Omaha Beach
Trip Start
May 03, 2008
1
4
Trip End
May 11, 2008
Colleville-sur-Mer, Normandy, France
Tuesday, May 6, 2008
Find it: From Arromanches, take the D-14 towards Omaha Beach (follow the Overlord road signs.) As you enter the town of Longues-sur-Mer, you'll turn right at the only major intersection. You should see the sings for the battery. Just folllow the road to the coast. It dead ends at the battery.
So why it famous? Well first it is a beautifully preserved site situated on a bluff over looking the Seine Bay, about 6km from Arromanches. Secondly, it is the only battery to have it's original guns in place and somehow escape the post-war scrap metal scavengers
Aerial of Longues
. Construction on the battery began in the fall of 1943 as part of the Atlantic Wall defense system. The walls and roof of each of the four casemates are about two meters thick. They have a firing chamber housing the gun and in the rear, two smaller rooms for storing ammunition. Under the gun is a trench for storing used shells. Above the gun is a large exhaust duct to filter the toxic fumes that are expelled after each firing.300 meters in front of the battery, directly on the bluff's edge, sits the firing command post. It's actually dug into the cliff's edge and is comprised of two stories. The ground floor houses the observation post with a crenel (frontal gap) with about a 180 degree angle of view. It also has a map room, telephone exchange, and sleeping quarters for the gun crew. The upper floor would have housed the telemetry post (an optical device used to determine the range to a target.) The roof, supported by four steel posts, is 70cm thick. The battery surrendered to the British on June 7th.
From here, I went just a short way down the coast to the Normandy American Cemetery.
Find it: Go back out to the D-14 and turn right going West towards Colleville-sur-Mer. You'll actually go through the other side of town and then you'll see the signs for the Cemetery
Longues-sur-Mer Battery
.The American Cemetery is difficult to describe. It's really something that has to be experienced. But bottom line, it's beautiful. You'll pass through security at the visitors entrance and then past the reflecting pool, down the path and around through the trees into the Garden of the Missing. Here, the names of 1,557 missing soldiers have their names carved all around the curved wall. You then walk up through the memorial and out into the cemetery.
There are 10 sections, five on each side of the central mall (there's a computerized index in the visitors center if you're looking for a specific grave.) The site is 172 acres and there there are currently 9,387 graves, each with a Latin Cross or Star of David made from white Lasa marble. There are also 38 sets of brothers buried here.
Now on to Omaha beach where we'll start right in the middle at Dog Red sector.
Find it: From the Cemetery, go back out to the D-14 and turn right. When you get into Saint-Laurent-sur-Mer, turn right onto the D517 (Rue de la Liberation) towards Les Moulins. The street will dead end into the beach.
Dog Red sector is on the eastern edge of the 29th Infantry Division's landing beaches. It's located at the town of Les Moulins. The road that goes to the beach is the D-3 draw and passes between WN68 and WN66. It's hard to imagine what it would have looked like 60 years ago. Today it was warm and sunny, and pretty little houses now line the beach. There are two big memorials here. The stone one, the American Memorial, and the newer modern-art memorial, the Les Braves Memorial, which sits directly on the beach
Path to Longues-sur-mer
. I moved east along the beach as far as you could until the road ended as the E-1 draw (Easy Red sector.) Here you can see the remains of WN65. I got some good photos from the top of the bluff there. No wonder the Germans chose this location for a defensive position. Moving back west along the beach to the other end you wind up at the town of Vierville. The road that comes in from the town is the D-1 draw between WN72 and WN71. This spot marks the division between Charlie sector and Dog Green sector. This is where A/116 came ashore. They were the first men to land on the beaches. And they were slaughtered (read the book, The Bedford Boys to learn more about it)Omaha beach was also the location of the artificial Mulberry A port. It stretched from Vierville all the way east to Colleville-sur-Mer. It was completely destroyed during the storm of June 19-21, 1944.
The last stop of the day was Point du Hoc.
Find it: From Veirville, go back out to the D-514 and go West. It's only about 10km down the road. You'll see the signs. Point du Hoc was one of the most important targets for the allies on D-Day. Situated on a bluff 30 meters above the sea, it had a commanding view of both Omaha and Utah beach
Behind the battery
. With the radar station at near by Point de la Percee, this battery was a force to be reconed with. The task of Colonel Ruddres 2nd Rangers was to seize the 155mm guns. In the hours before D-Day, the battery was bomed with over 700 tonnes of bombs and the battleship Texas fired over 600 shots from her guns. The barrage was so terrific in fact, that it changed the landscape. Even today, there are bomb craters everywhere. But the attach was naught. When the Rangers finally seized control of the bunkers, they realized the guns weren't there. Rommel had the guns moved about a mile inland 2 days before, fearing an ariel bombardment by the allies. However, the guns were quickly found and destroyed with thermite grenades. The site is well worth the visit. The view of the coast in both diretions is amazing. And the moon-like landsacpe is erie to walk though. It's a large site and there's plenty to see. Unfortuantely the American Battlefield Monuments Commission has closed the artillery command post to the public and it is now fenced off.
Arriving back at the hotel at low tide, I walked out on the beach to get a closer look at the 850-ton platform. You can see how big this thing is from the pictures. You can also get an idea of how far out the tide goes and how much ground the soldiers had to cover (running in full gear under enemy fire) before reaching safe cover.
Comments
omaha beach
You've made a mistake with the number of graves. There are 9387 graves, including the brother of Gen Roosevent who was killed in the 1st world war.
Re: omaha beach
You are correct. I misread the information. There are 9,238 Latin Crosses and 149 Stars of David, totaling 9,387 headstones. I'll make the correction! Thanks for pointing that out :)