The Falaise Pocket And The Demise of A German Army

A road in the Falaise Pocket choked with bodies and destroyed vehicles

As the South Staffordshire regiments were coming to terms with the news that the 59^th Division and their associated regiments were to be disbanded, the encirclement of German Army Group B was nearing completion.

The last action in which the 5^th South Staffordshire Regiment engaged the enemy in the Menil Hermai and Rabodanges area took them  some 9 miles south of Falaise in positions approximately equidistant from Falaise and Argentan, towns near to the mouth of the notorious ‘Falaise Pocket’.

Given the involvement of the 59 (Staffordshire) division in the encirclement, it is appropriate to describe some of the drama that played out in the Falaise-Argentan sector. The Battle of Falaise brought the Battle of Normandy to a conclusion and the liberation of Paris on the 25^th August closed Operation Overlord.

The town of Faliase was also an entry on the envelope upon which my Grandfather detailed his passage across north west Europe.

Operation Cobra in July had allowed the huge US forces to breakout of the Normandy bridgehead into Brittany enabling rapid progress to the south and south east by General Patton’s 3^rd Army, now unhindered by the Normandy bocage. To the north, the 1^st Canadian Army were pressing south east from Caen towards Falaise whilst the 2^nd British Army maintained pressure further west.

Location of opposing forces in the area of  Falaise between 8th to 17th August 1944

(image: EyeSerene)

Plans were afoot to trap the German forces to the west of the Seine. The original plan was to execute a long encirclement with 21^st Army Group (1^st Canadian and 2^nd British armies) pivoting to the left from Falaise to reach the Seine whilst US 3^rd Army would block a breakout to the south, thereby trapping German Army Group B (the 7^th German Army and the 5^th Panzer Army) between the rivers Seine and Loire.

The German High Command recognised the risk of encirclement and Hitler responded to the threat by ordering Generalfeldmarschall von Kluge to punch a hole in the US 1^st Army front in a major offensive action between Mortain and Avranches.

Of this offensive Hitler wrote 

‘The decision in the Battle of France depends on the success of the Avraches attack. The commander in the west has a unique opportunity, which will never return, to drive into an extremely exposed enemy area and thereby to change the situation completely’.

The offensive was launched on 7^th August. The Allies, forewarned by Ultra information, neutralised the attack within 24 hours and the action, known as Operation Lüttich, ceased on 10^th August. The intended breakout failed and only served to drive the German armour of Army Group B deeper into the pocket.

In the immediate wake of Operation Lüttich, General Bradley recorded 

‘This is an opportunity that comes to a commander not more than once in a century. We’re about to destroy an entire hostile army and go all the way from here to the German border’.

Operation Totalise and then Operation Tractable took the Canadians into the town of Falaise which was secured by the 17^th August. On the same day Hitler relieved von Kluge of his command and replaced him with Feldmarschall Walter Model. Von Kluge, blamed for the failure of the German Army in the west and implicated in the 20^th July plot to assassinate Hitler, committed suicide in Metz two days later.

Back in the field, XV US Corps, which formed the lower jaw of the trap reached positions overlooking the town of Argentan. The possibility existed to close the gap with the coming together of the Canadians and Poles from the north and the Americans from the south. However, Patton’s orders to advance beyond Argentan were countermanded by General Bradley. The rationale for this decision has been hotly debated since 1944.

Numerous reasons have been given for the order to stop the XV advance that would close the pocket thereby cutting off the escape route to the east for the remaining forces of the 7^th German Army and the 5^th Panzer Army.

One explanation proffered by Bradley himself after the war stated that a meeting of the British/Canadian and US units between Falaise and Argentan would have been a ‘dangerous and uncontrollable maneuver’ which in the words of General Eisenhower might have resulted in a ‘calamatous battle between friends’. Alternatively, the delicate politics associated with maintaining the Allied coalition may have lead to a reluctance to order US forces across the international army boundary. A thoroughly feasible reason was a purely military consideration. Four divisions of US XV Corps were extended over a broad front. To further thin the line in order to close the gap posed a considerable risk given that the remnants of no less than nineteen German divisions were poised to ‘stampede’ east to escape the pocket. This could have lead to the annihilation of the Corps. Bradley also said of this decision that he would prefer to have ‘a solid shoulder at Argentan to a broken neck at Falaise’.

Closure of the Pocket 17th to 21st August 1944

(note the position of the 59 (Staffordshire) Division at the base of the Pocket

On 17^th August the Allies proceeded to close the gap. On 18^th August the 4^th Canadian Armoured Division seized the village of Trun whilst formations of the Polish Armoured Division captured Chambois, meeting up with US and French troops coming from the south.

Whilst in a desperate predicament, the German forces continued to show a great tenacity in battle. On 19^th August an armoured column of 2^nd Panzer Division broke through the line in the Canadian held position at St Lambert. In doing so they facilitated the escape of thousands of troops by keeping the road open for a full six hours until darkness fell. In this time, other units converged in the Dives river which ran across the mouth of the pocket.

On the 19^th August, the Poles moved north east from Chambois to take the high ground of Hill 262 from where they could direct accurate artillery fire onto the German armoured columns formed up in the pocket. On the same day, elements of two Panzer divisions launched attacks on the Polish positions from outside of the pocket whilst from the interior further Panzer divisions broke through the Polish lines and opened up a corridor through which an estimated 10,000 further German troops escaped. The linking of Polish and Canadian forces on 21^st August finally closed the gap and sealed the pocket.

The encirclement of the remaining forces of German Army Group B was without doubt a decisive and crushing defeat. In the chaos of those August days an accurate determination of the extent of the German losses was not possible and estimates vary widely depending on the source of the information. However, in general terms it is accepted that between 80,000 to 100,000 troops were encircled within the pocket of whom 10,000 to 15,000 were killed, 40,000 to 50,000 were taken prisoner of war and an estimated 20,000 to 50,000 escaped to the east out of the pocket.

On visiting the Falaise area shortly after the conclusion of the action General Eisenhower described the scene thus 

‘The battlefield at Falaise was unquestioningly one of the greatest ‘killing fields’ of any of the war areas. Forty eight hours after the closing of the gap I was conducted through it on foot, to encounter scenes that could be described only by Dante. It was literally possible to walk for hundreds of yards at a time, stepping on nothing but dead and decaying flesh’.

Devastating though the losses to the German army were in terms of men, armour and other essential equipment, the fact that between 20,000 and 50,000 men were able to escape out of the pocket prior to the closure was crucial. Regrouped, these men were to form the basis of the determined and effective resistance that the Allies were to experience as the fighting continued in the direction of Berlin, across Belgium and Holland.