British 3rd Division
D-Day and Sword Beach
a brief summary of events
On The British sector, like the American the main aerial bombardment of the Atlantic Wall and the inland German defences began at 3am, before first light. But the amphibious landings were not to start until 7:30am, giving the Eastern Task Force under Admiral Sir Philip Vian an hour longer than the Western Task force to make sure of the heavy German guns before the troops hit the beaches.The British placed the assembly areas for thir landing craft closer in than the Americans, about seven miles off shore, but they also had two main beaches to assault, together with the Canadians. The three British and canadian beaches ran in a continuous line for twenty four miles , but the first landings would secure only five one mile sections of beach to be joined together during the day as the beachhead expanded.Unlike the almost deserted American beaches , those chosen by the Brtish and Canadians were dotted with small seaside villages, hamlets and individual houses, making the character of the fighting on their sector very different.
Coming ashore at Gold Beach, the westernmost of the British Beaches, the troops of the 50th Northumberland Division were expected to reach Bayeux, seven miles inland and link up with the Americans coming off Omaha at Port en Bessin, between the two beaches. east of Gold came Juno Beach, the canadian target.But the most difficult and most important task on D day went to the men landing on Sword Beach, opposite Caen. The Brigade groups of the veteran 3rd Division were to capture Caen itself, linking up with 6th Airborne Division east of the river Orne. Caen was senn as a vital prize of D Day. If the British could reach it they could stop the German 21st Panzer Division, which Allied Intelligence had placed southe of the city, from charging forward onto the landing beaches.
The first troops of the leading Brigade of 3rd British Division , 8th Brigade group under Brigadier E.E.E ( Copper) Cass, hit the beach at the little seaside village of La Breche at 7.25am, with at one officer reading speeches from Shakespear's
Henry V through a megaphone to his seasick men. Lying between Ouistreham a mile to the east and an off shore shoal a mile to the west, Sword beach at La Breche, which had been turned into a formidable strongpoint by the Germans, had room for only one brigade to land at a time. But air and naval bombardment and the landing by 6th Airborne Division
( which included the 1st Battalion Royal Ulster Rifles) hours before, had done a good job of reducing the defenses, and the first wave came in together on time. Of 40 DD tanks , all but six were successfully launched, and twenty-eight survived the landing and the first few minutes on the beach. As at Gold Beach , the first wave also included Hobart's " Funnies".
Centaur tanks of the Royal Marine Armoured Support Regiment , and self propelled guns.The engineers arriving to clear the beach defences were hit by German machine gun fire as they landed, but within minutes the armor had dealt with the enemy.The first two Infantry Battalions expecting to be wiped out by German fire, landed almost without a casualty.
Soon they were heavily engaged with small parties of defenders further inland. Following them within minutes were the rest of the brigade and the Commandos of 1st Special Service Brigade, under Brigadier Lord Lovat, complete with piper
Left. Lord Lovat wades ashore
at sword ( at right in the water)
His piper in the foreground.
While fighting for La Breche continued 8th Brigade Group and Commandos fanned out to secure the landing.
The centre of Ouistreham, a fashionable resort complete with hotels and casino, was captured by French troops of
No.10 ( Inter-Allied) Commando. Lovat reached Pegasus Bridge two minutes behind schedule, apologizing to the tired
paratroops for the delay. But by the time La Breche fell at 10am, the bad weather and fast rising tide had reduced the strip of beach to barely fifteen yards of sand. meanwhile , two miles inland near Colleville, a regimental headquarters strongpoint of 716 Static Division ( German), codenamed Hillman by the British and defended by over 270 men, kept the leading Battalion of 8th Brigade Group 1st suffolks, pinned down all day.The last defenders at Hilman surrendered only on the following morning.Within hours of the first landing at Sword the British timetable began to slide, as the beach became a jumble of landing craft, men and equipment. Although the Infantry of 185th Brigade Group came ashore
successfully with the commandos, the narrow strip of sand made it much harder for armor and specialist equipment to get ashore. Only about half of the intended number of vehicles and stores reached dry land by the end of the day, and there were terrible traffic jams as tanks maneuvered past La Breche. the divisions main Armored Brigade, took until midnight to land the last of its troops, and most of its tanks were tied down in the fighting at La Breche and Hillman.
Left , Infantry struggle to get ashore even though the LCI lands close to the beach.
Having Little choice but to go forward alone, at 1230pm the first Infantry of 185th Brigade Group set off inland, leaving the armor to catch up. Skirting Hillman, the brigade came under fire from enemy guns and infantry, and had only pushed as far as Pegasus Bridge by mid afternoon. By 4pm as the leading battalions reached Bieville, just three miles short of the outskirts of Caen, they found that they had left their advance too late. Emerging toward them from out of the city were the tanks of 21st Panzer Division, which the Allies had believed to be still at least ten miles further south. Hastily calling for armored support to be moved up past Hillman , 185th Brigade Group destroyed sixteen German tanks and stopped the Panzer Divisions counterattack, but Bieville remained the limit of 3rd British Divisions advance. Although the leading battalion of 185th Brigade Group, the 2nd Battalion The King's Shropshire Light Infantry
got two companies into Lebisey Wood and a mile closer to Caen than anyone else, they had to retreat during the night.
Pegasus Bridge today
Infantry cross Pegasus Bridge then..
The remaining brigade of the division, the 9th Brigade Group, was meanwhile moving westward to complete the link up with the Canadians at Juno beach. The brigade's intended target for D Day was Le Carpiquet airfield, two miles west of Caen and ten miles from Sword Beach. Instead facing a growing threat from the German armor, the Divisional commander Major general T.G Rennie ordered the brigade to reinforce the line of the Orne and Pegasus Bridge. A few minutes later a german mortar bomb wounded the brigade commander and killed most of his staff. The brigae group was employed to provide additional security for the xisting lodgement rather than driving forward.
At 7pm 21st Panzer ivision put in a major counterattack from Caen onto the sword landing area, a charge led by fifty tanks of the 22nd Panzer Regiment " if you dont push the British Back into the sea" the regimental commander,
Colonel Hermann Von Oppeln-Bronikowski was told " we will have lost the war". Rushing down into the three mile wide gap between the British and the Canadians to their west, the armored drive almost reached the sea at Lion-sur-Mer. But well prepared british defences and anti-tank fire knocked out thirteen tanks and stopped the drive lierally in its tracks just short of the cliffs.The Germans withdrew. By Nightfall the gap between Juno and Sword was unoccupied by either side.
In The days fighting 21st Panzer Division had lost a total of 54 out of 124 tanks, and had failed in its objective to to push the invasion back into the sea.The British 3rd Division had put 28,845 men ashore at Sword beach. The real struggle was about to begin.
Men of the 6th Airborne grab a welcomed " fag break '
Men from the 1st Battalion RUR drive off from the drop zone
