|
CHAPTER 3 From the 27th of April to the 5th of May, the Fifth Ranger Battalion took part in "Operation Fabius" an amphibious maneuver that included the embarkation on British Landing Crafts Assault. We made assault landings, and the land campaign that followed was designed as a training vehicle in the type of operations that we were expected to encounter in the invasion of France. Of course, we did not yet know the destination of our amphibious assault. In "Operation Fabius" about two hundred of our men lost their lives when a German torpedo boat, in a night raid, sank one of our United States Landing Ships. This was kept secret until after the war. On 6 May 1944, the Fifth Ranger Battalion moved to the village of Swanage, England, where we had more training in cliff scaling and rapelling. There we were also introduced to the use of eight-foot sections of aluminum scaling ladders. We were quartered in a hotel on the top of an eighty-foot cliff. When we arrived at the beautiful wide front steps, our battalion commander told us that we would use those stairs only once. At first none of us knew what he meant, but we soon found out. My men and I were quartered on the third floor in two rooms. In each room near the window was a coil of rope tied to a pipe. We were instructed to throw the rope out of the window, then rapel down the wall of the building to the yard, run across the yard, climb over an iron picket fence, and rapel down an eighty-foot cliff to the beach below. All formations would be held on the beach. The mess hall was on the first floor, but we still had the mess formation on the beach and then had to climb back up to the first floor for mess. The outfit that preceded us was an engineer company from the First Infantry Division, which had been in Swanage for quite some time. When they left they told everyone that those in the unit coming in were Rangers who were something like the British Commandos, except that we were all criminals, under a sentence of death or scheduled for life without parole. If we lived through the war, we were to be pardoned. We were allowed to go into the village on pass and there had an interesting experience. Swanage is a resort village, and they had lots of entertainment places. One of them was an electric bumper car amusement court. A gang of us went to this place and paid a fee to ride the cars. As soon as we got in the cars and on the floor, everyone pulled in and left. The same thing happened when we went into a fish fry, the kind where you could sit down and eat your fish and chips. Everyone in the place got up and walked out. When we walked down the street, people crossed the street and walked on the other side. They tried to avoid us in every way possible. It was as though we had the plague. Father Lacy, our chaplain, was the one who sorted it all out. He talked to the various clergy and the police and found out that the villagers had received some misinformation about us. Apparently, the villagers had seen us rapelling out of the building and up and down the cliff and concluded that we were crazy and were receiving some sort of punishment. We have Father Lacy to thank for straightening everything out. Once the clergy passed this information on to their parishioners, the Rangers were welcomed everywhere and many were able to get dates. As in every other place, our stay was all too short. On 17 May 1944, the Fifth Ranger Infantry Battalion moved to Camp D-5 in Dorchester, England. D-5 was surrounded by a double strand of barbed wire, patrolled on the outside by a United States military police sentry and a British soldier walking in pairs. We were not allowed on the outside of the compound, nor were we allowed to talk to the sentries. These patrols had orders to shoot anyone who tried to leave the compound. While we were allowed to write letters, they were censored and we were told they would not be mailed until after the invasion. I was temporarily assigned to the Headquarters Detachment for special duty in the War Room, because of my knowledge of maps, the interpolation of aerial photos, and my ability to plot information on maps. Another Ranger, Technician Fourth Class (T-4) Herbert Epstein of Headquarters Detachment, was also assigned to duty with me. One of us was required to be there at all times. We moved our bunks into the War Room. The room was manned twenty-four hours a day. One of us had to be there at all times. We alternated going to mess and all other activities. When we went to bed, the entrance door was bolted shut from the inside. On the War Room floor was a large soft rubber map of the French coast showing the location of the invasion area of Omaha Beach and Pointe du Hoc. We also had a large paper map of the same area on the wall of the room. There were no names on either maps. We were required to plot information on the paper map from aerial photographs that we received periodically. We also briefed groups of our men and officers who came in front the various companies and the staff. There were nightly raids by German bombers that tried to sneak on the tails of some of our flights returning from bombings on the mainland. Every night a lone German bomber would bomb the harbor and/or the village. Most of the ships had barrage balloons attached and flying above the ships preventing enemy planes from making low-level attacks. No planes ever made it completely around the harbor of the village. The sky, at such times, was regularly alive with tracers and bursts of ack-ack fire, and all of the enemy planes were shot down. At such times, there was a danger of getting hit from our own falling shrapnel. One night, a German plane made it far enough to drop a couple of bombs on our cantonment area. One of the bombs landed in the area of our motor pool. It did no damage but it scattered stones and gravel on our Quonset hut. Herb and I were in bed and when we heard the bomb falling, we pulled our cots, mattresses, and blankets over on top of us. The next day everyone was out digging a fox hole in that hard gravel. On 1 June 1944, both the Second Ranger Infantry Battalion and the Fifth Ranger Infantry Battalion boarded their channel steamers, which were anchored in Weymouth Inner Harbor. The Second Ranger Battalion was loaded on the HMS Ben Machree, HMS Amsterdam, and the HMS Prince Leopold. The Fifth Ranger Battalion was loaded on the HMS Prince Charles, HMS Prince Bedouin, and HMS Prince Leopold. The HMS Prince Leopold carried A and B Companies of the Second Ranger Battalion and some of the Fifth Ranger Battalion. All of these ships had experience in landing British Commandos and were crewed by British sailors operating British Landing Crafts Assault, which were hung from davits that allowed loading troops at deck level, rather than by climbing down cargo nets into American Assault Landing Crafts bobbing around on the swells. If you fell as you climbed down, you could fall into the landing craft or overboard between the landing craft and the mother ship and be crushed to death. Our battalion was comprised of the Headquarters, which was made up of the battalion commander, the executive officer, the adjutant, the intelligence officer, the operations officer, the supply officer, the medical officer (the Battalion Surgeon), the chaplain, the Headquarters Detachment, with a medical section, and six line companies (A, B, C, D, E & F). I was the Assault Section Leader of the First Assault Section of the First Platoon of A Company of the Fifth Ranger Infantry Battalion. The A Company Commander was a First Lieutenant named Charles (Ace) Parker. When we later broke out of the beachhead, during the Normandy invasion. Lieutenant Parker wound up commanding what can best be called a platoon; I will explain this in one of the following paragraphs. This platoon was the only group to accomplish the D-Day mission of the Fifth Ranger Battalion. When we broke out of the beachhead, I was, fortunately, in command of what is known in military parlance as the "Point." Once on board, we were briefed as to our destination. The officers and senior noncommissioned officers were issued maps with the names of the villages and our objectives. These maps also had the Naval Gunfire targets numbered for "on call fire." Each battalion headquarters had a naval fire-control party (NSFCP), which referred all requests for concentrations of naval gunfire to the appropriate ship. Such concentration could be 3,5, 6, 8,10,12,14-inch or any combination thereof. The size and number of rounds depended on the target. On the evening of 4 June 1944, some of the slower ships started out across the channel, but they had to be called back because of bad weather. The invasion originally scheduled for 5 June had to be rescheduled for 6 June. The ships and crafts returned to port and had to be refueled. Allied destroyers and corvettes did an outstanding job of herding all of the boats and crafts back into the harbor and refueling them. On the afternoon of 5 June, the slower boats and crafts started out again. Late that evening the steamer that I was on pulled up anchor and got underway. An invasion can be very confusing to almost everyone, and the invasion of Normandy was no exception. The plan was known to almost every military person who participated. The plan was very simple, but as it developed, it became very complex. Spin-off plans became necessary in the event of possible failures. The initial plan called for D, E, and F Companies of the Second Ranger Infantry Battalion to assault a promontory known as Pointe du Hoc at 0700 hours (7:00 A.M.) on 6 June 1944. The Fifth Ranger Infantry Battalion with A and B Companies of the Second Ranger Infantry Battalion would follow D, E, and F Companies of the Second Rangers once they had secured their initial area by 0715 hours (7:15 A.M.). Lieutenant Colonel Rudder would announce this over his radio with the call sign "PRAISE THE LORD/' Fifteen minutes was a very tight time schedule. Meanwhile a second promontory located halfway between Pointe du Hoc and Omaha Beach, known as Pointe et Raz de la Percee, was to be assaulted by C Company of the Second Rangers. When they had reduced Pointe et Raz de la Percee, C Company was to proceed over land and join the rest of us at Pointe de Hoc. In the event that D, E, and F Companies of the Second Rangers were unable to complete their initial mission by 0715 hours (7:15 A.M.), they were to issue a different radio call, which was "TILT/' In that scenario, A and B Companies of the Second Rangers would assault Omaha Beach, Dog Green, at 0715 hours (7:15 A.M.), to be followed by the Fifth Ranger Battalion of which I was a part. The Rangers were to avoid a fire fight on the beach, move to an assembly area about one and a half miles inland, and then move across country and assault Pointe du Hoc from the rear. This considered everything but a fire fight on the beach. This then required yet another contingency plan. In the event of a fire fight, yet another coded message would be issued by the Fifth Ranger Battalion Commander. The call sign was "TALLYHO." Units receiving this call sign would break up into small groups, infiltrate the German lines, and move to an inland assembly area. Once assembled, the battalion would move across country and assault Pointe du Hoc from the rear. All of these plans were excellent. The American invasion force had been advised that the German forces defending Omaha and Utah beaches were second-class fortification troops that lacked transportation. The German fixed fortifications were excellent and mutually supporting. Also, there were mine fields. In addition there were underwater obstacles, at high tide. There were mined posts, hedgehogs, Belgian gates, and capsizing posts, on the tidal flats. The German Command expected that an invasion force would attempt a landing at high tide. Since the German troops were second-class troops, we had reason to predict that it would take three days for the American troops on Omaha to break through the German defenses. But this is what happened. Several days prior to the invasion, the German High Command moved the 352nd Infantry Division, one of their finest combat infantry divisions, into the area on maneuvers. The American Invasion Forces received no information about this development prior to their landing. The invasion force would have to fight these outstanding troops as well as the fortification troops, and the Rangers would come face to face with them at Vierville su Mer, Pointe et Rez de la Percee, and Pointe du Hoc. But first we had to get there. During the crossing, our battalion commander. Lieutenant Colonel Max Schneider, gave all of his men permission to go up on deck whenever they wanted. After having sweated two invasions below decks, he desired to spare his men the same experiences. It was light enough to see a lot of ships around us, and at times we passed some of the slower boats and crafts. The night sky was filled with planes, some of which were towing gliders. At about 0400 hours (4:00 A.M.) our ships pulled into their convoy assembly area off the coast of Normandy. They then dropped anchor with our bows headed towards shore. A half hour later, we received the call over the ship's speakers, "Rangers, man your boat stations." As we assembled on deck at our boat stations, I saw the battleship Texas pull up on our starboard side with its bow headed into us. It dropped its anchors from the bow and stern. Two anchors are used in this fashion in order to stabilize the ship for firing. HMS Heavy Cruiser Glasgow also pulled up on our port side with its bow headed into us and dropped anchors in a like manner. Both ships swung their primary and secondary armament toward the beach and opened fire with a broadside. The destroyers and corvettes, which were in closer to the beach, opened up with everything they had. These ships were firing everything from 3-inch to 14-inch projectiles. I can only describe the effect as one hellacious noise. We watched the projectiles fly through the air towards their targets. They were red hot and very easy to follow. There were five invasion beaches. The American Invasion Forces landed on Utah and Omaha beaches. The British landed on Gold, the Canadians on Juno, and the British also had Sword. The invasion armada for all five beaches consisted of four thousand one hundred ships, boats, and crafts of all types. Everywhere I looked, the sea was covered with them. The bombardment flotilla on all five beaches consisted of nine battleships, twenty-three cruisers, one hundred four destroyers, and seventeen corvettes. In addition, each beach had a varying number of modified assault crafts that opened fire on very precise schedules. Of the five beaches, Omaha Beach was the longest beach and included Pointe et Raz de la Percee and Pointe du Hoc. This was a front of about ten miles. In the assault on Omaha Beach, there were five landing crafts modified so that each could carry two 47-mm guns, each firing on selected targets. There were also sixteen landing crafts modified to carry two tanks that could fire over the ramps. Here were ten landing crafts modified to carry thirty-six 105-mm howitzers of the fifty-eighth and sixty-second Armored Field Artillery Battalions that were to fire one hundred rounds per gun, opening fire at range of eight thousand yards at H hour minus thirty minutes and closing to a range of three thousand seven hundred yard by H hour minus five minutes. Finally, there were nine landing craft tanks modified to fire one thousand rockets each when the leading assault waves were three hundred yards from its touchdown. In my thirty years in the army, I have never heard anything that could compare to that cannonade. Naval gunfire would commence at H hour minus forty minutes and continue to H hour minus three minutes. The battleships Texas and Arkansas (mounting ten 14-inch, twelve 10-inch, and twelve 5-inch guns) would fire from eighteen thousand yards offshore. About six thousand of their heaviest rounds would be aimed on the enemy coastal batteries at Pointe de Hoc and on the enemy positions defending Exit D-3. Three cruisers, with six-inch and/or 152-mm guns, fired nine hundred fifty rounds on the enemy defenses at Port en Bessin and the strong points near the D-3 and E-I draws. Eight destroyers (4 and 5-inch guns) were to fire two thousand rounds on the beach strong points. Beginning at H Hour, all naval gunfire would shift to inland targets and wait for direction from naval shore fire control parties. There were twenty-four such parties allocated to each of the assault battalions, including each Ranger Battalion. Fire Support Group I, consisting of a battleship, cruiser, and four destroyers, would be on call for the Twenty-ninth Infantry Division units and the two Ranger Battalions. Fire Support Group II, consisting of a battleship, two cruisers, and four destroyers would support the First Infantry Division units. All soldiers carried a heavy load of equipment into combat, although different soldiers carried slightly different equipment, depending on their mission. The same was true in the Rangers. I wore a steel helmet and a liner. Underneath that I wore a wool-knit cap. The battle dress was an impregnated, olive drab, fatigue-type uniform that was designed to reduce casualties should the Germans use toxic chemicals. We used stripped-down field packs and carried some "K" and a "D" ration (fortified chocolate bar), a mess kit with knife, fork and spoon. And a rain coat. Attached to the pack was a bayonet and an entrenching shovel. I had an eighty-one millimeter white phosphorous mortar round tied on the top of my pack, which I was to drop once I was on the beach. This was to provide extra ammunition. Everyone carried extra explosives. I wore my trousers bloused over my jump boots. I carried an M-l rifle and wore a cartridge belt, which was held up by a pair of suspenders that also held my pack. On my cartridge belt, I carried a pair of wire cutters, a lensatic compass, a canteen full of water, a fighting knife, with a stiletto-type knife strapped to my lower left leg. I also carried two concussion grenades, two anti-tank rifle grenades, and a grenade launcher. I wore a first-aid packet on my cartridge belt with another, with a morphine syringe tied on my left shoulder. On my wrist I wore an issued twenty-one jeweled Hamilton wrist watch. I wore a life preserver around my waist, that could be inflated by squeezing two CO cylinders built into the belt. It could also be inflated by blowing into a mouthpiece. Strapped to my left leg was an assault gas mask in a rubber waterproof container. Shortly after receiving our call to man our boat stations, we were loaded into our British assault landing craft which was made of steel and sat much lower in the water than the American landing craft assault, and also called Higgins Boats, named after the man who designed and built them. |
|