Normandy

24-25 July 1944

“Operation Cobra” was the largest military operation since Operation Overlord, the D-Day landing in Normandy on 6 June 1944.

It was planned to make a serious breakthrough of the German defensive line, which at the time was the St. LO – Perier road, which lay in a SW to NW direction from St. LO.

This breakthrough was designed to create a wide gap in the German defensive line, their Main Line of Resistance, (MLR), so that Gen. George Patton and his newly created Third US Army, composed of the 1^st Infantry Division and the 2^nd and 3^rd Armored Divisions, could pass through this gap and make a speedy dash for Avranches and the Brittany peninsula.

This breakthrough was to be preceded by a heavy saturation bombing by the Air Corps, composed of fighter-bombers, medium and heavy bombers. Following this saturation bombing, were the three battle tested Infantry Divisions, the 4^th, 9^th and the 30^th, with the 30^th Infantry division designated as the ‘spearhead’.

There were to be 350 Fighter-bombers, 400 Medium bombers and 1,500 Heavy bombers in this saturation bombing action.

The target area was to be 2,500 yards deep and 6,000 yards wide, along the St. LO – Periers highway.

On July 23^rd, General Omar Bradley, having flown back to England to confer with the Air Corps, insisted that the mission be flown so that the bombing would be parallel to and just south of the St. LO-Periers road. The Air Corps insisted that the mission be flown perpendicular to this road, coming in over our troops.

After much discussion, it was agreed that the bombing mission would be flown parallel to the highway, although at a higher loss of planes.

Originally, Operation Cobra had been planned for the 18^th, but because of poor weather conditions, it was postponed until the 21^st. Again because of bad weather, it was postponed until the 24^th.

In the early hours of the morning of the 24th, and having been in the hospital for the past 10 days, I was being returned by ambulance to the Regimental Headquarters, and had just finished completing all of the routine paperwork, and being assigned back to my Company.

Upon returning to my Company, I was there just in time to witness the bombing. One of the bombs, I learned later, hit and demolished the ambulance in which I had just returned, and another hit the Regimental Hq. building, where I had been just moments before.

On the morning of 24 July, all was in readiness, with the troops of the 30th Infantry Division situated on the north side of the St. LO-Periers road for this momentous and well planned attack.

The jump-off for the attack was scheduled to be at 11:30 A.M. and the aerial bombardment was planned to be executed 15 minutes before this time.

For safety reasons, our 30^th Infantry Division troops were ordered to be withdrawn approximately 1,200 yards, a little bit over ½ mile, ‘just in case’ that a few bombs might accidentally fall astray from their assigned target.

At this same time, the 230^th Field Artillery Battalion fired several rounds of red smoke shells from each Battery, and they dropped them precisely on their target, an area on the south side of the St. LO-Periers road.

This was to emphasize the location of the road for the benefit of the Air Corps in aiming their bombs to the prescribed target.

No one was aware of it at the time, but a slight breeze of 2-3 miles per hour was blowing directly from the south. This placed the red smoke directly over our troops at the scheduled time of the bomb drop.

At the prescribed time, the drone of the oncoming planes was heard, well before the time that they could be seen. Shortly, the approximately 2,250 planes came into view, and in the words of many, “the sky was black, and totally obscured the sun”.

However, they were coming in from behind us – perpendicular to the road, which was contrary to what we had been told – that they would be coming from the West, flying towards the East, across our front and parallel to the road.

Even in spite of this, many cheers went up, knowing full well that these planes were going to be dropping their load of bombs momentarily, right on target – right on top of the Germans, in a rectangular area just south of the St. LO-Periers road. As I mentioned earlier, this area was 2,500 yards deep and 6,000 yards wide. That is approximately 1 ½ miles deep and about 3 ½ miles wide. A pretty big area! The cheering was loud and clear, and there was much jubilation and enjoyment of the anticipation of an easy attack on the German MLR.

While looking upwards at the approaching bombers, we could clearly see the bomb bays of the planes open, in preparation of dropping their load of bombs.

Having been through this before, although on a much smaller scale, we could judge the timing of the release of the bombs and the time relation to their hitting the target.

It is normal for the lead plane of the flight to drop its bombs first, on the prescribed target, then, all of the other following planes take this as a signal that this is the time and place to drop their bombs. Therefore, the area receives a ‘saturation bombing’.

As we watched the planes approach and open their bomb bay doors, we were horrified to see the bombs plummeting down prematurely, and heading directly for those troops who had withdrawn the 1,200 yards to the rear for safety measures. Whoomp! Whoomp!! Whoomp!!!

The bombs had been dropped along the entire line, precisely on the red smoke line, which had drifted back on top of them.

These troops that had been moved back 1,200 yards, knew at the time that this was an extreme safety measure, and for the most part, since this was a very temporary expedient, had not dug fox holes for any protection. Such an incident was never supposed to happen! But it Did!!

Consequently, the majority of bombs missed their initially designated target, and were dropped short by about 1,200 yards, and right on top of the troops who were waiting to begin the attack.

After about 20 minutes into the bombing, it was cancelled due to poor visibility, but the damage had already been done!

The result of this bombing error, cost us 24 men killed and 128 wounded.

Needless to say this attack was immediately called off, but it was rescheduled again for the same time the next day. It was too soon and without enough notice, that replacements for the men lost were not able to be sent forward.

The following day, the same preparations were made in anticipation of a smoothly coordinated attack, with all assurances that the bombing this time would be from a West to East mission, as had been promised the previous day. It was a “have to go” situation, as the element of surprise had been lost.

There had not been much rest that previous night, but the officers and men did the best that they could in spite of the damage – loss of men, weapons and supplies.

Again, on the following morning, the attack was to be at 11:00 A.M., with a saturation bombing to take place 15 minutes prior to H-Hour, as it did on the previous day. Likewise, the 230^th F.A. Battalion was to place their red smoke shells just south of the St. LO-Periers road.

Soon the roar of the planes was heard, and then they came into view. As on the previous day, “the sky was black with planes”! And, Yes, they were coming in again from the rear, perpendicular to the St. LO-Periers road, contrary to what we had been led to believe.

Only this time, the troops being a little bit more cautious and jittery, had dug substantially deep fox holes or slit trenches for their own protection – “just in case” it happened again. So, they were a little bit better protected than they were the previous day.

It was simply amazing that at the precise time that the 230^th F.A. Bn. placed their red smoke shells on the MLR just south of the St. LO-Perier road, that the same southerly breeze came up from the south, causing the red smoke to drift northwards to a point right over the troops. A complete repetition of the day before!!

Now we were again horrified to see the bomb bays open up prematurely, and to see the bombs come dropping down directly towards us.

I need to point out here that these bombs were of 1,000 lbs. and 500 lbs. with the larger bombs creating a crater some 20 feet deep and 30-40 feet across, depending on the consistency of the soil where they hit. Needless to say, this causes many tons of earth to be propelled upwards, outwards and then down. Without any further explanation, these piles of earth came cascading down on top of our troops, who were dug in their fox holes, and in many instances, buried these men alive, with little or no chance of recovery or survival.

At the close of the bombing, the first reactions were to attempt to dig out any known comrades whom we knew to be buried. In most cases, it was hopeless and too late! The 30^th Infantry Division suffered another 64 killed, 324 wounded and 60 Missing – mostly buried alive, and 164 cases of Battle Fatigue. Those who were missing were later unearthed by our own Engineers with bulldozers and the bodies recovered by the Graves Registration Unit. Many of them are still buried in the Normandy American Military Cemetery overlooking Omaha Beach, where they first landed only a month earlier.

However, as ruthless as it may seem to be, we were fighting a war against an enemy, as well as a war against survival, so it was necessary to continue with the attack as originally planned. We just had to do the best that we could with whatever manpower and weapons that we had. Our own men were groggy from our own accidental bombing, but they did remarkably well in spite of these horrible bombings of these past two days.

Ironically, Lt. Gen. Leslie McNair, Chief of the Ground Forces in Europe, had come forward to the 2^nd Battalion Hq. of the 120^th Regiment to observe and try to determine what had gone wrong the preceding day in order to make the necessary adjustments in planning, so that this does not happen again.

Lt. Gen. Leslie McNair was killed in this second bombing on 25 July, and he was the highest ranking officer to be killed in action during the entire European Campaign. His death was not announced officially for many months after this incident, so as not to give the enemy the satisfaction of knowing that one of our highest ranking officers was killed by our own Air Corps.

It can be asked, “Why didn’t we contact the Air Corps and direct them away from the area, and let them know that things had changed on the ground.”?

In any such operation at that time, the Air Corps was still stationed in England. Once they left their air bases, they had to maintain ‘radio silence’, and they could not be contacted from the ground. Radio messages had to be transmitted from the ground unit concerned, back through Corps Hqs., then Army Hqs., and they in turn would contact the Air Corps in England. Only “They” could contact the planes to change course or a mission.

Too much time would have elapsed anyway, and the mission accomplished before they could possibly be contacted. All messages sent, had to be coded, then decoded at each transfer point for approval, and this took up much valuable time.

This system was changed some time later based on this incident, whereby the Air Corps had a Ground-to-Air Liaison Officer, who was situated at the Division level, and with the coordination with the Division Commander, he could be authorized to abort or change a mission.

In spite of all of the setbacks of these two days, Operation Cobra went forward with great success.

The Division, Corps and Army artillery units, in a coordinated effort, saturated the area that we were to attack, and in spite of our troops weakness, we found the German defenders more groggy than we had anticipated, so our attack on their MLR was very successful, although very costly, and we made good headway that day and during the next several days.

This allowed Gen. Patton and his Third US Army to go through the gap in our lines that we had established, with his armored and infantry divisions, to make a headlong dash for Brittany, and cut it off.

Thus, Operation Cobra was a complete success, and it allowed the U.S. First Army to move forward along our entire line across the Cotentin peninsula.

This brought to a close the Normandy Campaign, and as the German High Command put it, “This was the first major turning point of the war” that led to our ultimate victory 10 months later.

Frank W. Towers ©

8/07/05

This document was originally compiled from notes written during and after the war, and in 1955, were they put together in a draft form. Not until recently were they re-edited and entered into my computer in the above form.