D-Day and onwards: Dragoon in the South

The 15^th August was the 65th anniversary of the allied landing in the south of France – Operation Dragoon. This has not received much attention, primarily because, like all the Normandy beach landings except Omaha, it was a fairly straightforward operation, and unlike at Omaha Beach, the landings went according to plan and on time. By the time it took place, most German defences had moved north, so progress was fairly rapid through France.

The D-Day landings were an international effort with only a minority of Americans, but in the south this was a mostly American landing, though with extensive support from the RAF, British Paratroopers and the Royal Navy, and of course French commandos and other troops, especially the Free French 1st Army, under General Jean de Lattre de Tassigny.

Churchill had opposed the plan, because he believed it would have an impact on the main invasion efforts, but eventually agreed to it. Wikipedia has an accurate overview of the events here.

Although overall, there was not excessive opposition, there were still casualties. My father was one of those landing, as a Warrant Officer in the RAF, organising transport for the air operations. As he ran up the beach at St Maxime – just along from another fishing village called St Tropez – his friend running beside him was hit by an enemy bullet, and killed outright. A couple of feet to the side and I would not be here to write about it.

The full personal story of his war from 1939 until demob in 1946, is at www.one-mans-war.com, although he doesn’t mention that – rather significant - incident! In fact, there are many other incidents that he doesn’t mention, mainly because the memoirs were written, as a therapeutic exercise, over a few days. There are however, many interesting and unexpected details. The memoirs have been published as an eBook titled One Man's War:in the RAF from 1939-1946 for Kindle and other eReaders, details on the website.

There is a new book about the south landings, which was reviewed in a local paper. Unfortunately, I left the paper in a café, and now I cannot find any reference to the book anywhere……

D-Day and on: 65 year commemorations

With the commemoration of the 65th Anniversary of D-Day itself now past, there have been many other memorials, gatherings and other marks of respect and recollection around the progress of the Allied invasion in summer 1944. Here are a few of them, picked at random to illustrate the range and variety of events, and the reasons they were held.

Canadian cemetery at Cinthaux

This is one of a number of cemeteries for those Canadian soldiers who died during both World Wars. Cinthaux is for those who died during the Caen, Falaise, Trun and Chambois phase of the invasion. There are 2980 Canadians buried there.

The former French health minister Simone Veil attended a memorial service there on August 9th; a survivor from the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp where she lost part of her family, she is the Honorary President of the Fondation pour la Mémoire de la Shoah.

Liberation of Alencon 12 August

This was the first town to be liberated by the Free French Army, under General Leclerc. The French had been part of the D-Day forces, along with Canadians and Poles, and with the British made up the greater part of the invasion forces. The fact of the French liberating part of their own country makes Alencon a very important commemoration for them.

Bailey Bridge at Pont Farcy

There were over 1500 Bailey Bridges in Normandy in 1944, and the last one still in existence is at Pont Farcy, over the River Vire. There bridges were easily assembled , in effect like IKEA furniture, and replaced all the essential bridges destroyed by one side or the other. There has been a campaign to preserve and commemorate the bridge, and details can be found here:

http://www.christopherlong.co.uk/baileybridge/baileybridgeappeal.html

Murdered family

One of the more moving ceremonies was that remembering the Lebailleux family, who lived in St Planchers, a village near Granville. At the end of July 1944 the area was still occupied by German forces. On the night of 30 July, German soldiers raided the house and found a transmitter hidden there. They took away all four members of the family in the house: parents Louis and Ludivine, and children Louis and Simone. The next day all four were found shot dead.

Coutances – liberated but lost

The town of Coutances had 8,000 people living in it. It suffered an enormous amount of bombing on 6 June, and subsequent days. Between bombings, almost all the population (over 250 were already dead) retreated into the countryside. When eventually they returned, about 70% of the town was rubble. Page 3 of this pdf file has pictures from the time. This year there were a range of services, parades, and other memorial activities. As with many Norman towns, liberation came at a high price.

Chateau reunion

A couple of years ago a couple called Simon and Kate Howard bought a chateau at Langotiere, near St Lo. In the archives they found a photograph from 1944, showing a number of schoolchildren standing 9on the steps of the chateau. They were from nearby schools, escaping the bombardment of St Lo. An article in the local newspaper found about 19 of them still around, and this month 10 of them gathered on the same steps.

D-Day 65 controversies?

So, here we are at D-Day plus 65 years, and there are two controversies. The first is the lunatic assertion by President Sarkozy that 'D-Day is traditionally a Franco-American event'. That is admirably demolished by the writer Agnes Poirier, in a piece in the Guardian newspaper. All the French people I have spoken to are outraged. Not only has Sarkozy now had to back down on inviting the Queen by French pressure, Barrack Obama also told him he was wrong, and has since refused a dinner invitation from him. 

The second, which is discussed on the BBC website, is what they are calling 'revisionism' – the idea that not all was wonderful about the original D-Day and the following events. I have made the same points before on this blog - here and in particular here. One only has to look at photographs of utterly destoyed towns where the sole standing building is the church steeple, preserved for aiming and range finding, to understand the horror of the process, never mind the fact that civilian deaths outnumbered those of the military.

Perhaps a good summary of how we should mark the anniversary is the 6 June editorial on the front page of the local Ouest France newspaper: after referring to Churchill's determination, and the role of the then Queen, it goes on to say: Rendons hommage aux soldats des États-Unis, blancs et noirs, aux Canadiens, à tous ceux du Commonwealth qui vinrent mourir pour nous, loin de leur pays. Rendons hommage aussi aux forces armées libres comme les Forces françaises combattantes ou les brigades polonaises, à tous les résistants des pays européens occupés qui avaient poursuivi leur combat malgré la défaite de 1940 ; mais aussi aux armées de Russie dont, en débarquant ici, les alliés ont voulu soulager la peine. (Render homage to the soldiers of the US, white and black, to the Canadians, to all those of the Commonwealth who came to die for us, far from their countries. Render homage as well to free armed forces like the French fighting forces and the Polish brigades, to all the resistance of the occupied countries who continued their fight after the defeat of 1940; but also the armies of Russia, who by landing here the allies relieved their suffering - my translation). 

The real point, surely, is to recognise and respect the terrible realities of the time, and learn not to repeat the horrors. To do that we need to remember exactly what happened. Not a Hollywood version, not an edited by special interests version, but the horror, the mistakes, the failures and bad behaviour, as well as the heroism of ordinary civilians and armed forces.

I previously mentioned my father's memoirs of his time in the RAF throughout World War II: these can now be found as a collection of pdf files at www.one-mans-war.com They have also been published as an eBook for Kindle and other readers, and can be bought from Amazon and other eBook sellers; details on the website.

Visiting Normandy for D-Day +65

A few helpful quick tips for people planning to visit Normandy for the 65^th Anniversary of D-Day. From the UK, look at the British Legion site, and from the overall French perspective, check the official programme of events here.

Firstly, make your cross channel ferry reservations as early as you can. Now that P&O no longer travel the western crossings direct to Normandy, the remaining services – Brittany Ferries and LD Lines - will fill up quickly. There is not likely to be a problem on the short crossings to Calais and Boulogne (unless the French fishermen blockade the ports again, which is always possible – but to get to Caen (Ouistreham) on the north coast nearest the landing beaches, or Cherbourg for the second phases of the invasion, or Le Havre for the consolidation, early booking is probably a good idea.

Hotel bookings will be essential. Try Logis de France for real independently owned hotels (see this blog item). Reasonably priced chains include Mercure, Ibis, Accord.

There are also some very cheap hotel chains, such as Formule 1, which are acceptably comfortable at very low prices. I prefer independent, quirky, little hotels which are usually cheap, in interesting towns, and all very different. Speaking as little French is probably essential, though.

A useful initiative is the Normandie Pass, which for a one off fee of one euro, provides reduced admission to museums, events and non D-Day attractions, products and services. If you want to see as much as possible, it can save you a fair bit of money, as well as lead you to some unexpected places and events.

There is a very large number of events being planned throughout the region. To find out details of what and when, visit any local Tourist office – Office de Tourisme, or Syndicat d'Iniative - where you will usually find English speaking staff, large volumes of usually free leaflets, guides and other materials. Look for the 'i' symbol on signs and streets.

None of the organisations mentioned here have paid anything to be named. Alas...

D-Day +65years: personal connection

This year’s 65^th anniversary of D-Day is a couple of months away, and sadly, will probably be the last significant anniversary where there will be more than a handful of survivors able to attend. My own father is 88 this year, and there are now only one or two of his former comrades from the RAF still around.

He will be coming to Normandy, as usual, this summer for a visit. He did not land in Normandy in 1944, but in the south of France in August, near St Tropez, in what was called the D-Day of the South, but which is now almost entirely overlooked. He had been fighting in Corsica before, so it was an obvious outcome as the northern invasion was making progress. It was no easy trip: landing on a beach under fire. His best mate beside him was shot dead as they ran; could have been him.

As the participants fade away, the facts become increasingly lost in the fog of Hollywood films and inventions. Few people, for example, seem aware of the tremendous importance and breathtaking innovation of the floating Mulberry harbours, which made the invasion possible, or know that of the five landing beaches only one was not an immediate success.

For the 60^th anniversary of D-Day, we took my father to the extraordinary and moving Memorial museum at Caen. This is dedicated to peace not war, and puts the emphasis on the people and not the hardware. When the staff knew he was an ancien combattant (veteran), we were all given free admission, and the constant help and attention of the incredibly soignée hôtesses who are the guides and attendants.

At one point, one of them kneeled beside him – he has to use a wheelchair these days – and said ‘Merci, merci pour tout vous avez faites pour la France’ – thank you for everything you did for France. As she said it the other people around were in tears, she was in tears, and though he tried hard not to let it show, so was my father. Later he said that this was the first time anyone had ever thanked him personally, and it was the first time he had realised that no one ever had.

Many of the exhibits in the museum are around the occupation, not just D-Day and its aftermath, with documents such as death sentences for resistance members, photographs of events, people and hardship – everything from death to starvation, and the resistance. My father also said later that this was the first time he had ever had to think about the occupation and the lives of the people they were invading, effectively to rescue.

We now rarely think of the reality of those days, or of the people, particularly civilians, who died during the occupation and the liberation. The photo at the top of this page is of the war memorial at Ouistreham, where all the western crossing ferries now land. It is outside the wonderful Romanesque church that you can see at the end of the road to the centre of the town as you drive out of the port. The names are categorised: soldiers, deported to the concentration camps, shot, and just ordinary civilians killed (this group of names is continued on the other side of the memorial).

I hope that those who visit Normandy for the anniversary will see the events for what they were, and not just the raw material for another wretched shoot-em-up computer game. There were no second lives, no-one got up and had another go. The dead from the invasion and the war overall are still dead.

The Caen Memorial is off junctions 6 or 7 of the peripherique nord, the northern ring road, and there are good public transport links from Caen. It is imperative if you want to understand the reality of war and D-Day.

My father has written his memoirs – not badly, as it happens – and there are copies in the Imperial War Museum and the RAF Museum. The memoirs  have been published on Kindle as an eBook from Amazon, and more details including chapters to read on this website.