Story: Overlord - Operation Neptune, D-Day - Part 1

OVERLORD, D-DAY

OPERATION NEPTUNE, June 6, 1944

By Clayton Marks, RCNVR and Combined Operations

The true scale of the D-Day landings. Some 156,000 Allied troops landed

on five beaches along the Normandy coast. Photo - Imperial War Museum

Introduction - The following story (presented here in several parts) can only be found in Combined Operations by Clayton Marks of London, Ontario. The book was printed in 1993 (approx.) and is extremely difficult to find. I present a short summary of Mr. Mark's 23-page-long account on this site.

OPERATION NEPTUNE, June 6, 1944 - Part 1

The effort called forth to defeat the shameful dreams of Adolf Hitler was both gigantic and majestic. Operation Overlord was "the stately title of the plan" to defeat the Reich. Operation Neptune was the Navy's part of the plan and it involved the landing of Allied armies on French soil as well as the development and maintenance of lines of communication and supply by water. The "direct Canadian contribution of 110 ships and 10,000 men" was about four percent of the total Naval effort.

Assembly of fighting vessels began in January, 1944. The flood of cargo to the UK rose still higher in June and July, as armies battled in France.

The battle upon the Atlantic Ocean "was a lesser task" than during earlier years, but still not insignificant. Convoys of ships in 1944 continued to increase in size and number, until some were made up of 150 ships carrying a million tons of supplies. The traffic could not be hidden from the Germans but now the policy was to mislead them. The strength assembling in the southeast grew boldly, and pointed across the Straits of Dover, but the build up in the south and west, which might have appeared to target the actual invasion area farther down the French coast, was concealed. Best hidden were all the materials to be used to build large pre-fabricated harbours - "the most novel and daring feature of the Allied plan."

Canadian ships, HMCS Prince Henry and Prince David, assembled with other landing ships at Cowes on the Isle of Wight. Prince Henry, Senior Officer of Landing Ships in Assault Force J (one of five assault forces destined for Normandy, was also responsible for discipline, navigation, etc. of many converted merchant vessels destined for beaches in Juno sector. 

A news clipping from 1944 re HMCS Prince David, Troop "Fortress"

As found in Combined Operations (P. 170) by C. Marks, London

On April 21st, after an intensive training period, Flotillas of assault landing craft - to be carried aboard Prince Henry and David - also gathered at Cowes, as did three Canadian Flotillas of LCI(L)s, consisting of thirty craft. Exercises involving Canadian, Royal Navy and U.S. Navy ships and craft began on a very large scale.

During Fabius, the largest and last of the exercises, an enormous assault force sailed from Southampton and continued south of Isle of Wight for twenty-five miles. It was a dress rehearsal, "very probably observed by the enemy". There was no German response, however, and when close to mid-channel, the assault force turned back to disembark troops ("under the thunder of supporting guns on the beaches") ten miles east of Portsmouth. After this final exercise and the King's inspection and salute, there only remained "last-minute preparations and days of waiting."

On land, vast armies moved into sealed camps, and as soon as final invasion orders came on board the ships just off shore, they too were sealed. "No man, except on an urgent official mission... could set foot ashore." Feverish, last-minute preparations continued under a shroud of secrecy. 

The forces of Overload were to strike the French coast in the region of the Seine estuary (and Baie de la Seine), directly across the Channel from Portsmouth, the Solent and Southampton Water, for it was there that lay the longest stretch of open shore lying within range of England's fighter aircraft. The waters along the Normandy coast would provide anchorage for Neptune shipping. At the approaches to the bay there existed a daunting belt of German mines, but lanes would be swept, by mine-sweepers, allowing assaulting ships to reach shore.

Overlord also consisted of plans to drop three divisions of parachute troops well inland, while the sea-borne landings took place on a five-divisional front. Five Naval forces (three British and two U.S.) were to deliver the troops to five code-named fronts, i.e., Sword, Juno and Gold in the east, Omaha and Utah in the western sector. In each area specific Naval craft would land assigned troops and equipment, all according to an appointed day, hour and minute. The appointed day initially had been set for June 5th, but the plan remained flexible - within narrow limits.

Appropriate dates in June were dictated by the tactics of the landing. According to Overlord, after a "night-long smashing by aircraft", German strong-points were to be smothered by Naval bombardment. Landing craft would then proceed "on a rising half-tide" over beach obstacles, including mines, the first line of German defense.

The assault beaches had been closely studied, inch by inch. Aerial photographs and intelligence reports numbered in the thousands. Every feature of the area, "every battery or minefield or cluster of beach obstacles" had been dutifully mapped. And landing craft had been assigned to exact beaching positions. By the time of the assault, crews had become very familiar with the beaches that lay before them. 

More to follow.

Please link to Story: Waiting for D-Day Normandy, June 1944