Battle of Normandy

While a cross-channel attack had been discussed since 1942, and several alternate plans drawn up, Allied strategy revolved around landings in North Africa in late 1942, Sicily in Jul 1943, and various operations in Italy in 1943 and into 1944, when the Allies finally felt ready to commit to landing in France. Planning began in earnest in Mar 1943 by British Lieutenant General Sir Frederick E. Morgan (who was appointed COSSAC - Chief of Staff, Supreme Allied Commander), whose plan was developed further beginning in Jan 1944 by the Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force (SHAEF), under the command of the Supreme Allied Commander, US General Dwight D. Eisenhower, who was named to this post on 24 Dec 1943. Operational command of the armies going ashore would go to General Sir Bernard Law Montgomery, who had advised the Canadians in the UK on matters of training, had been involved in some preliminary planning of the Dieppe Raid, and who had commanded the 8th British Army (to whom the 1st Canadian Division, 1st Canadian Armoured Brigade belonged) in Sicily and later southern Italy. The Normandy invasion would mark the first operation in which formations passed from control of the First Canadian Army to the Second British Army and vice versa. For the assault, 3rd Canadian Division would be under operational control of I British Corps. Canadian higher headquarters would come ashore after the beachhead had been expanded. Once 2nd British Army had established a firm foothold, First Canadian Army would breakout and advance from a secure bridgehead. During Exercise SPARTAN in Mar 1943, the First Canadian Army trained to do exactly that, with three Canadian divisions and three British divisions under command. The short operating range of Allied fighters from UK airfields, as well as the geography of the French coast, limited the choice of landing area to either the Pas de Calais or the Normandy beaches. The need for a large port facility resulted in the innovative idea of bringing one across to Normandy rather than attempting to capture one. The artificial harbours, codenamed MULBERRY, were just one of the many logistical successes; others included PLUTO (Pipe Line Under the Ocean) through which vital supplies of gasoline were pumped into the bridgehead from England. Other technical innovations would be used directly on the beach, particularly the "funny" tanks; armoured vehicles adapted for special purposes.
	The Atlantic Wall featured formidable obstacles to Allied invasion, including weapons of all types and sizes sited in strong concrete and steel fortifications.
	Elements of the 3rd Canadian Division come ashore on Juno Beach from LCI(L) 299 of the 2nd Canadian (262nd RN) Flotilla, optimistically bringing their issue bicycles with them. LAC 137013.

The Canadians made great use of the Duplex Drive (DD) tanks; regular Shermans fitted with collapsible canvas screens and propellers to allow them to swim to shore and provide immediate close support. Other vehicles were equipped to assist in the passage of obstacles and demolition of strongpoints and were used by Royal Engineers units of the British Army.

Allied intentions were masked through successful and complex deception plans and intelligence/counter-intelligence operations. Security was extremely tight and Allied soldiers entered the "sausage machine" several days in advance of the landings; these were sealed camps in which the soldiers waterproofed vehicles, received final briefings, and were cut off from contact with the outside world as a security precaution.

At left: His Majesty, King George V, inspects the Cameron Highlanders of Ottawa (MG) on 25 Apr 1944. Preparations for the invasion included new helmets, boots, and equipment such as the 1942 Battle Jerkin, and of course a flurry of Royal Inspections. Canadian Army Photo. At right: His Majesty inspects self-propelled 105mm guns (dubbed "Priests") of the divisional artillery of the 3rd Canadian Infantry Division on 25 Apr 1944. LAC 145376.

Objectives

• Establish a firm lodgment with all five assault divisions linked up by D+1 (one day after D-Day).

• Create a firm beachhead including the cities of Caen (to be captured on D-Day) and Cherbourg (with its permanent port facilities)

• Liberate Brittany, the Atlantic ports, and advance on a line from Le Havre to Le Mans to Tours by D+40.

• Reach the line of the Seine by D+90.

The Landings

The task on Juno Beach was to establish a five-mile wide beachhead between Courseulles and St-Aubin-sur-Mer, then push forward between Bayeux and Caen, penetrating eleven miles inland to Carpiquet airfield. On their flanks, the 3rd and 50th British Divisions would take Caen and Bayeux with the Canadians astride the road and railway linking the two towns.

7th Brigade

The Brigade was delayed by bad weather and rough seas, and faced strong opposition from enemy strongpoints on the beach which had survived the initial bombardment, with mines on the beach also causing considerable losses. High casualties resulted in the fighting for Courseulles-sur-Mer and the inland villages of Ste-Croix-sur-Mer and Banville. The brigade consolidated on its intermediate objective near Creully by evening.

8th Brigade

Assault engineers arrived in a timely manner and assisted greatly in the reduction of enemy strongpoints; the beach and town of Bernières were taken although Bény-sur-Mer, on the road to Caen, held out comparatively longer.

9th Brigade

The reserve brigade was able to land just before noon, moving from Bernières through Bény to Villons-les-Buissons, only four miles from Caen. The advance was stopped short of the division's final objective, Carpiquet airfield.

Flanks

The 3rd British Division only came within three miles of Caen, and the 50th had been stopped short of Bayeux by two miles. The 1st Canadian Parachute Battalion fought well as part of 6th Airborne Division, though they had been badly scattered like most of the three airborne divisions.

Approximately 14,000 Canadians landed in Normandy on 6 June 1944, with the assault force suffering 1,074 casualties; 359 of them had been fatal.

Early Actions

The first days ashore saw several frantic actions as the Germans mobilized their armour in an attempt to push the invading Allied armies back into the sea. The defence of the beaches had been entrusted to coastal formations of largely low calibre, tied to fortifications and given no armour and little motorized transport. The British 2nd Army faced only a single German division on D-Day, the 716th Infantry. Inland, however, were the armoured divisions.

On the front of the 3rd Canadian Infantry Division, the 12th SS Panzer Division "Hitlerjugend" attempted several counter-attacks, which while unsuccessful for the most part at seizing ground, inflicted heavy casualties on the Canadians in the week following D-Day. After actions at Authie, Putot-en-Bessin, Bretteville-l'Orgueilleuse, and Le Mesnil-Patry, the division settled in to a routine of patrolling and local actions. The first six days ashore cost the Canadian Army 196 officers and 2635 other ranks; 72 officers and 945 of whom had died. With respect to the German counter-attacks on the Canadians, the official Army historian summed up:

The Germans' plan of defence had failed. They had not succeeded in mounting the great armoured counter-offensive which was to drive the invaders into the sea. Even a more limited attack, in which General Geyr von Schweppenburg (whose Panzer Group West had now taken over the Caen sector) planned to use parts of the 21st and 12th SS Panzer Divisions under the 1st SS Paner Corps against the Canadian front, had to be cancelled on 10 June; and immediately afterwards a devastating attack by aircraft...which wiped out almost his whole staff put an end to such projects for the present, and the sector was returned to the 1st SS Panzer Corps' control. Moreover, the Germans remained fully convinced that a second invasion...was probable. They therefore continued to hold (at Calais) the divisions that might have turned the scale in Normandy.¹

Normandy Bridgehead: June 1944

For three weeks, the 3rd Canadian Division held a line from Putot-en-Bessin to Villons-les-Buissons, with all three brigades in the front line and no reserve. By the end of June, Canadian Army casualties for the month of June totalled 226 officers and 3066 other ranks.²

The Americans on the right flank of the invasion had  fought hard to establish themselves ashore, particularly at OMAHA Beach where an above-average division, the 352nd, reinforced the coastal defences. Bayeux fell to the British on D+1 (7 June) but the 21st Panzer Division effectively intervened between the British 3rd Infantry Division and Caen. Territory intended to marshal the 1st Canadian Army remained in German hands, and the narrow bridgehead prevented the arrival of additional formations on French soil. The Americans had better progress in the west; while St. Lô, remained in enemy hands, on 18 June Cherbourg fell, and the Cotentin Peninsula on which it sits was cleared by 1 July.

These triumphs owed much to hard fighting by the British Second Army. Although progress had been halted for the moment in the region immediately about Caen, the lodgement area was somewhat extended as the result of the determined efforts...south and south-east of Bayeux. Here in the last week of June a bridgehead established across the Odeon, a tributary of the Orne, seemed to offer the hope of "pinching out" Caen by an enveloping movement. Against this threat the enemy concentrated a tremendous mass of his very best formations....(All told) the enemy had no fewer than eight armoured divisions on the Anglo-Canadian front between Caumont and Caen. On  30 June, in a directive to his British and American Army Commanders, General Montgomery wrote: "My broad policy, once we had secured a firm lodgement area, has always been to draw the main enemy forces in to the battle on our eastern flank, and to fight them there, so that our affairs on the western flank could proceed the easier." The policy succeeded; but it meant some very hard sledding for the British and Canadians.³

Additional Canadian forces deployed to Normandy toward the end of June, including advance elements of the 2nd Canadian Infantry Division, the headquarters of 2nd Canadian Corps, and the headquarters of 1st Canadian Army.

Operation EPSOM

EPSOM was a British operation intended to seize Caen, with fighting lasting from 26 June to 1 July 1944; local objectives were met but the city remained in German hands. German counterattacks forced British units back just south of Buron. 

Operation WINDSOR

On 4 July 1944, the 3rd Canadian Infantry Division launched a costly assault on Carpiquet aerodrome, originally a D-Day objective. A small force of the 12th SS Panzer Division inflicted sizeable losses on the attacking force, including the North Shore Regiment, the Régiment de la Chaudière, the Queen's Own Rifles and the Royal Winnipeg Rifles. Supporting the operation were the tanks of the Fort Garry Horse, assault vehicles of the Royal Canadian Engineers (as well as a flame-throwing Crocodile), and the entire divisional artillery.

Operation CHARNWOOD

This operation, following Epsom in the second week of July 1944, finally managed to push into the city of Caen itself. The 3rd Canadian Division saw heavy combat to the west of Caen, suffering heavily in their first major advance since the D-Day landings; the Highland Light Infantry of Canada, for example, lost 262 men in Buron during the battle to extricate a battalion of the 25th SS Panzergrenadier Regiment from the village.

Operation ATLANTIC

Operation ATLANTIC was the Canadian component of Operation GOODWOOD, involving Canadian actions in the vicinity of Caen. Their objectives including taking the suburbs of Colombelles and Fauborg-de-Vaucelles. Both Canadian infantry divisions were to operate on the flanks of the armoured operations as part of Operation GOODWOOD, with Canadian troops tasked to cross the Orne, clear the suburbs, and eventually push on to the Bourguébus Ridge.

On 29 June 1944, Lieutenant General Guy Simonds activated tactical headquarters of II Canadian Corps at Amblie, becoming operations on 11 July. The 2nd Canadian Infantry Division came ashore in the first week of July 1944 and moved into the line along the Orne on the right flank of the 3rd Canadian Infantry Division.

The operation began on 18 July 1944, and 3rd Division moved south to Colombelles, with the 8th Brigade battling for the suburb and the 9th Brigade passing through into Fauborg de Vaucelles. To the east, Giberville was taken by the 7th Brigade. On the 19th, objectives across the Orne near Cormelles were captured.

The 2nd Division also attacked through Fauborg de Vaucelles, coming into action for the first time since Dieppe, and though intially managed to achieve their objectives of clearing the suburbs of Caen across the Orne and establishing a bridgehead south of the city, when pressed to relieve the British armoured divisions halted in their attack on the Bourguébus Ridge, the operation became a costly one for the units involved.

Operation SPRING

Operation SPRING was an operation in which the costly attacks on the Verrières Ridge occurred on 25 July 1944.

Operation TOTALIZE

The 21st Army Group decided that after SPRING the primary task on the Canadian front would be pinning the enemy down while the main effort would shift away from the great German strength opposite, to the British front east of the Orne. The start of August saw the Canadians (now serving under their own Army headquarters) delivering local attacks, but also saw German units - now realizing that no attack would come via Pas de Calais, as they feared - moving across the Seine and into the battle area. Armoured units opposite the Canadians were pulled out and redeployed to face the 3rd US Army. By 7 August only one German armoured formation remained on the Canadian front.

By this point, the British had made progress at the Vire and Orne Rivers, and the Canadians were ordered forward to Falaise. On 7 August, Operation TOTALIZE went forward, with heavy bomber support and the infantry using for the first time in history fully tracked armoured personnel carriers. While the 3rd Canadian Infantry Division attacked east of the Falaise road, the 2nd attacked to the west under cover of darkness. The newly arrived German 89th Division fought hard but the defensive line that had held out for two weeks was finally breached, and the heights of the Verrierres Ridge were finally seized. The second phase saw two armoured divisions - including the newly arrived 4th Canadian (Armoured) Division - pass through. Stiff fighting brought the Canadians to a halt - by 11 August, eight miles had been gained, but eight still remained between the Canadians and Falaise.

The German armour that moved away from the Canadian front was used to launch a desperate counter-attack towards Mortain beginning on 6 August. The attack ground to a halt within a day, and the Canadian advance on Falaise worried the German Field Marshal in command, who was prohibited by Hitler personally from redeploying his troops. The opportunity to encircle large parts of the German Seventh Army now presented itself, as US armour rolled towards Argentan from the south. The Canadian Army was ordered south; while the armour made its preparations to move on the 14th, the 2nd Division busied itself with preparatory attacks, crossing the Laize River at Bretteville-sur-Laize and southward for two days, recrossing the river at Clair Tizon and threatening the main German defensive line along the Falaise Road.

Operation TRACTABLE

Operation TRACTABLE was an attempt, initiated on 14 August 1944, to meet up with American forces driving north to close the "Falaise Gap". Initial efforts were stopped and a renewed offensive on 16 August managed to liberate Falaise. The Gap itself remained open while efforts were made to close it by both the US forces from the south and Canadian and Polish forces from the north. The 1st Polish Armoured Division linked up with the US Army at Chambois late on 20 August 1944, and the Canadians linked up with the Poles the next day.

Pursuit to the Seine

2nd Canadian Infantry Division began to move east on 21 August, into the valley of the Seine, where hard fighting in the Forêt de la Londe awaited the 4th and 6th Brigades. Fierce forest fighting lasted from the morning of 27 August to the afternoon of 29 August against well equipped enemy troops present in strength.

August 1944 had been a pivotal month. Not only had the German 7th Army been virtually destroyed, but Allied landings in the south of France were coupled with the fall of Paris. The future looked bright, and as early as 20 August, and one division turned its gaze northwest to a familiar stretch of coast. First Canadian Army was advised by an order on that day from 21st Army Group "I am sure that the 2nd Canadian Division will attend to Dieppe satisfactorily."

As German forces retreated across the Seine at the start of September, the Battle of Normandy was over. The fighting for the Channel Ports was about to begin.

Casualties

TOTAL CANADIAN ARMY CASUALTIES - NORMANDY BATTLE AREA

Total from 6 Jun 44 through 31 Jul 44 ⁴

(Canadian Military Headquarters file 22/Casualty/1/2 - A.G. (Stats), C.M.H.Q., 14 Aug 44))

(This figure represents battle casualties but does not include 31 deaths described in the CMHQ report as "ordinary".)

Deployment Schedule

Battle Honours

The following Battle Honours were granted for Canadian units participating in the Battle of Normandy:

• Normandy Landing
• Authie
• Putot-en-Bessin
• Bretteville-l'Orgueilleuse
• Le Mesnil-Patry
• Carpiquet
•  Caen
• The Orne or The Orne (Buron)
• Bourguebus Ridge
• Faubourg de Vaucelles
• St. André-sur-Orne
• Maltot
• Verrières Ridge - Tilly-la-Campagne
• Falaise
• Falaise Road
• Quesnay Wood
• Clair Tizon
• The Laison
• Chambois
• St. Lambert-sur-Dives
• Dives Crossing
• Forêt de la Londe
• The Seine, 1944

Dramatizations

• The Longest Day (1962). The only Canadian content seems to be a dramatization of two German pilots strafing Juno Beach, and the theme song by Paul Anka which was later authorized as the Regimental March of The Canadian Airborne Regiment.

Notes

1. Stacey, C.P. Official History of the Canadian Army in the Second World War: Volume III: The Victory Campaign: The Operations in North-west Europe 1944-45 (Queen's Printer, Ottawa, ON, 1960) p.141

2. Stacey, C.P. Canada's Battle in Normandy (King's Printer, Ottawa, ON, 1946) p.75

3. Ibid, pp.79-80. The remarks by General Montgomery have come under scrutiny and much debate. For example, see Carlos d'Este, Decision in Normandy "What Montgomery absurdly attempted to portray as the end result of a deliberate master plan was, in reality, one of the most untidy series of operations he ever conducted."

4. Canadian Military Headquarters Report: "OPERATION "OVERLORD" and its Sequel. Canadian Participation in the Operations in N.W. Europe 6 Jun - 31 Jul 44 (Prelim Report). (Report No. 131, revised edition, 1945)

References

• Barris, Ted. Juno : Canadians at D-Day, June 6, 1944 (Toronto : T. Allen Publishers, 2004) xxii, 307 p., [24] p. of plates : ill., maps ISBN: 0887621333

  •  Good selection of personal accounts, including the true story of the famous cine-camera footage taken during the actual landings.

• Copp, Terry and Robert Vogel Maple Leaf Route: Caen (Alma, ON 1983) 119pp ISBN 0919907016

• Copp, Terry and Robert Vogel Maple Leaf Route: Falaise (Alma, ON 1983) 143pp ISBN 0919907024

• English, John The Canadian Army and the Normandy Campaign: A Study of Failure In High Command (Praeger, New York, NY 1991) 347pp. ISBN 027593019X

• Granatstein, J.L. and Desmond Morton. Bloody Victory: Canadians and the D-Day Campaign 1944 (Lester & Orpen Dennys, Toronto, ON 1984) 240pp ISBN 0886190460

• General introduction to the subject of Canada's participation in Normandy.

• Reid, Brian A. No Holding Back (Robin Brass Studio, 2004) 491pp ISBN 1896941400

  •  Excellent, in-depth and professionally researched book on Operation TRACTABLE in August 1944, written by a retired Canadian staff officer with excellent knowledge of the German military. Useful, detailed appendices on the death of Michael Wittman and the 1st Polish Armoured Division.

• Whitaker, Denis and Shelagh Whitaker with Terry Copp The Soldier's Story: Victory at Falaise (HarperCollins Publishers Ltd., Toronto, ON 2000) 372pp ISBN 0002000172

  • Overview of Allied operations in Normandy from July to August 1944.

   

   

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