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Image 1
Three of the Horsa gliders
that brought the 'coup de
main' force in on the night
of D-Day to capture the
bridge over the Caen Canal
at Benouville, which
subsequently became
known as 'Pegasus Bridge',
12 July 1944.
IWM Ref: B7033
Account 1
The location was immediately to the East of the Caen Canal (which ran
from the coast down to the town of Caen, some 10 miles inland).
Running parallel to the Canal and some 500 yards to its East was the
River Orne. As a point some 5 miles inland both were crossed by
bridges and it was the special task of D Company, the 2nd Battalion
Oxfordshire & Buckinghamshire Light Infantry to gain the two bridges
intact to enable the British Army at a later date to thrust eastwards with
tanks and other heavy vehicles. As a normal anti-invasion tactic the
Germans had prepared the bridges for demolition.
The overall invasion plan was that the first move was to be the successful
capture of the bridges so that when the Germans realised where the
invasion was to take place they would want to rush reinforcements from
the East as quickly as possible and by denying them access over the
bridges they would be forced to make a detour down to Caen. This
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would take time, and time was what the Allies needed during the first
few vital days as they fought to secure their bridgeheads along the
coastline.
It had finally been decided that the most effective method would be to
use a small handpicked glider-borne force of six Horsa gliders (each
carrying about 25 men). Three gliders to be allocated to each bridge and
all 6 to be crash landed at night-time in the small strip of rough pasture
land between the river and canal.
We spent the entire afternoon being briefed in the differing tasks of each
25 man Platoon. Then the tasks of each 7 man Section was considered
and finally in cases where individuals had special tasks, these were also
looked at in detail since, working in such a confined area, in darkness, it
was essential that everyone knew what everyone else was doing at any
given time, and to be in a position to carry out their job if the appointed
individual was not available for any reason. We worked out each of our
moves, then looked at possible counter-moves that the enemy might
make, and considered ways of blocking them. Nothing could be left to
chance and split second accuracy was vital for the success of the mission.
We studied the latest aerial photographs (some had been taken within
past 24 hours). These were extremely helpful as they showed the
bridges in minute detail. The RAF boys had been busy and had taken
considerable risks for some pictures seemed to have been taken at
treetop level. The large scale model had been compiled with the aid of
photographs, maps and local intelligence reports. Nothing that could be
of help to us had been left out every house, outbuilding, hedgerow,
gateway, ditch, tree and fortification had been meticulously recorded.
We were advised that if a pane of glass had been broken in any window
it would be shown on the model.
My platoon (No. 25) was to fly in the first of the three gliders to go
down onto the canal bridge. In theory we should be the first to touch
down. An hour after our landing we were to be reinforced by a
Parachute Battalion. Although it would hopefully only be for a short time,
the prospect of initially being the only unit of the entire Allied forces
actually in France, and facing the might of the German Army seemed to
me to be a daunting proposition.
Monday 5th June or D 1.
At 2256 hrs the steady hum of the bomber engines suddenly increased
to a deafening roar. My muscles tightened, a cold shiver ran up and
down my spine, I went hot and cold and sang all the louder to stop my
teeth from chattering. Suddenly there was a violent jerk and a loud
twang as the slack on the thick tow rope was taken by the tug-plane.
The glider rolled slowly forward.. and with a bump or two as the
heavily laden glider gathered speed, momentarily left the ground, set
down again with a bump, a final jerk and roar as the bomber engines
reached full thrust and we were airborne.
We had been underway for what seemed to be only a matter of
minutes. and were informed by one of our two glider pilots we
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cover of darkness highly trained enemy snipers had climbed up into high
trees and buildings and, from daylight onwards, began firing their highpowered long-range rifles (fitted with telescopic sights) with deadly
accuracy. The first indication was the distant crack as they fired and,
almost instantaneously one of our lads would crash to the ground
killed or wounded.
Whilst German infantry had begun moving in towards the bridges from
daylight onwards, during the hours before dawn a fair number of the
scattered Paras had managed to reach our positions and with their added
firepower we were able to repulse successive waves of enemy attacks.
By late morning, as far as I could gather we had lost our Platoon
Commander (who died from his wounds soon after we landed), our
Platoon Sergeant (who had been sitting near me) was badly injured
during the glider landing and our Section Corporal had just been
wounded. At this point in time I didnt know how the rest of the
Company were making out but I gathered that during the night and
morning most of our Officers and Sergeants were either dead or
wounded, and nothing had been heard of the missing glider which had on
board Capt. Priday (the Company Second-in-Command) and, of course a
Platoon Commander and his men.
Our leadership seemed to be diminishing at an alarming rate and we
had only been in action for a few hours and it was likely to be several
more hours before we could expect any help from the beachhead. We
had no knowledge of how things were going there as the beaches were
several miles away and we were entirely surrounded by Germans.
Image 2
Transport moving across
the Caen Canal Bridge at
Benouville. The bridge was
renamed Pegasus Bridge,
after the mythical winged
horse on the formation sign
of British airborne forces.
IWM Ref: B5288
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Account 2
The layout of the bridge and the position of the pill boxes was identical
in every mock operation so it was fairly obvious what we were going to
land on and what we were going to dowe were doing this on a regular
basis, on a daily basis. We didnt have a clue, didnt even know where
we was going or anything else. We were shown this layout, scaled
layout - a model.
We were introduced to the glider pilots..we was very impressed- they
both had the Military Medal, and they had won these Military Medals
with their flying in North Africa and Sicily and we was told that they was
probably the best pilots that they had in the whole of the Glider Pilot
Regimentthey were exceptionally experienced.
Before we loaded on the morning of the 4th we went and got
weighedthis was to get the correct weight of the glider, the glider
load.. they weighed us on, like farmers scales we was all weighed
individually and all our weights recorded because they told us we would
be carrying a boat, a collapsible boat in the bottom of the glider. This
was for the four engineers we was taking with us. The object of the boat
was to get the engineers under the bridge to defuse the, as we were told
the bridge was mined..
At about 6 oclock that evening we was told we could go back to our
tentsthey told us it had been postponed, we wouldnt be going that
night.in a way it was a big let down because we had all sort of got
ourselves acclimatised to the fact that we were actually going that night
and then, I wouldnt say it was disappointment of not going that wouldnt
be true, but if we hadnt gone at all we would have been very happy, but
they said that we would going to have to stand down for 24 hours.we
just played cards using the fake French money we had been given.
I personally was quite frightened not knowing what to expectsome
men took a sing song mood
We joined in with a thousand bomber raid that was going on further into
France, to cover us invery little flakMajor Howard said when we got
near the coast, that was to everybody to keep quiet, as he said
afterwards he didnt want people looking up and seeing a singing glider
coming across
The glider pilot shouted out Were making our approach, so we
immediately linked all our arms together, which was the usual procedure,
lifted our feet up off the floor, if you could, and just waited for the
landing. Well the first time we hit the deck we expected to land at
about 90 miles an hour , 80-90 mile an hour I now know that we was
well over 100 when we landed, miles per hour, we hit the deck and low
and behold before we knew what we was, we were airborne again. The
wheels had come off the glider we came down a terrific thud on the
skid, the metal skid underneath the glider, the parachute was thrown out
the back door, this turned out to be absolutely useless, it caught in the
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scout section should be, we didnt know what was actually going on up
on the road.well when it started to get first light and thats when
things began to happen. Hell of a lot of sniping, you couldnt move about
pretty well pinned down by snipers.practically pinned down any
movement we were making on the bridge. Next we hear bagpipes.
Coming down the towpath, was this officers with his white submarine
sweater on and a piper behind himthe section that was over the other
side, 24 Platoon, was shouting at them to pack it up and keep back from
the bridge areawe were shouting at them as well run, run.this
was Lord Lovat and his Commandos..
Prior to the commandos getting through we were starting to get dribs
and drabs of the 7th Battalion. They were supposed to come through us
to re-enforce Le Pont crossroads. They were promised there would be
at least 6 to 800 men. Up to half past 3, as Im given to understand there
were only 180, owing to the fact that they had been dropped all over the
place.
Account 3
Training: I did 43 fights all together, many of which were remote
release.which we did during the day and then we did that 13 times at
night, with no lights at all
We took off from Tarrant Rushton like any other night operation,
remember this is my 43rd, 44th go, of which it was the 14 at night so
whats the difference, except that there were live bods at the back?
The cockpit door was open, we conversed with each other, reassured
them. It was just a flight. It was an incredible sensation though,
emotionally, once wed sorted ourselves out and got off. Perfectly
smooth take off, got up to the height and started on our journey. As we
crossed the coast of England, it is a, I found, even at that age, enormously
emotional to know that you, a very small number of, there were just 3 of
us on this particular bridge which was the prime target, were setting off
on an adventure as a spearhead of a most colossal army ever assembled
in the history of mankind virtually. I found it very difficult to believe it
was true because I felt so insignificant.
You are up there, moonlight, and the coast came into view. decision
time to release at 7000 feet, pull the button, or the plug, like a bath plug,
and youre on your own, up there, dead quiet, floating towards and over
the coast of France and know that theres no turning back whatsoever
and as you know the Halifaxs went on as if they were on a bombing raid
and left us up in the air
Wed flown up past the bridge.the only way that you were going to
get there was by flying with extreme accuracy.this was the trick of the
thing, is if youre going to be invaded, youre going to be invaded from
the coast, right, and the main, one of the key factors, although the
contour of the ground obviously played a part, is in fact you dont expect
to have an airborne glider invasion coming from inside your own
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territory so we flew over the landing site, although to the side, and then
turned and did a 2 right angles and then came back descending.
I, as the first pilot, was sitting on the right hand side, the bridges are now
on my left, right, and Im coming down towards the bridges, and
descending at the appropriate rate, I had still not seen the bridges, but
my view to that extent would be masked by my pilot, cos hes, co-pilot,
hes looking, but we didnt see the bridges as such for a while, then we
suddenly saw them..
When suddenly the bridges come into view and Im quite low now trying
to see whether there are any trees, remember that we had no real
knowledge of the site, at all and its dark...landing any second now,
when gunfire right in front of my noseand we then crash landed,
literally crash landed, as we all did there the landing was very rough
indeed
Im tearing along just above the ground, tearing relatively, just above the
ground,
(question from interviewer about 90 miles an hour approximately ?)
no no, 30, very low landing speed, or less, 20, and Im suddenly faced
with Jimmy in front of me, whos crashing through and into the hedge,
and a pond, and I cant go into the pond cos I dont know how deep it is,
nobodys told me and Ive got 30 blokes in the back, full of gear, so I pull
the spoiler and drop the last foot, or so, and then I have to swerve to
the right to avoid going into the pond, so the back of the glider broke,
nobody got hurt as such, other than my co-pilot, who got a severely
pulled tendon or something, or something in his knee at any rate which
incapacitated him, made it difficult for him to walk, we put him on a
stretcher.
It was over in what was really minutes there. The main bridge as you
know, was heavily defended with a bloody great 88 in there, the other
bridge had got a sentry on, possibly one at each end there. So the
surprise was so complete, including coming from the wrong end that the
Germans really never got, were never really able to defend the bridge
except in the most sporadic way.
We started getting an increasing amount of sniper fire, because they
were able to use an awful lot of cover and youd still got parachutists
coming in from all directions and youd also got Germans now coming in,
right, mixed up with the parachutists obviously, and I suspect theyd
actually got into the wrecked gliders and were using those as cover.
Account 4
A fairly uneventful flight Underneath the Arches was sung..then we
got the order no noisewe braced arms.. we hit the ground with
this tremendous wallop..Id never had a landing like it..as we
looked so there were great red, what we thought for a minute were
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Image 3
Gliders of the 6th Airborne
Division by John Ward. In
the foreground the tail end
of a Horsa glider lies on the
grass. In the background
are several other pieces of
glider, spread over a field,
including wings and tail fins.
IWM Art Ref: LD4586
Image 4
Crashed Gliders: The
landing-zone at Ranville,
1944 by Albert Richards.
The wrecks of several
crashed gliders; different
parts of the aircraft are
separated from the body
and strewn on the ground.
IWM Art Ref: LD4232
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Image 5
The Final Embarkation:
Four 'stick' commanders of
22nd Independent
Parachute Company, British
6th Airborne Division,
synchronising their watches
in front of an Armstrong
Whitworth Albemarle of
No 38 Group, Royal Air
Force, at about 11 pm on 5
June, just prior to take off
from RAF Harwell,
Oxfordshire. This
pathfinder unit parachuted
into Normandy in advance
of the rest of the division in
order to mark out the
landing zones, and these
officers, (left to right, Lieutenants, Bobby de la
Tour, Don Wells, John
Vischer and Bob Midwood),
were among the first Allied
troops to land in France.
IWM Ref: H39070
Image 6
The Airborne Assault:
Oblique aerial view of
parachutes and Airspeed
Horsa gliders on 6th
Airborne Division's Landing
Zone 'N' near Ranville, on
the morning of 6 June.
IWM Ref: CL59
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Account 5
The British 6th Airborne Division had been allotted the task of landing
from the sky onto the left flank of the British Army. The 6th Airborne
Division would thus be the left hand force of the entire Allied invasion.
The main seaborne force was to land, capture and secure the ground
along the coastline, move inland for several miles and pivot round in an
anti-clockwise direction towards the East. Our Division had to capture
and hold a large area on the left flank and prevent any attempt by the
Germans to rush reinforcements along the coast from the East (where
their main anti-invasion force was located).
within the past few days, probably resulting from a visit by the German
Field Marshal Rommel, local people had been recruited to erect huge
poles in the proposed Divisional main dropping and landing area. Such a
pole would easily smash to bits any troop carrying glider that hit them
for the average speed of a fully laden Horsa glider as it first hits the
ground, is between 70 and 90 miles per hour and, at that sort of speed,
it would only need the wingtip to touch a pole to rip a wing off and turn
a glider onto its back (with disasterous consequences since they were
only made of plywood and fabric and were extremely vulnerable when
landing on rough ground even without the added danger of huge poles.
The weather conditions were by no means ideal for an airborne landing
but there was some problem about the height of the tides for the landing
of the seaborne forces within the last few days the crack 12th and 21st
S.S. Panzer Divisions had moved into the area around Caen. These 2
Divisions were known to be amongst the most highly trained troops in
the German Army - and Nazi fanatics to a man! Just our luck!
Everything that we would need during the next few days we would have
to carry ourselves boxes of ammunition, light machine guns, small antitank weapons, mines, grenades, light mortars (and their bombs), tools,
food (and cooking utensils, spare clothing and every other item of
equipment that might be needed for the task ahead.
Once a fully laden glider is released from the tow plane it has just one
way to go downwards. Unlike the birds and the small one man glider
that can swoop upwards and downwards on the slightest current of air,
the heavy Horsa glider just keeps plummeting earthwards and I have the
greatest respect and admiration for the glider pilots who have to make
an immediate and once only decision. If they misjudge their approach,
unlike the pilot of the powered plane, they cannot go up again and make
another circuit.
A small group of Paras were to jump and land in the area to set up
marker lights to guide in the Para reinforcements they were being
carried on a highish wind and would be scattered over a very wide area
and not the compact Dropping Zone that had been planned this area
was heavily wooded and those that missed the Dropping Zone were as
likely to end up in the high trees, as upon open groundthe Paras had
been scattered over a very wide area which made it impossible for them
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Account 6
23 June 1944
I have just changed my underclothes and washed my feet for the first
time since I left England. What we would really like is some bread
getting awfully tired of these biscuits, but the army bakers are not here
yet and the local French dont have any to spare.
Being now at liberty to talk slightly about D.Day here you are for what it
is worth
The glider flight was bloody! It was, of course, longer that most weve
done before because of the business of getting into formation, collecting
fighter escort and so on. After about hour I began to be sick and
continued until we were over the Channel where the air was much
calmer. The Channel was a wonderful sight especially the traffic at this
end Piccadilly Circus wasnt in it. We were not over the coast this
side long enough for me to be sick again and we were pretty busy
thinking about landing. The landing was ghastly. Mine was the first glider
down though we were not quite in the right place, and the damn thing
bucketed along a very upsy-downsy field for a bit and then broke across
the middle we just chopped through those anti-landing poles (like the
ones I used to cut during my forestry vac.) as we went along. However,
the two halves of the glider fetched up very close together and we
quickly got ourselves and our equipment and lay down under the thing
because other gliders were coming in all round and Jerries were shooting
things about at them and us so it wasnt healthy to wander about. Our
immediate opposition a machine gun in a little tranch(sic) was very
effectively silenced by another glider which fetched up plumb on the
trench and a couple of Huns quite terrified came out with their
hands up! Having discovered that we were all there and bound up a few
scratches we then set off to the scene of the battle. I shall not tell you
about that except that apart from a bar of chocolate and half the
contents of my whisky flask I had no time to eat or drink for a very
uncomfortably long time too much else to do, but it seems incredible
now. From my last meal in England to my first cup of char and hard
ration in France was very nearly 48 hours!
Disclaimer
All source material used in this learning pack comes from the Collections of the
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