Destination Normandy: Three American Regiments on D-Day
Each participant's story is woven into the larger picture of the assault, allowing Bennett to go beyond the largely personal viewpoints yielded by traditional oral history but avoiding the impersonal nature of studies of grand strategy. In addition to the interviews and memoirs Bennett collected, he also discovered fresh documentary evidence from American, British, and French archives that play an important part in facilitating this new approach, as well as archives in Britain and France. The author unearths new stories and questions from D-Day, such as the massacre of soldiers from the 507th at Graignes, Hemevez, and elsewhere. This new material includes a focus on the regimental level, which is all but ignored by historians, while still covering strategic, tactical, and human issues. His conclusions highlight common misperceptions about the Normandy landings. Questions have already been raised about the wisdom of the Anglo-American amphibious doctrine employed on D-Day. In this study, Bennett continues to challenge the assumption that the operation was an exemplary demonstration of strategic planning. |
From inside the book
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Captain Charles Cawthon , who was in command of Headquarters Company , 2nd Battalion , later wrote : a GI's training had started off in a fumbling way , for there was only a vague idea of what we had to do .
As Captain Phillips later recalled : “ We caught them from a cross - fire from both sides of the road and they emptied fast . The Germans who weren't killed in the trucks were running down the road madly . One of our men jumped on the ...
Two years later , in the presence of the American ambassador to Paris , the rebuilt tower of the church in Graignes was dedicated as a memorial to the dead . The main walls of the church were reduced to their lower courses of stone to ...
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Contents
Operation Bolero and the Clash of Cultures | 1 |
Three Regiments and the Mind of the GI | 7 |
Early Training and the Buildup to June 6 1944 | 17 |
Copyright | |
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