59th (Staffordshire) Division Memorial Galmanche 19th May 2017

In May 2017 I returned to Normandy for the third time with some special tasks in mind that would wrap up my efforts to complete this 'Pithead Polar Bear' project of mine. 

In 2014, with the research in its infancy I made it to St Contest and the 59th Memorial in the square. On that occasion I left believing that the impressive property located next to the Church was the focus of the fighting in which my Grandfather with the 5th South Staffords was engaged over the 8th and 9th July 1944. 

Whilst La Grande Ferme, the aforementioned property, was indeed occupied and fought over,  the objective of the 5th South Staffs was located about a kilometer away. It was only on our most recent visit that Owen and I determined to finally find the elusive Galmanche memorial come what may. 

After the usual circuitous journeying along the narrowest of country lanes we spied two flag poles. Could it be that the side by side Tricolour and Union Flag marked the much sought after spot. Indeed it did and I was finally able to pay my respects at a spot that lay within 100 yards of where my Grandfather had fought 73 years earlier. Unusually I was well prepared and had with me a Royal British Legion with me for the occasion.

Over the past few years it had been my understanding that the only remaining evidence of the Chateau of Galmanche was now fashioned into the cross design memorial to the 59th that stands in St. Contest. However, having finally located this corner of Calvados we decided to venture further down the track, at the end of which the rebuilt property was visible. 

I have to say that I was thrilled to see that on either side of the new building their remained a couple of sections of the outer walls of the original Chateau and what's more, these walls were suitably peppered with bullet holes as well as bearing the scars of artillery attention.

Just to think that one of these pock marks could have originated from my Grandad's rifle...... assuming that he could shoot straight!

The approach to the original Chateau from the memorial site.

The rebuilt property on the site of the original Chateau Galmanche.

It is notable that the new building has retained the spiraled wrought iron work on the gates that can been seen on the photograph of the pre-war Chateau.

The original Chateau de Galmanche.

The photographs below show a section of the outer wall of the original Chateau bearing the scars of the July fighting as the 59th tried to dislodge the SS from the fortified position of Galmanche.

Scarred exterior wall of the original Chateau.

One of Jim Heath's potshots?

St. Contest and Galamanche - 11th May 2014

Arial view of St. Contest showing the location of the Church and Chateau

Having spent a full Saturday driving along three quarters of the Overlord front (Utah on the Contetin Penninsula being a little too far when we were hungry and I, as non-driver, had my sights set on assaulting a beer in the nearby town of Bayeaux!) we headed back to our hotel to consider which sites relevant to the 59th we were going to head for in the morning.

As our hotel was located in the north of Caen it was logical that we should initially head into the area where Operation Charnwood played out.

A few days before leaving for Normandy, as a result of contacting the Staffordshire Regimental Museum, I had been sent a chapter of ‘Your men in battle; the story of the South Staffordshire Regiment- 1939-45’ that documented the actions of the Regiment throughout the Normandy campaign. Armed with this detailed account we aimed to locate the chateaux of St. Contest which had been the scene of such fierce fighting on the night of the 8th July.

Even equipped as we were with a detailed road map of the area, the unique nature of French road signs and their tendency to present the information that they are intended to convey against the direction of travel meant that we took considerably longer than anticipated to locate St. Contest and its church spire.

St. Contest Church

Parking up in front of the church, we left the vehicle to cross the road to the location of the 59th (Staffordshire) Division.

Memorial to the 59th (Staffordshire) Division

St. Contest, Normandy

The simple plaque commemorates the role played by the men of the 59th Division in the St. Contest area on 8th and 9th July that was ultimately to lead to the liberation of Caen.

The fighting in St. Contest and neighbouring Galamanche centred on the 'chateau', then occupied by the SS.

Of this chateau I recall an often repeated anecdote of my Grandfather's that involved a house (as he described it) the ground floor of which was occupied by two British soldiers whilst, unbeknownst to them, the upper floor was the chosen residence of many German soldiers. In my childish mind's eye, I equated this house to something like the council house that my Grandparents lived in (my points of reference were somewhat limited at that age!). The story continued that the two British soldiers emerged from the property unscathed and still unaware of their overnight co-habitees! Such was the unusual nature of this unintentional close encounter with the enemy that the story was relayed back to the UK where it appeared in the national press in the days that followed.

Imagine then my surprise when I read the following passage in the account of the St. Contest action as recounted in ‘Your men in battle; the story of the South Staffordshire Regiment- 1939-45’.

'Two men of D Company of the 5th Battalion [South Staffordshire Regiment], unknown to each other, had spent the night inside the chateau with the Germans without the enemy knowing of their presence, although both knew the Germans were there. As dawn broke one man crawled away, but was quickly followed by a German with a bayonet clenched in his hands. The other man, Private Parker, looking through a slit, saw what was happening and set off in pursuit. Just as the German was about to rush forward to make his kill, Private Parker killed him with his bayonet thus saving his comrade's life. Private Parker, who was killed at a later date, was awarded the Military Medal'.

So here I had, for the first time, courtesy of the above printed passage a concrete correlation between a contemporary written account of the battle* and one of my Grandfather's rare recollections of his part in the fighting. There were some differences in the detail and my Grandfather spared me the gory conclusion, but I am convinced that both book and anecdote describe one and the same event.

The task was now to locate the chateau and to place it within the context of the fighting.

Looking at the pen and ink map of St. Contest and Galamanche as it appears in ‘Your men in battle; the story of the South Staffordshire Regiment- 1939-45’ a roughly square feature to the right of the church was a logical candidate for the chateau. 

Access to the property (at least from this side) was via a gate which runs onto a courtyard in front of the house.

Having found what we believed to be our chateau, I was ever keen to photograph the property for this site**. As I snapped away through the gate my actions clearly aroused the suspicions of the owner who emerged from the building in order to establish exactly why two black-clad strangers were busy photographing his rather desirable house. In fairness to him, in his shoes I would not have been impressed either! Anticipating another poor reception from an irate Frenchman (two days previously, some words had been exchanged over parking with a rather unpleasant farmer at the gates of Serre Road Cemetery No. 1 in the Somme region), we moved forward to greet the owner.

On this occasion, our expectations were unfounded, as once we explained the reason for our visit in rusty school French aided by English pointing (in the direction of the memorial), and our interest in his house he was very obliging. The owner, whose name I am sorry to say I didn't get, confirmed that our assumptions were correct and that his property had indeed been the focal point of the fighting in the area in July 1944 since it was serving as an SS Panzer Headquarters. As an H.Q. at the time of the fighting, the chateau would have been bristling with machine-gun posts dug into a warren of interlocking trenches and well concealed snipers would have been in position to pick off unfortunate individuals. One such sniper was positioned in the bell tower of the adjacent St. Contest church. Moreover, the owner was happy to snap away. In one photograph the scars of the fighting can still be seen on the building. Were the pump on the front of the building still required to draw up water from a nearby well, more than one bucket would be required for collection as the pump is riddled with bullet holes (supposedly thanks to the efforts of the bell tower sniper).

View of the Chateau through the gate on the corner of the 'square' of St. Contest

(note the owner on his way out).

The front aspect of the Chateau

(Owen engages the owner as best he can!).

The bullet holed water pump.

The Chateau looking in the direction of St. Contest Church.

The grounds of the Chateau, showing outbuildings on the other side of the gate.

The bell tower of St. Contest church from which a German sniper operated.

After taking these photographs and exhausting our very limited French vocabulary, we parted with the owner who returned to his kitchen and lunch preparations whilst we headed off in the direction of the nearby Cambes-en-Plaine cemetery.

I have to say that the time we spent locating St. Contest and the time spent looking over the exterior of the Chateau were quite emotional for me. On the preparation of this blog, I have described to people how it has once again brought me very close to my Grandfather twenty years after his death. In St. Contest, to be standing in exactly the place where he fought as a young soldier of 'A' Company on 8th July 1944 was, for wont of a better word, surreal.

* ‘Your men in battle; the story of the South Staffordshire Regiment- 1939-45’ is a compilation of official and unofficial reports by the officers of the regiment that was published by the Wolverhampton Express and Star in 1945).

** Not long after this visit the confusion about the Chateau objective of the 59th was resolved. Whilst as already stated the Grand Farmhouse located in St. Contest was indeed fought over, it was the Chateau in Galmanche, a couple of kilometers away that was the focus of the SS defence.

Later I was able to find an old postcard of the building prior to the fighting.

Chateau de Galmanche in more prosperous times.

This RAF aerial reconnaissance photograph clearly shows the importance of this position and the lengths that the German SS units went to defend it on the outer limits of Caen.

In the fighting of the 8th and 9th July and in subsequent bombardments the Chateau de Galmanche was reduced to rubble, the cornerstone of the building becoming the 59th Staffordshire Division memorial on the small square of St. Contest.

However, a small memorial honours the fallen of the 59th close to the site of the former Chateau.

Memorial to the 59th (Staffordshire) Division

Galmanche.

(Photograph courtesy of Bert Bamford of the 5th South Staffordshire Regiment)

It is worthwhile to compare the original Chateau with the more modest version that replaced it. Notably the spiraled wrought iron gates of the original have been reproduced.

Galmanche today.

The Battle - Operation Charnwood

Zero hour for the attack was set at 4.20 am of the 8th July. Seconds before the allotted time, a few guns stuttered to herald the start of the attack. Instantly these guns were joined by the the roar of the Division's supporting artillery (the 61, 110 and 116 Field Artillery Regiments) as they opened up on the German fortified positions. Additional supporting fire came in from the sea courtesy of the big guns of the Royal Navy. HMS Belfast, Roberts, Emerald and Rodney, anchored in the beach-head added significant weight to the bombardment, termed the 'Monty barrage'.

'HMS 'Belfast', Normandy, 8 July 1944'

by Francis Russell Flint

As the barrage continued, so the men of the South Straffordshire Regiment formed up at their designated start line in front of Galamanche.

As a result of the haste with which the infantry battalions of the Division were deployed, the opportunity for detailed and accurate reconnaissance was limited, but such was the reality of the mobile and reactive warfare. Nevertheless, unfortunately the expected single opposing company was in fact an extremely well equipped reinforced battalion whose compliment of mortar and machine guns was supplemented with a good supply of anti-tank weaponry. 

It was under these conditions that the 2/6th Battalion (temporarily under the command of 197 Brigade) advanced towards Galamanche. By virtue of the smoke and dust raised by the artillery barrage, visibility from the start line was reduced to 30 yards and as the troops moved forward, they were rapidly swallowed up in the man made fog of war that enveloped the cornfields that separated them from the bristling German positions.

What was ahead of the advancing units of the 176 and 197 Infantry Brigades was an extremely well organised defensive line, consisting of well established trenches connecting the massively fortified village strongholds that they had been ordered to take. Whilst deficient of tank support at the onset of the action, the German positions were strongly defended by light and heavy machine gun posts, well concealed snipers and the fanatical resistance put up by the 12th SS Panzer Division Hitlerjugend  panzergrenadiers who took to the fight with a zeal borne out of indoctrination of the ideals of Nazism.

The demonstrated ability of the defenders to recover from the aerial and artillery bombardment during the six hours prior to the advance testifies to the integrity of the German line in front of Caen.

A Waffen SS soldier pictured in the summer of 1944 in the Caen region carrying an MG-42 of the type that halted the advance of 'A' and 'C' Companies of the 2/6th South Staffordshire Regiment on 8th July 1944

This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Germany license.

Attribution: Bundesarchiv, Bild 146-1983-109-14A / Woscidlo, Wilfried / CC-BY-SA 3.0

Within the 2/6th Battalion 'A' and 'C' Companies had advanced approximately 200 yards at which point concentrated fire from the German MG-42's, commonly known as Spandaus to the British,from both forward and rear positions, pinned the attackers down in the mediocre cover that the cornfields afforded. For a time the only offensive fire was maintained by the barrage. Accurate and effective artillery support was hampered by high casualty rates amongst NCOs and wireless operators who would otherwise direct the fire. Eventually, two troops of Sherman tanks moved up to assist but were obliged to withdraw in the face of heavy mortar fire. The tank withdrawal was aided by a covering smoke screen achieved by the mortars of 'A' Company of the 2/6th.

As the morning wore on, casualties started to return towards the rear passing through the attacking formations. In addition, a trickle of German prisoners started moving backwards towards the British rear. 

On the left flank of the attack, the 6th North Staffords of the 176 Brigade successfully captured the objective of La Bijude by 0730 hours, only to be forced back in a rapid counter attack. The two advance companies of the 6th North Staffords found themselves in an area just north of the cross roads between La Bijude and the infamous Chateau de la Londe, experiencing heavy casualties in the process.

Chateau de la Londe, Normandy in 1944. A key objective of the fighting in the area described as 'the bloodiest square mile in Normandy'. East Yorkshire and Suffolk regiments ultimately took this SS stronghold

In parallel with the 6th North Staffords, the 2/6th South Staffords were likewise taking heavy casualties on the right flank. At the same time 1/6th South Staffords were also encountering stiff resistance to the left of both the 2/6th and 5th Battalions. The latter formation looked on with frustration as their brothers-in-arms and in some cases brothers by blood forged ahead into the maelstrom of the battle.

It was not until midday of the 8th that 5th Battalion first received orders to move into an area that would support the efforts of the 2/6th whereby 'C' Company were positioned to oppose any enemy counter-attacks whilst 'D' Company, under the command of Major McIntyre was, alongside the 2/6th, to attack and capture the SS stronghold of St Contest Chateau.

By 1pm signalers were able to get the message back that the remnants of the leading companies of the 2/6th and 5th Battalions had gained the upper hand in St Contest and were fairly well established, except for an area within the orchard to the south of the village in which small numbers of Germans were still offering resistance.

Over to the left, the 1/6th Battalion were being harried by snipers in the environs of Cambes Wood. Within the wood, the resistance was overcome by members of the Battalion's own sniper section that accounted for 6 German snipers for no loss of their own. With this resistance overcome, the rest of the day was spent in consolidating the current positions and digging in.

In the evening, at approximately 8.30pm, in the half light, 'D' Company of 5th Battalion attacked the Chateau, but their attempt to take the building faltered as a result of the fierce resistance put up by the defenders. 'D' company reassembled with the intention of resuming the attack at dawn on the morning of 9th.

In the meantime, at 9pm, 7th Battalion passed through its beleaguered sister battalions to assault the Chateau. Advancing across the railway line to the east of the building 'B' Company and 'D' Company encountered heavy machine gun and mortar fire. In an attempt to outflank the defenders, one platoon of 'B' Company veered round to the right flank but in doing so became caught in an enemy minefield and suffered heavy losses as a consequence. Support of the attack from Sherman tanks across open land was of little use as they encountered accurate fire laid down by German 88 mm anti-tank guns and thus withdrew from the fray.

'B' Company eventually crossed the railway line, but any further advance was halted as the British reached a system of extensive trench works and dug-outs. Vicious hand to hand fighting ensued resulting in the award of the Military Medal to Private Rutter of the 7th Battalion.

As night fell, the two attacking companies were withdrawn with 'C' Company stepping up to defend against a possible counter attack.

Sherman tanks advance towards Epron, north of Caen, during Operation 'Charnwood', 9 July 1944 © IWM (B 6749)

http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205204584

By the morning of 9th July, the objective of La Bijude had fallen to the 1/6th Battalion, only the fortified position of Malon held out. The position, directly in front of the 1/6th and about 600 yards from Cambes Wood was stormed at dawn by soldiers of the 6th North Staffs, who after a hard fight gained control of Cambes by noon.

For the 59th, this action marched the end of the Battle of Caen. Elsewhere, the combined efforts of the men of I Corps had secured the the territory of the city up to the north banks of the Orne, but at a heavy cost. The official casualty figures (killed and wounded) for the 2/6th South Staffordshire Regiment up to 0600 hours of 11th July are as follows:

• 16 Officers
• 199 Other Ranks

At 4.20am in the predawn of 8th July the men of 59th (Staffordshire) Division stood apprehensively on the start line ahead of their first action, alone with their thoughts and prayers. In the following 36 hours all the toil and training of the previous four years was put to the test in the field. By the close of the 9th July they emerged from 'Operation Charnwood' as battle tested soldiers of the British Army.

Infantry of the 59th Division dug in on the outskirts of Caen, 9 July 1944 © IWM (B 6760)

http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205206005

This for many, including my Grandfather, was the start of a long campaign that would take them through France, Belgium, The Netherlands and into the Reich itself before the tyranny of Nazism was overcome ten months later.

Lancashire Fusiliers (59th (Staffordshire) Division) crawl cautiously through a cornfield near St Contest, 9 July 1944 © IWM (B 6754)
http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205206001

Carriers and infantry advance across a field of wheat near St Contest, 9 July 1944 © IWM (B 6755)
http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205206002

Infantry and carriers of 59th Division advancing during fighting around Caen, 11 July 1944 © IWM (B 6866)
http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205202145

The Plan Of Attack For The 59th (Staffordshire) Division - Operation Charnwood

The positions of Allied and German formations at the outset of Operation Charnwood
(map used with the kind permission of http://59div.morssweb.com)

Across the centre of the Charnwood front the three infantry brigades of the 59th Division were positioned as follows:

• 197 Brigade opposite Galamanche on the right flank
• 177 Brigade in reserve in front of Cambes-en-Plaine
• 176 Brigade opposing the fortified villages of La Bijude and La Londe

The allotted tasks of the 177 Brigade in the centre of the front was to secure the stronghold villages of Galamanche (a 2/6th Battalion - (presently under the command of 197 Brigade) objective) and La Bijude (a 1/6th Battalion objective). It was the role of the 5th Battalion to stand firm in the area between these two villages and to exploit any opportunities that these simultaneous actions on either side of there position presented.

Map of the Galamanche-La Bijude area showing the position on start position of my Grandfather's 'A' Company of the 5th South Staffordshire Battalion on the morning of 8th July 1944

The battle orders stipulated that the attack would start at 5.30 on the morning of 8th July with full tank and artillery support.

On the basis of acquired military intelligence, it was the expectation of the I Corps commanders that all of the objectives would be delivered into Allied hands within one hour of the start of the assault.