Church, Colleville-sur-Mer, Omaha beach, Normandy, France

Church, Colleville-sur-Mer, Normandy, France

On the photo:

Colleville-sur-mer was one of the main objectives on D-Day as it lay behind one one of the vital draws which were needed to land tanks, trucks and heavy equipment.

This church was the scene of heavy fighting as troops of the 1st Division (“The Big Red One”) finally struggled ashore. The first Americans reached the church around noon and there was a gun battle in the churchyard with casualties on both sides but more importantly it was the scene of the worst friendly fire incident on D-Day.
Since few radios survived the landing and as radio operators were often targeted by snipers, the ships offshore had little idea of what was happening. Based on some misleading information, the USS Harding, a destroyer stationed offshore, fired over 100 shells into the village, aiming particularly at the church tower as it was believed that it was occupied by German soldiers, who were directing artillery fire on to the beach. There were many American casualties and it was some time before accurate information was relayed to the ship.

Nowaydays a photo how it was back in june 1944 is erected near the entrance.

Omaha Beach

Omaha was divided into ten sectors, codenamed (from west to east): Able, Baker, Charlie, Dog Green, Dog White, Dog Red, Easy Green, Easy Red, Fox Green and Fox Red. On june 6, 1944 -D-Day - the initial assault on Omaha was to be made by two Regimental Combat Teams (RCT), supported by two tank battalions, with two battalions of Rangers also attached. The RCT's were part of the veteran 1st Infantry division ("The Big Red One") and the untested 29th ("Blue and Grey") , a National Guard unit.

The plan was to make frontal assaults at the "draws" (valleys) in the bluffs which dominate the coast in Normandy , codenamed west to east they were called D-1, D-3, E-1, E-3 and F-1 . These draws could then be used to move inland with reserves and vehicles.

The Germans were not stupid; they knew the draws were vital and concentrated their limited resources in defending them. To this end they built "Widerstandsneste" with AT guns, mortars, MG's in Tobrul's, trenches and bunkers, manned by soldiers of the German 716th and - more recently - 352nd Infantry Division, a large portion of whom were teenagers, though they were supplemented by veterans who had fought on the Eastern Front. All in all some 1100 German soldiers defended the entire Omaha beach sector of over 5 miles.

Preliminary bombardments were almost totally ineffective and when the initial waves landed at low tide they met with fiece opposition of an enemy well dug in and prepared.

Casualties were heaviest amongst the troops landing at either end of Omaha. At Fox Green and Easy Red, scattered elements of three companies were reduced to half strength by the time they gained the relative safety of the shingle, many of them having crawled the 300 yards (270 m) of beach just ahead of the incoming tide. Casualties on this spot were especially heavy amongst the first waves of soldiers and the demolition teams - at Omaha these were tasked with blasting 16 channels through the beach obstacles, each 70 meters wide. German gunfire from the bluffs above the beach took a heavy toll on these men. The demolition teams managed to blast only six complete gaps and three partial ones; more than half their engineers were killed in the process.

Situation on Dog Green and on Easy Red on the other end of Omaha by mid morning was so bad with nearly all the troops essentially pinned down on the beach gen. Eisenhower seriously considered to abandon the operation.

As the US first waves assault forces and combat engineers landing directly opposite the "draws" were pinned down it was up to forces landing on the flanks of the strongpoints to penetrate the weaker German defences by climbing the bluffs. Doing this they had to overcome the minefields and barbed wire as well as machinegun fire from German positions but they did and they were able to attack some key strongpoints from the side and the rear, taking them out by early afternoon.
This happened on several spots at Omaha and essentially saved the day: individual acts of initiative by lower ranked officers and courage like that of First Lieutenant Jimmy Monteith, who led a group of men to take one of the key German widerstandsneste and was killed in action, succeeded where a flawed plan failed.

See my other Omaha beach photo's for more viewpoints, panorama shots and notes on the fighting

Tonemapped using three (Handheld) shots made with a Nikon D7000 and a Tamron 28-75 mm f/2,8 XR Di, augustus 2012.

Taken in: France / Basse-Normandie / Colleville-sur-Mer (show map)

Taken on: August 2, 2012

Tags:

Omaha Beach

Colleville-sur-Mer

Normandy

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Sets appears in: • Omaha Beach, Normandy, France

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Camera: Nikon D7000, f/4.5, 1/8000 sec, 28mm (=42mm), ISO 400 (more info) (hide info)

Camera:	Nikon D7000
Lens:	28.0-75.0 mm f/2.8
Aperture:	f/4.5
Exposure Time:	1/8000 sec
Focal Length:	28mm (35mm equivalent: 42mm)
ISO:	400
Exposure Bias:	-1/3 EV
Flash:	Off, Did not fire
Exposure Program:	Aperture-priority AE
Exposure Mode:	Auto
Metering Mode:	Spot
White Balance:	Auto
Gain Control:	Low gain up
Sharpness:	Hard
Color Space:	Uncalibrated
Software:	Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 5.7 (Windows)
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