen Lebenskraft, die der Nationalsozialismus in der geschichtlich so kurzen Ära seines Wirkens der Nation der Deutschen eingeimpft hat, als die heute schon weithin sichtbare Tatsache, daß der Stoß vom 20. Juli nicht zum „Gnadenstoß“ für unsere Sache geworden ist, sondern neue Kräfte aus uns geboren und neue Energien in uns wachgerüttelt hat. Erst in der größten Not zeigt sich, was wirklich in einem Menschen steckt. Mit Völkern, nationalen Bewegungen und Revolutionen ist es nicht anders. Der Feind selbst hat seine hohe, durch bittere Erfahrung gewonnene Meinung vom Reich und der Wehrmacht Adolf Hitlers unfreiwillig bekundet, als er am Tage nach dem Anschlag seine Völker davor warnte, nun auf einen raschen Zusammenbruch der deutschen Front und der deutschen Heimat zu rechnen.

Wir sind nie beliebt gewesen in der Welt, aber man hat uns immer Außerordentliches zugetraut, im Guten wie im Bösen. Seit das Reich nationalsozialistisch geworden ist, hat sich diese Einschätzung unserer Fähigkeiten so gesteigert, daß selbst die rosigsten Prophezeiungen der Gegenseite stets mit dem warnenden Nachsatz versehen wurden: „Aber hütet euch vor der Illusion, daß die Deutschen bereits am Ende ihres Lateins seien!“ Selbst die unbestreitbaren Erfolge des Sowjetfeindes im Osten und das lange Ausbleiben deutscher Gegenschläge auf den übrigen Fronten, einschließlich des Luftkriegsgebietes, haben Bolschewismus und Plutokratie bis auf den Tag nicht von dem Druck der Angst zu befreien vermocht, so laut aus durchsichtigen taktischen Gründen dann und wann auch die Siegesglocken geläutet wurden. „V1“ ist denn auch prompt und mit sichtlicher Verstörung als der erste neue Prankenschlag des deutschen Löwen gebucht worden.

In seiner inhaltsreichen, von kalt beherrschter Leidenschaft getragenen Rede hat der neue Reichsbevollmächtigte für den totalen Kriegseinsatz uns nüchtern die materielle Voraussetzung für den Sieg geschildert. Er hat den Vorsprung angedeutet, den unsere Waffentechnik durch gänzlich neuartige Gedanken in den letzten beiden Jahren hinter den verschwiegenen Mauern der Laboratorien und Werkstätten erarbeitet hat – in diesen beiden Jahren, in denen das Rüstungsvolumen des Feindes uns mehr und mehr zu erdrücken schien. Dr. Goebbels hat ausdrücklich hinzugefügt, daß nüchterne Tatsachen ihn zu einer solchen Sprache berechtigen.

Der Führer hat uns durch seinen Erlass vom 25. Juli aufgefordert, das Höchstmaß von Kräften für Wehrmacht und Rüstung freizumachen. Er hat uns, in die Sprache des praktischen Alltags übersetzt, aufgefordert, noch mehr zu leisten als bisher. Er hat aufs Neue eine totale Mobilmachung befohlen.

Kann man eine totale Mobilmachung zweimal durchführen? Ist es möglich, das Heldentum der Front, die Leistung des Arbeitenden und die Beharrung der Heimat noch mehr zu steigern? Wir sind uns ganz klar bewusst, lass viele dies im ersten Augenblick verneinen werden. Und doch: jeder, der sich in seinem eigenen Arbeits- und Kameradenkreis aufmerksam umsieht, wird ohne weiteres Punkte finden, an denen personell und materiell noch mehr eingespart werden kann. Jeder, der mit einem Funken Selbstkritik begabt ist, wird bei genauem Zusehen die überraschende Feststellung machen, daß auch er selbst dieses oder jenes noch zusätzlich zu leisten und auf das eine oder andere noch zu verzichten vermag. Opfer und Leistungen sind relative Begriffe: vieles, was uns 1939 als eine außerordentliche Zumutung erschienen wäre, empfanden wir 1942 als etwas beinahe Selbstverständliches, und mancher Verzicht, der uns 1942 noch beinahe das Herz gebrochen hatte, erscheint uns heute nach den Erfahrungen des Bombenterrors als eine durchaus erträgliche Sache. Wenn wir von diesen persönlichen Erfahrungen an uns selbst und unseren Beobachtungen an der eigenen Arbeitsstätte auf das große Gesamtgefüge der kämpfenden Nation schließen, so werden wir die Frage nach der Möglichkeit weiterer Mehrleistung, nach der Durchführbarkeit einer neuen totalen Mobilmachung ohne weiteres, ohne Phrase und Selbsttäuschung bejahen können und müssen.

Wir sprachen unmittelbar nach dem 20. Juli hier von den unerquicklichen Zuständen, die da und dort in den Schreibstuben des Ersatzheeres eingerissen sind. Die Schuld daran trugen in starkem Maße jene Verbrecher an wichtigen Stellen des Ersatzheeres, die nun entlarvt und ausgemerzt worden sind. Aber vergessen wir nicht, daß das Nachlassen der kämpferischen Energie und des Einsatzwillens nicht nur durch Bösartigkeit einiger weniger verursacht wird: Jeder Mensch, von wenigen Ausnahmenaturen abgesehen, läßt mit der Zeit in seiner Leistung nach, wenn er ständig die gleiche Arbeit verrichtet und durch keine neuen Antriebe aufgerüttelt wird. Jedem Sportsmann ist diese Tatsache ebenso bekannt wie jedem Betriebsführer und jedem soldatischen Kommandeur. Der Stoß vom 20. Juli aber hat die ganze Nation erschüttert und jedem einzelnen die Größe der drohenden Gefahren, die er vorher nur halb bewusst um sich herum wachsen sah, enthüllt. Dieses grausame Erwachen hat unser Volk aber nicht gelähmt, sondern seinen beleidigten Stolz aufs Neue geweckt und es seiner Kraft wieder voll bewusstwerden lassen. Es fühlt das eiserne Muß, es erkennt mit festem Blick die großen Möglichkeiten und es antwortet deshalb auf den Anruf seines Führers mit dem Wort: Wir schaffen es!

THEODOR SEIBERT

579

Cherbourger Hafen macht Sorgen

Vico, 27. Juli –
Zu einem der schwierigsten Probleme der zuständigen Dienststellen gehört die Aufräumung des Hafens von Cherbourg, meldet der Marinefachmann der Sunday Times. Vor allem hätten die Deutschen in umfassendster Weise den Hafen von Cherbourg vermint.

In jedem nur denkbaren Teil der Gewässer einschließlich des äußeren und inneren Hafens sowie innerhalb der geschlossenen Hafenbecken fänden sich Minen, sei es in tiefem oder flachem Wasser, in toten Ecken oder auch auf den Hauptankerplätzen. Viele Minen standen irgendwie mit den Bojen in Verbindung, so daß jedes Schiff, das an einer solchen Boje festmache, in die Luft fliegen müsse. Minen seien auch im gesamten Strandgebiet verstreut. Die Säuberung des Hafens sei durch die vielen versenkten Schiffe noch erschwert worden. Besonders die toten Winkel der Molen und Wellenbrecher seien schwer von den Minen zu säubern.

580

Die wachen Augen

SS-pk. Langsam neigen sich zwei Hügel zueinander, deren Hänge mit dichten, grünen Getreidefeldern bestanden sind. Das Tal ist von einem schmalen Pappelwäldchen durchzogen, in dessen Schatten ein Bach dem Talausgang klickernd und hell zufließt. Auf dem Hügel nach Norden haben die ersten Linien der SS-Grenadiere sich eingegraben. Ihre Schützenlöcher fügen sich ebenso unmerklich dem Gelände ein wie die des Gegners. Allein das Wrack eines englischen Panzers, das links ab am Rande einer zerschossenen Straße gegen den Horizont steht, bietet ein deutliches Mal, wo der Kampf in den vergangenen Tagen hin und her gewogt ist. Im Schatten des vordersten Höhenzuges ist ein eiliges Kommen und Gehen, denn dort werden Verwundete verladen, Bereitstellungen bezogen, und dorthin auch schafft der Nachschub das zur Front, was in den Kämpfen verbraucht werden wird.

Wenn Kampfpause ist, herrscht im Tal idyllische Ruhe und ein Frieden, den man ungestört glauben könnte, wenn nicht die zerborstenen Stämme am Bach eine allzu deutliche Warnung aussprächen. Die Granattrichter werden von den Getreidefeldern unsichtbar in den Schoss der Erde aufgenommen.

Das Tal und die beiden Hügel liegen ständig unter gezieltem Beschuss, der spüren läßt, daß der Gegner von irgendeinem Punkt aus Einblick in das Gelände hat. Seit 24 Stunden sind unsere Grenadiere dabei, den englischen Artilleriebeobachter ausfindig zu machen. Vergeblich!

Dem alten Rottenführer, der vom Feldzug in Polen bis in die Tiefen der östlichen Steppen alles erlebt hat, was dieser Krieg dem Soldaten an Aufgaben überhaupt stellen konnte, will das nicht in den Kopf. Sein „Eigensinn“ ist in der Kompanie nicht als die störrische Willkür eines Widerspenstigen bekannt, seine Sturheit gilt vielmehr als das Zeichen eines erfahrenen Soldaten, der bisher noch mit jeder auch noch so schwierigen Lage fertig zu werden verstand.

Er nimmt sein Gewehr, macht sich aus dem schmalen Bunker der vordersten Linie davon und springt gebückt längs eines Grabens, der die Höhe des ersten. Hügels erreicht bergan. Die Pausen des Artilleriebeschusses muß er schnell und geistesgegenwärtig nutzen, wenn er nicht in den Feuerschlägen untergehen will. Nun liegt er oben und vor ihm breiten sich die beiden Hänge und das Tal, deren Lieblichkeit für ihn vollkommen versunken ist in jener besonderen Landschaftsbetrachtung des Krieges, in der es nur nach rein militärischen Gesetzen zu sehen gilt. Er späht das Gelände hinauf und hinab, doch kann er nichts entdecken. Er gibt es später selbst zu, daß es nichts Bestimmtes war, was er gesucht hat, sondern daß er sich allein von seinem Instinkt führen ließ, der ihn nun schon durch fünf Kriegsjahre begleitet hat. Er zupft sich einen Getreidehalm ab und nimmt ihn zwischen die Lippen. Er liegt, kaut und schaut.

Der Himmel in der Normandie ist in diesen Tagen wechselnd. Graue Wolken ziehen niedrig und zerfetzt über die Täler und Hügel des Landes. Jetzt braust von Norden her ein Windstoß das Tal hinauf und fährt in die Getreidefelder, daß die Halme wie die Wellen eines Meeres sich senken und wieder steigen. Gelb treten dabei die Granattrichter aus den grünen Wogen hervor, und dort – ein einziger Blick hat genügt – erspäht sein scharfes Auge zwischen dem Grün und Braun einen Fleck grauer Farbe, der nicht in die Landschaft zu gehören scheint. Langsam arbeitet er sich durch das Getreidefeld den Hang hinab. Immer wieder pfeifen, während er sich vorsichtig voranarbeitet, die Granaten des Feindes heran, um mit spitzem und bösem Knall vernichtend zu detonieren. Längst ist ihm wieder der graue Fleck im dichten Grün des Getreides entschwunden, aber er weiß, wo er ihn zu suchen und zu finden hat. Er durchläuft das Wäldchen und überspringt den Bach. Nun geht es wieder hügelan. Und plötzlich zeichnet sich vor ihm im Getreidefeld eine dunkle Stelle ab, die er lange beobachtet. Er hört leise Geräusche, die er nicht zu deuten vermag, deren Natur aber sein empfindliches Ohr als feindlich empfindet. Längst hat er das Gewehr zu sich herangezogen und den Sicherungsflügel herumgelegt.

Wieder nähert sich ein Windstoß dem Getreidefeld. Der Rottenführer geht langsam hoch, und jetzt, wo die große Woge des Sturmes die Halme beugt, erspäht er die Uniform eines Gegners. In der gleichen Sekunde bricht ein Schuss. Wieder hält die Erde den Soldaten in ihrem bergenden Arm, und er wartet, was nun geschieht. Doch das Getreidefeld bleibt still bis auf ein leises Stöhnen, das aus der Richtung des dunklen Fleckes zu ihm dringt. Mit wenigen Sätzen pirscht er sich heran. Der Feind hat seinen artilleristischen Beobachter mit einem kleinen Gerät in der Nacht vorgeschickt. Aus der Verborgenheit des Getreidefeldes hat der Beobachter das Feuer ins Ziel gelenkt. Fast in der gleichen Sekunde trommelt der Gegner ein wahlloses Störungsfeuer über das Tal und die beiden Hügel. Dann erlischt das Feuer, als wäre einer Lunge das Atmen vergangen.

Nach einer Stunde kehrt der Rottenführer aufrecht in seinen Bunker zu den Kameraden zurück.

SS-Kriegsberichter Dr. ROLF BONGS

581

Innsbrucker Nachrichten (July 28, 1944)

Steigende Heftigkeit der Abwehrschlacht im Osten

Erbitterte Kämpfe bei Saint-Lô – Im Zuge einer Frontbegradigung Lemberg, Brest-Litowsk, Bialystok und Dünaburg geräumt

dnb. Aus dem Führerhauptquartier, 28. Juli –
Das Oberkommando der Wehrmacht gibt bekannt:

Im Kampfraum beiderseits Saint-Lô setzten die Nordamerikaner ihren Großangriff den ganzen Tag über fort. Während ihnen östlich Saint-Lô einige unwesentliche Einbrüche gelangen, wurden unsere Truppen südwestlich der Stadt in erbitterten und beiderseits verlustreichen Kämpfen weiter nach Süden und Südwesten zurückgedrängt. Die Gegenangriffe zur Schließung der an einigen Stellen aufgerissenen Front sind im Gange. 75 Panzer wurden abgeschossen. Im Abschnitt von Caen führte der Gegner nur erfolglose Angriffe geringen Umfangs.

Jagd- und Schlachtfliegerverbände schossen in Luftkämpfen zehn feindliche Flugzeuge ab.

Torpedoflieger versenkten in der Nacht zum 27. Juli in der Seinebucht einen feindlichen Tanker von 4.000 BRT und beschädigten vier Transportschiffe mit 25.000 BRT und einen Zerstörer schwer.

Im Ostteil der Seinebucht erzielte eine Heeresküstenbatterie mehrere Treffer auf einem feindlichen Schlachtschiff.

Sicherungsfahrzeuge eines deutschen Geleits schossen vor der Loiremündung von acht angreifenden feindlichen Jagdbombern sechs ab.

Im französischen Raum wurden 42 Terroristen im Kampf niedergemacht.

Schweres „V1“-Vergeltungsfeuer liegt fast ununterbrochen auf dem Großraum von London.

In Italien tastete der Feind unsere gesamte Front durch zahlreiche örtliche Angriffe ab. Der Schwerpunkt der feindlichen Aufklärungsvorstöße lag im Abschnitt südlich Florenz und an der adriatischen Küste. Alle Angriffe wurden vor unseren Stellungen abgewiesen.

Seit den frühen Morgenstunden ist der Feind in breiter Front südlich Florenz erneut zum Großangriff angetreten. Heftige Kämpfe sind entbrannt.

An der Ostfront hat die große Abwehrschlacht zwischen den Karpaten und dem Finnischen Meerbusen an Heftigkeit noch zugenommen. Nachdem es dem Feind an verschiedenen Abschnitten gelungen war, zum Teil in unsere Front einzubrechen, wurden zur Kräfteeinsparung in einigen Abschnitten vorspringende Frontbogen zurückgenommen. Im Zuge dieser Frontbegradigung wurden nach Zerstörung aller militärisch wichtigen Anlagen die Städte Lemberg, Brest-Litowsk, Bialystok und Dünaburg geräumt.

In Galizien setzten sich unsere Truppen befehlsmäßig auf neue Stellungen im Karpatenvorland ab und schlugen dann alle Angriffe der scharf nachdrängenden Sowjets ab.

Westlich des San sind wechselvolle Kämpfe mit vordringenden feindlichen Angriffsspitzen im Gange.

Zwischen dem oberen Bug und der Weichsel wurden von Panzern unterstützte Angriffe der Sowjets in erbittertem Ringen nach Abschuß zahlreicher feindlicher Panzer abgewiesen.

Im Abschnitt Bialystok und Kauen scheiterten örtliche Angriffe der Bolschewisten. Nördlich Kauen sind heftige Kämpfe mit feindlichen Panzer- und Aufklärungskräften im Gange.

An der Front zwischen Dünaburg und dem Finnischen Meerbusen brachen wiederum zahlreiche schwere Angriffe verlustreich für den Feind zusammen.

Starke Schlachtfliegerverbände unterstützten die Abwehrkämpfe des Heeres und vernichteten in Tiefangriffen 71 feindliche Panzer und über 400 Fahrzeuge. In der Nacht waren der Bahnhof von Wilna und sowjetische Truppenansammlungen westlich Lublin das Angriffsziel schwerer deutscher Kampfflugzeuge.

Nordamerikanische Bomber führten einen Terrorangriff gegen Budapest. Durch deutsche und ungarische Luftverteidigungskräfte wurden 29 feindliche Flugzeuge, darunter 26 viermotorige Bomber, zum Absturz gebracht.

In der vergangenen Nacht warfen feindliche Flugzeuge Bomben auf einige Orte in Westdeutschland und in Ostpreußen. In der Stadt Insterburg entstanden Schäden und Personenverluste. Drei Flugzeuge wurden abgeschossen.

582

Supreme HQ Allied Expeditionary Force (July 28, 1944)

Communiqué No. 105

In the western sector, Allied forces have maintained their rapid advances.

Our troops have pushed forward west of MARIGNY to the vicinity of CAMPROND and south-west to the vicinity of CERISY-LA-SALLE.

Other formations have advanced south of PÉRIERS.

Ground has also been gained west of CAUMONT.

South of CAEN, our positions remain firm.

A number of attempts by the enemy to develop counterattacks have been broken up by our artillery and supporting aircraft which were active throughout yesterday on both sectors.

In the western sector, fighter-bombers patrolled ahead of the advancing armored columns, attacking tank units, gun positions, defended hedgerows and observation posts as far as COUTANCES and southward to VILLEBAUDON.

In the eastern battle sector, rocket-firing aircraft scored hits on tanks and motorized infantry targets.

East and south of the battle area, fighter-bombers in strength attacked rail targets. In the AMIENS–SAINT-QUENTIN area in an ammunition train was blown up. Other rolling stock was attacked and rails cut in many places.

During yesterday, at least 23 enemy planes were destroyed in the air. Twenty-one of our aircraft are missing from all operations.

Communiqué No. 106

In the western sector, there has been some progress south of LESSAY where Allied troops have advanced down the LESSAY–COUTANCES road to the vicinity of MARGUERIN.

Further east, our forces have advanced up both banks of the river AY to the area of CORBUCHON.

On the PÉRIERS–COUTANCES road, a strong armored thrust has joined the westward drive from MARIGNY in the outskirts of COUTANCES. Our forces have passed through NOTRE-DAME-DE-CENILLY and are continuing down the road to the southwest. Another force has passed through MAUPERTUS, north of PERCY. Our forces have taken TESSY-SUR-VIRE and have continued along the road southwest of the town. We are eleven kilometers from GAVRAY.

South of SAINT-LÔ and CAUMONT, we have improved our positions.

Our aircraft continued their support of the ground forces, concentrating on road and rail targets, as weather permitted. Light and medium bombers cut rail lines radiating from PARIS to MONTARGIS, DIJON, MOULINS, TOURS, and ROUEN. Supply stores near BRÉCEY and CAILLOUET were hit. Fighter-bombers later destroyed rolling stock in railyards at BUEIL and near MAINTENON.

583

The Pittsburgh Press (July 28, 1944)

Yanks race to trap Germans

Two U.S. columns drive into Coutances, another takes Tessy
By Virgil Pinkley, United Press staff writer

map.072844.up
New sweeping advances were made by U.S. forces in Normandy, scoring gains in the following places: (1) a drive south of Lessay and across the Ay River; (2) an advance to the outskirts of Coutances, linking up with another column (3) driving down the road from Saint-Lô; (4) a smash south of Maupertus, and (5) the capture of Tessy-sur-Vire. In addition, other U.S. troops captured high ground south of Saint-Lô (6) and advanced between Saint-Lô and Caumont. On the eastern end of the front, around Caen, the stalemate continued.

SHAEF, London, England –
Two U.S. armored columns closed in today from the north and east on Coutances, Normandy transport hub commanding the escape corridor of seven German divisions, and drove into its outskirts after making a junction.

Capitalizing swiftly on the American armored breakthrough, which shattered the German defenses in western Normandy, 1st Army spearheads struck into the edge of Coutances and completed the encirclement of Nazi troops northeast of the imminently threatened town.

The other remnants of the seven Nazi divisions north of Coutances were falling back in disorderly retreat in a panicky effort to escape southward before the Americans captured the town and cut the last practical escape routes out of the fast-shrinking pocket.

United Press correspondent Henry T. Gorrell reported from 1st Army headquarters that the columns advancing southward from Périers and westward along the road from Saint-Lô joined at Coutances and struck into the outskirts.

Another takes Tessy

Still another column of U.S. armor plunged forward five miles to capture Tessy-sur-Vire, 10 miles due south of Saint-Lô, after a duel with retiring German tanks.

Slightly to the west, a spearhead was driven two miles south-southwest of Maupertus and within less than a mile of Percy, a road town 15 miles southeast of Coutances and seven miles southwest of Tessy.

Mr. Gorrell rode up with the armored forces extending the American breakthrough to a depth of 15 miles in the Coutances area, and reported while the main force was still a little over two miles from the town that its fall appeared imminent.

Another village falls

One U.S. column struck down Lessay Road, 2½ miles below the fallen western anchor of the crumpled German defenses and captured the village of Marguerite. Slightly to the east, another moved down the Ay Valley about four miles and seized Corbuchon, seven miles north of Coutances and five southeast of Lessay.

A headquarters spokesman said the Germans were withdrawing as fast as possible along the main road down the west coast, with various degrees of confusion in their ranks.

Stronghold is outflanked

Coutances was already outflanked on the southeast by armored units which captured the eight-way highway junction of Cerisy-la-Salle, 11 miles southwest of Saint-Lô, and Notre-Dame-de-Cenilly, two and three-quarter miles southeast of Cerisy.

On the east wing of the American front, Gen. Bradley’s forces advanced two miles south of Le Mesnil-Herman, cutting a lateral road, and struck out southeast and southwest down other roads leading inland to the heart of Normandy.

U.S. infantry moved forward to improve their positions west of Caumont at the extreme eastern end of the American line, while a new attack a little over a mile southeast of Saint-Lô overran Hill 101. This assault was apparently aimed at ironing out the hump in the line immediately east of Saint-Lô.

Although the weather held down air activity in support of the American breakthrough drive, fighter-bombers based in France blasted German tanks and horse-drawn artillery a mile ahead of the American armor. Pilots reported that the advanced ground elements were beyond Saint-Martin-de-Cenilly, a mile southeast of Notre-Dame-de-Cenilly.

Supreme Headquarters did not expect to know for several days how many Germans will be rounded up as a result of the breakthrough. The seven divisions in the pocket below Coutances had taken a bad beating and were far below normal strength.

British sector quiet

The British end of the Normandy front was quiet after guns and planes broke up another German attempt to form for an attack in the Verrières area late yesterday.

United Press correspondent James McGlincy reported that one U.S. armored column advanced 3½ miles to within 1½ miles of Tessy-sur-Vire, 10 miles south of Saint-Lô. Reconnaissance airmen said the town appeared to have been abandoned by the Germans.

The Germans appeared to be in panicky retreat all along the 40-mile western half of the Normandy front as the greatest tank offensive ever mounted in Western Europe went into its fourth day. Allied Supreme Headquarters said there was no longer “any question of a line on the U.S. front.”

Slashing forward at will under a mighty umbrella of dive bombers, fighter-bombers and fighters, Gen. Bradley’s tank columns engulfed dozens of roadside hamlets and villages and appeared well on the way toward breaking completely out of the Normandy bottleneck, paving the way for a drive on Paris.

The proportions of the German rout were mounting almost hourly. More than 3,000 prisoners were taken in the first three days of the offensive and Mr. Gorrell said he counted at least 700 more streaming back from the front in trucks this morning.

Tank units self-sufficient

Considerable amounts of enemy material have been destroyed, front dispatches said. The Germans were known to have gambled all available strength on containing the Allies in the Normandy Peninsula, and a breakthrough to the interior of France probably would result in an Allied advance to the west at a pace rivalling that of the German push to the French coast in 1940.

Mr. Gorrell said:

What happens next is likely to influence the entire course of the war. We have hundreds of armored vehicles operating within enemy country right now.

He also revealed that the tank columns were self-sufficient carrying their own gasoline, ammunition and food supplies.

The stalemate continued on the British part of the front southwest and south of Caen, with British and Canadian artillery fire and supporting fighters and fighter-bombers breaking up a number of German counterattacks before they could get fully underway.

The American command was ramming at least five main armored prongs through the retreating Germans west, southwest and south of Saint-Lô, with resistance slight along the whole line. German planes heavily bombed the American lines at 3:00 a.m. today, but the advance went ahead on schedule.

584

MacGowan: Yanks fire from ditches, hedgerows near Marigny

Town strategically captured, but tactically it was still in German hands
By Gault MacGowan, North American Newspaper Alliance

With U.S. forces in Normandy, France –
Though strategically ours, Marigny, a pretty Normandy town, was still tactically in enemy hands when I approached. A battalion had the job of clearing the enemy out, while our flying columns pushed ahead on either side.

Street fighting was in progress and the enemy was shipping us from houses in the town or straggling out of it and shooting from woods just beyond, which commanded the road as we came down the valley. We, on one side, and they, on the other, could look down into the town – really little more than a village – and “see down each other’s throats,” as someone graphically described it.

Runs into orchard

It wasn’t too comfortable on our side of the road and my jeep driver from Illinois ran the vehicle into a little apple orchard, while I talked with the infantry boys shooting from ditches and from sheltering hedgerows.

This street and village fighting isn’t exactly a movie cameraman’s dream. Nor does it move with the pace you might think. It’ s more like evicting a band of gangsters out of a city dwelling in which they have barricaded themselves. There’s a lot of lying around to do, keeping the bandits engaged with your fire while the police get around at them over the rooftops.

Takes time

It takes time to locate the exact building from which their fire comes and a good deal more time than just attacking a gang of bandits, because there is not just one gang, but several, each keeping you covered lest you attempt to isolate them.

So, it’s your supporting fire against the enemy’s and it takes old hands to do the job with a minimum of delay.

It is just another variation of hedge warfare which you don’t learn on drill ground or on Hollywood sets. This is a pocket-handkerchief country with hedges wound around every one- or two-acre lot and villages that are laid out in a snakelike fashion and not on the square.

585

20 Nazis surrender to Negro signalman

With U.S. troops near Marigny, France (UP) –
A Negro signalman was stringing wire along the road near Marigny last night when a German suddenly approached him in the darkness.

He jumped and shouted: “Who dat?”

At the same time, he reached for his rifle and started firing. That brought 20 more Germans tumbling from the hedges. They had been waiting all around him and debating whether to surrender. His random shots convinced them.

The Negro shouted for help and got it.

586

Mistake bombing kills U.S. troops

U.S. 9th Air Force HQ, Normandy, France (UP) – (July 26, delayed)
About 50 Flying Fortresses and medium bombers dropped bombs shot of their assigned area and killed and wounded American soldiers during yesterday’s record 3,000-plane bombardment of enemy lines west of Saint-Lô, Maj. Gen. Lewis Brereton acknowledged today.

Gen. Brereton, commander of the 9th Air Force, told correspondents that the American casualties were much fewer than had been feared and added that:

You are practically certain to have some shorts when you have that many planes in the air and resulting smoke obscures the ground.

In the case of one group of Havoc bombers, he said, the bombing release mechanism on the lead plane went wrong and bombs plummeted down 10,000 yards short of the scheduled area. Other planes in the group immediately released their explosives.

Though practically the entire mass of bombs fell in the assigned area 9,000 yards long and 2,000 yards wide, Gen. Brereton admitted that the Army was not satisfied with the results of the mass bombardment, presumably because of its failure to bring a quick breakthrough by tanks and infantry.

The breakthrough was achieved late Wednesday and Thursday, however.

He said the bombardment was planned at the request of the Army commander, who indicated the area to be hit.

587

British claim –
Monty plays Caen battle like a champ

Some think war is almost over
By L. S. B. Shapiro, North American Newspaper Alliance

With British and Canadian forces below Caen, France – (July 26, delayed)
Despite the disappointing pace of our advance south of Caen and the violence of German resistance to every thrust made in this sector, feeling grows among all tanks in this portion of Normandy that the war in Europe may fold up quickly. The notion that the war has reached the stage comparable to August 1918 becomes more firmly fixed even as the German defensive reaction becomes more stubborn and effective.

This seemingly is an incongruous observation and yet it is an honest one. Yesterday was not a particularly good day for British and Canadian troops on this front; progress was limited to about one mile. Today there has been practically no forward movement against the screen of guns and dug-in tanks the Germans have thrown up along the ridge which dominates the Laize Valley.

Yet all along our line, I have heard officers speak in the same breath of the doggedness of the German resistance and of the expectation that the war in Europe is almost finished.

Rommel lacks reserves

Events inside Germany, the phenomenal Russian advance, and Prime Minister Churchill’s pointed observation while he was in Normandy last Sunday – all these helped to make firm this expectation. But the real explanation may be found in the battle situation on the Normandy front.

Men fighting on this front base their calculation on three points. The first is that the whole line from southeast Caen to the western shore of the Cherbourg Peninsula contains a single battle which is now in process of being fought. The second is that Marshal Rommel has brought almost everything he has into line for a last-ditch stand and has very little else to back him. The third is that Gen. Sir B. L. Montgomery is holding the initiative firmly and is fighting the sort of battle of which he is an undoubted master. The actions fought here and there along the line are still jigsaw pieces in Gen. Montgomery’s main gain which is yet to be revealed.

Like champion boxer

As one officer put it to me this morning:

Monty is playing this like a champion boxer. He knows he’s got Rommel beat. If he wanted to, he could wade in and slug to a victory. But he wants to play it nicely – to jockey Rommel into position and then let him have the haymaker.

588

Eyewitness story –
Gorrell: Yanks to try bold maneuver to trap Nazis

Germans rushing up men to stop us
By Henry T. Gorrell, United Press staff writer

Five miles from Coutances, France (UP) –
Guns are booming a prelude to the next big battle of the Normandy campaign – a bold attempt by Lt. Gen. Omar N. Bradley’s armored army to trap the German 84th Army Corps north of Coutances.

The Germans already know what we are up to and our spotters report they have rushed up reinforcements of artillery, anti-tank guns and mortars during the last few hours in an attempt to protect the bottleneck at Coutances until the 84th Corps can slip out.

Resistance is stiff

On arrival at this armored command post, I was informed that our tank spearheads had probed to within 2½ miles of the vital road junction and that other tank units, supported by motorized infantry, were dashing north and northwest of the Marigny–Coutances highway in an attempt to cut roads north of the town.

They were meeting stiff German resistance centered on Hill 176, located on one of the highways running into Coutances just south of Mont Houchon, off to our right.

Great convoy moves

A great convoy of multi-wheeled vehicles and halftracks is bringing the infantry down from Marigny to join the battle. Giant bulldozers are clearing a path for them through roads littered with burned and blasted Nazi Panther and Tiger tanks. I saw many of these scorched monsters lying overturned in shell holes at the roadside where the bulldozers had shoved them.

The countryside west of Marigny is infested with German troops bypassed in our rapid advance. That they did not fire on my jeep as I motored toward the front, I attribute to the fleet of Piper Cub spotter planes which patrols the roads at treetop height looking for signs of the enemy.

Prisoners brought in

When these Cubs spot an enemy concentration, they radio a report to batteries which at once open up. Hundreds of German prisoners are coming in from such bypassed points, including paratroops wearing camouflaged helmets and fatigue uniforms.

I watched a long line of them being herded toward prisoner pens. They were young and cocky and they walked with a spry step. There was nothing beaten about them. They merely had been outmaneuvered and had quit when they saw resistance was futile. Some of them complained that if our tanks hadn’t broken through behind them, they never would have been beaten.

589

Editorial: Gen. McNair

When the Army Chief of Staff last month inspected the Normandy beachhead, he was asked what impressed him most. Gen. Marshall replied that American troops never before under fire had fought like veterans. This was the highest tribute to the bravery and skill of America’s citizen-soldiers. It was also praise – as every soldier and officer knew – for the man who had organized and trained them.

Lt. Gen. McNair was not as well known to the public as such famous front commanders as Gens. Eisenhower, MacArthur, Stilwell and Bradley. But without his work and achievement theirs would have been impossible, as they have always said. He expanded an American Army of 1,500,000 into a team of 7,700,000. They came to him amateurs; they left him professionals. He even followed them to the fighting fronts to check on their training and perfect it, as he did last year in Tunisia where he was wounded.

It was not accident that made Gen. McNair chief of the Army Ground Forces. He had long been known as “the GHQ sparkplug.” Gen. Marshall had called him “the brains of the Army.”

So, Gen. McNair trained the G.I.s, believing that “the infantryman is our foremost soldier.” He was forever reminding his associates that other arms of the service could prepare the way, but the ground soldier must take and hold positions. When the tank loomed large, he, an old artilleryman, helped to bring up the anti-tank weapons and tactics.

He even matched the morale of more glamorous services. When the humble mud-slogging G.I. seemed neglected for the more publicized airmen, paratroopers, tankmen and others, he set up a unit to educate press and public in the Army truism that “the infantry is the Queen of Battles.”

Two weeks ago, the big training job almost done, the War Department announced that the chief of the Army Ground Forces had been given another important assignment overseas. Yesterday the Department announced that he had been “killed by enemy fire while observing the action of our frontline units in the recent offensive” in Normandy.

Americans everywhere, indebted to this great and gallant officer, join in Gen. Marshall’s tribute to him: “Had he the choice, he probably would have elected to die as he did, in the forefront of the attack.”