Title D-Day :a brief history of the battle

Part (1) Outline

This essay is about the D-day battle that took place in June 1944 on the French Normandy coast. I picked this because I thought it was interesting when I read about it in school during Junior Certificate.  

In this essay my aims are to:

(1) locate  sources on the Normandy battle

(2) look at and investigate the background to the invasion,

(3) research the start of the battle on the night/ early morning of the 6 June, 1994

(4) read primary sources from people who fought in the battle and

(5) write up my essay in Microsoft Word.

I went up to the local library and looked on the Internet to find out sources. Here are some of the books I used:

(1)D-day by Anthony Beevor

(2)Europe by Norman Davies

Here are some web sites I used :

(1) http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h1749.ht,l

(2) http://www.DDay.overlord.com/eng/.

(3) http://www.dday.co.uk/

(4) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D-Day_(military_term)

(5) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Normandy_Landings

 Then I wrote up some notes in my copy for my essay and then wrote it in Microsoft Word.I fixed up parts that were’nt good. This is my final version.

PART 2 Evaluation of source

 The main book I used was D-day by Antony Beevor .The book was about the story of the D-day battle. It was a good sources of information because it was well detailed and had pictures in it .I liked the way the author wrote as well and he include lots of stories from soilders who were there.The second book I used was Europe by Norman Davies.  Its not as good as the first book I read because there is not as much information in it and there is no pictures in it either.

The soures I used in this Leaving Certificate project from the Internet are

(1)d-day The Battle of Normandy http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h1749.ht,l

(2)The battle of Normandy http://www.DDay.overlord.com/eng/

(3)D-Day : etat des lieux at http://www.6jun1994.com/en.index.html

(4)D-Day   http://www.ddaymuseum,co,uk/

(5)D-Day the battle of Normandy: your questions answered at http://www.ddaymuseun.co.uk/fag.htm

The main website I used was D-day the battle of Normandy http://www.DDay.overlord.com/eng/.On this website there are pictures of the army and loads of information. There also a link to other websites on it for more information

Part (3)the extended essay

The invasion of Normandy and the battle of Omaha beach

During World War II, an Allied invasion of western Europe, was launched on June 6, 1944. It involved the landing of U.S., British, and Canadian forces on five separate beachheads in Normandy, France. By the end of August 1944 all of northern France was free, and the invading forces were on the move to get into Germany, where they would meet with Soviet forces advancing from the east to bring an end to the Nazi Reich.

June 1944 was a turning point in World War 2, especially in Europe. At the Teheran conference in Nov 1943 it was decided to open another front against the Germans in 1944. The battle began months before the invasion, when Allied bombers began to bomb the Normandy coast to destroy transportation links, and disrupt the German army. The planning which went on before the invasion and some mistakes by Germans meant it would be a success.

Allied equipment was top of the range and supplies there were plenty of Tanks were invented including new types that could move through sand and water. Two artificial harbours called Mulberries were carried across the channel. Under-ocean lines carried oil supplies to the attacking armies while ten thousand air crafts supported the invading fleet. Deception plans encouraged the Germans to think that the attack would come in the Pas de Calais region rather than Normandy They also though the weather would prevent the attack. The French rail and road system was badly damaged by allied bombing.

By dawn on June 6, eighteen thousand British and American parachutists were on the ground in Normandy taking over important bridges and disrupting German communications lines. At 06:30 early that morning the first troops landed at Utah beach with troops and tanks that could float on water. About an hour later at about 07:30 the British soldiers first started to land at ‘Gold’ and ‘Sword’ beaches and not far from behind them were two 2,400 Canadians supported by 76 floating tanks

Omaha beach was the code name for the beach second from the right of five landing areas of the Normandy invasion. This was the biggest assault area. It was over 6 miles between Port-en-bessin on the east and the mouth of the River Vire on the west. The western part of the beach had a 3 metre high seawall and the whole beach was looked over by one hundred foot high cliffs. There where about five exits from the beach. The best paved road was in a gap that lead to the village of Vierville-sur-mer. Two were only dirt paths leading to the villages of Colleville-sur-mer and Saint-laurent-sur-mer.

The Germans under Field Marshal Erwin Rommel had built formidable defences to protect this battlefield. The beaches were like minefields and even the water was heavily mined.There were twelve strong points called ‘widerstandsnester which means resistance nests and numerous other fighting positions covered the area supported by an extensive trench system. The defending forces consisted of three battalions of the veteran 352^nd infantry divisions. The weapons used were fixed to cover the beach with crossing fire turning Omaha into a killing zone.

Omaha was part of the invasion area assigned to the U.S first army, lead by lieutenant General Omar Bradley. The beach was going to be attached at 06:30 hours by the U.S first infantry division.The objectives of the first division were huge. First of all it was to capture the villages of Vierville, Saint-Laurent and Colleville. Then it was to continue on and cut the Bayeux-isigny road, and then it was to attack south towards Trevieres and west towards the Pointe du hoc. paets of the part of the 16^th regiment were to link up at Port-en Bessin with British units from Gold Beach to the east

At the beginning not much went right at Omaha. Special “DD” tanks (ambitious floating tanks) that were suppose to support the 116^th regiment sank in the choppy sea.Only 2 of 29 launched landed on the beach. With the exception of company A, no unit of the 116^th regiment landed where it was planned. Bad weather, strong winds and tidal currents carried the landing craft right to left. The 16^th regiment on the east half of the beach fared little better, landed in a state of confusion with units badly mixed up.

Through-out the landing waiting German gunners fired into the ranks of the invading Americans. Bodies lay everywhere. Men took cover behind beach obstacles and waited to make them run across the beach to the sea wall which gave some safety. Destroyed crafts and vehicles littered the waters edge and beach, At 08:30 hours all landing ceased at Omaha. The landing troops on the beach were left on their own and realized that the exits were not the way off. Slowly, and in small groups they climbed the cliffs. Meanwhile, navy destroyers scraping their bottoms in the shallow waters, blasted the Germans fortifications at point-blank range.

By 12:00 German fire was noticeably dropped as the defences positions were taken from the rear. Then one by one the exits were opened. By nightfall the 1^st and 29^th divisions held positions around Vierville, Saint-Laurent and Colleville. The Americans suffered 2,400 casualties at Omaha on June 6^th, but by the end of the day they had landed 34,000 troops. The Germans 352^nd division lost 20 percent of its strength with 1,200 casualties but it had no reserves coming to continue the fight.

By nightfall on D-Day, 6 June 1944 the continuous lodgement area planned had not been established, but instead a series of toeholds on the coast of northern France had been achieved. More than 100,000 Allied soldiers had made it ashore and the Allies had established a beachhead through which they could land men and supplies. The Allies hold on these tiny beachs was not great and the German reaction was swift.

Fighting inshore, the allies also had problems. efforts to break out by the paratroopers of the centre were frustrated by fierce German resistance. A large-scale infantry offensive west of Caen, called Operation “Epsom,”was also defeated on June 25-29 as the success of the German defence, led the Americans to doubt the if the plan could work . In fact, the Germans were also depressed, for their bitter defences was using up men and equipment that could not be replaced.

These setbacks brought about a crisis in the German high command, which in any case now suffered unforeseeable casualties, Dollman commander of the 7^th army died of a suspected heart attack, though it was quite likely it was he committed suicide. Rommel was injured in his car by a British fighter. Worst of all, Rundstedt confessed defeatism to Hitler and urged him to make peace he was later dismissed and his successor Gunther Von ‘Kluge who soon thought the same.

There is no official casualty figure for D-Day. It is estimated that more than 425,000 Allied and German troops were killed, wounded, or went missing during the battle. That figure includes more than 209,000 Allied casualties. In addition to roughly 200,000 German troops killed or wounded, the Allies also captured 200,000 soldiers. Captured Germans were sent to American prisoner-of-war camps at the rate of 30,000 per month, from D-Day until Christmas 1944. Between 15,000 and 20,000 French civilians were killed during the battle.
In the end, the invasion of Normandy succeeded in its objective by sheer force of numbers. By July 1944, some one million Allied troops, mostly American, British, and Canadian, were entrenched in Normandy. During the great invasion, the Allies assembled nearly three million men and stored 16 million tons of arms, munitions, and supplies in Britain.
The occupation of Normandy was crucial for the Western Allies to bring the war to the western border of Germany. If the Normandy invasion had not occurred, there could conceivably have been a complete possession of northern and western Europe by Soviet forced.

Part (4 ) Essay review

I finished my essay and now I am going to do my review. The first thing I had to do was to see if I achieved my aims. When I look through my assay I can see that.

(1)I did locate  sources on the Normandy battle

(2)I did look at /investigate the background to the invasion,

(3)I did research the start of the battle .on the night of the 5/6^th June,

(4)I did  read primary sources from people who fought in the battle and

(5)I did write up my essay in Microsoft word

During my essay I came across some problems. One example was the Internet not working in school on a number of days when I needed to use it. I got around this problem because I have the Internet at home. A second problem was I had to wait for one of the books (D-day by Antony Beevor). I was looking for in the libery to be brought back by people that already had them. This put me back by about a week. Other wise I had no other issues. I did think that doing the essay was a good idea because. I learnt a new of skills that are used by historians. These were

(1) I learnt to find sources

 (2) I learnt how to read the different sources

 (3)I learnt how to plan an essay  

(4) I learnt a lot about D-Day that I didn’t know I did it all again I would probably just do the battle for one of the beaches.