Figure 1.--Here a medic administers to a French boy who has hurt his ankle. Notice the Glengary cap. This means that British soldiers must have passed through. This would place the scene on the eastern part of the Normandy bridgehead. I'm not sure as to the nationality of the medic. I don't recognize his patch and he is not wearing his helmet--the most obvious way of differentiating between British/Canadian and American soldiers. A reader suggests, "I suspect the medic has loaned the boy his hat while he attends to the ankle". If so he might have had a hard time getting it back.

The Allied invasion transformed Normandy from a backwater of the War to perhaps the Wars most critical focal point. Both the Allies and Germans appreciated this and the fighting was not only intense, but confined to a relatively small area. The Germans knew that retreating from Normandy mean losing the War. The Allies had their backs to the Channel. The problem for the Germans was not only did Allied air power isolate Normandy, making reinforcement difficicult, but a massive Soviet offensive on the Eastern Front was destroying Army Group Center, the largest and most powerful German formation in the War. Dealing with increasing American pressure in the west forced the Germans to move forces west making the German position increasingly vulnerable to what would become one of the great tank battles of the War. The intense figting during June and July caused considerable damage throught out the area. This was especially true because the Germans managed to bottleup the Allies in the Normandy beidgehead for several weeks. This meant the fighting on the Western front was confined to Normandy. Many villiages and even cities like Caen were destroyed. There were large numbers of civilian casualties. The French during World War I had evacuated civilians from the Western Front in northern France. In Normandy there was no where to evacuate the civilians.

Intense Fighting

The Allied invasion transformed Normandy from a backwater of the War to perhaps the Wars most critical focal point. Both the Allies and Germans appreciated this and the fighting was not only intense, but confined to a relatively small area. The Germans knew that retreating from Normandy mean losing the War. The Allies had their backs to the Channel. The problem for the Germans was not only did Allied air power isolate Normandy, making reinforcement difficicult, but a massive Soviet offensive on the Eastern Front was destroying Army Group Center, the largest and most powerful German formation in the War. Dealing with increasing American pressure in the west forced the Germans to move forces west making the German position increasingly vulnerable to what would become one of the great tank battles of the War. But while in Normsandy the fighting was bitter abd at extremely close quarters. Opposing units were often separated only by small fields between hedgerows.

Civilian Casualties

The intense figting during June and July caused considerable damage throught out the area. This was especially true because the Germans managed to bottleup the Allies in the Normandy beidgehead for several weeks. This meant the fighting on the Western front was confined to Normandy. Many villiages and even cities like Caen were destroyed. There were large numbers of civilian casualties. The French during World War I had evacuated civilians from the Western Front in northern France. In Normandy there was no where to evacuate the civilians. We note reports of thousands of civilian casualties, byt have not been able to find any precise statistics. After the War there were criticisms from French sources, but there seems to have been replatively little complaint from French sources. Most accepted the terrible equation of warfare and that freeing France was worth the cost. And there was not a little conscious about French collaboration with the Germans. The largest casulaties in Normandy seem to have occurred in connection with air attacks on Cherbourg. One source reports 50,000 civilan deaths, mostly from Allied bombing attacks. [Amouroux] I'm unsure how accurate these estimates are, but there were undobtedly substantial civilian casualties. Not only was Cherborg heavily bombed, but Caen was almost completely destroyed.

Sources

Amouroux, Henri. La Grande histoire des Français sous l’Occupation volume 8. Amouroux estimates 20,000 civilians were killed in Calvados department, 10,000 in Seine-Maritime, 14,800 in the Manche, 4,200 in the Orne, and about 3,000 in the Eure. That adds up to more than 50,000 killed people.

Created: 6:49 PM 8/1/2007
Last updated: 9:12 PM 2/29/2008