Visiting the Utah Beach Museum was interesting, but standing on Utah Beach was where it really sunk in to me. It was so cold, cloudy and windy. I could not stop thinking about those men who stepped out of Higgins boats and on to the beach, walking right into enemy fire.
The Higgins boat was a landing craft used extensively by the Allied
forces in amphibious landings in World War II. Typically constructed
from plywood, this shallow-draft, barge-like boat could ferry a
platoon-sized group of 36 men. Men generally entered the boat by
climbing down a cargo net hung from the side of their troop transport;
they exited by charging down the boat's lowered bow ramp.
An estimated 1,500 Higgins boats were used on D-Day. Prior to the Higgins boat, WW2 soldiers were forced to attack heavily
guarded ports, putting troops directly in the line of fire. The Higgins
boats provided more flexibility in choosing points of attack, forcing
the enemy to spread out across the shoreline, thinning the
defensive forces.
Utah Beach was the most western of the landings. Casualties were the lightest here - out of 23,000 troops only 197 men were killed or wounded. Which is not to say that naval support at Utah Beach was easy. Many
became seasick on the way to the beachhead due to rough seas, and
incoming enemy fire forced many soldiers to swim for more than 200 yards
offshore, carrying at least 50 pounds of supplies.
Infantry and tanks landed in four waves beginning at 06:30 a.m. and quickly
secured the immediate area with minimal casualties. Meanwhile, engineers
set to work clearing the area of obstacles and mines, and additional
waves of reinforcements continued to arrive. At the close of D-Day,
Allied forces had only captured about half of the planned area and
contingents of German defenders remained, but the beachhead was secure.
Utah was poorly defended by the Germans, lead by Field Marshal Erwin Rommel. Rommel believed that the Normandy coast could be a possible landing
point for the invasion, so he ordered the construction of extensive
defensive works along that shore. In addition to concrete gun
emplacements at strategic points along the coast, he ordered wooden
stakes, metal tripods, mines, and large anti-tank obstacles to be placed
on the beach to delay the approach of landing craft and impede the
movement of tanks.
Expecting the Allies to land at high tide so that the infantry would
spend less time exposed on the beach, he ordered many of these obstacles
to be placed at the high-tide mark. The terrain at Utah is flat, offering no high ground on which to place fortifications.
The German unit defending Utah was made up of mostly conscripted men - non-German conscripts recruited from Soviet prisoners of war, Georgians, and Poles. All the best troops had been sent to the Eastern Front and these conscripts were not equipped for this attack.
"The sea was very rough, and everybody got seasick and we were soaking wet, cold and miserable," said Staff Sgt. John Robert Slaughter, Company D, 116th Infantry, 29th Division, according to the journal American History." It was June, but it felt like November, December." We could relate to the cold and wind, but we were there as tourists, not fighting for our lives.
There are quite a few memorials along the beach. The Lone Sailor, inaugurated during the 77th anniversary
of D-Day. It pays tribute to the sailors of the U.S. Navy and other
Allied sailors who served during the Normandy landings. It is also
dedicated to the 175 “Frogmen” of the U.S. Naval Combat Demolition
Units, who cleared obstacles just hours before the landings on Utah and
Omaha Beach and lost more than half of their comrades during the
dangerous operation.
On top of a dune overlooking the beach, lies the U.S. Navy Normandy monument, dedicated on September 27, 2008. The three men represent the roles of the U.S. Navy on D-Day: leadership, naval combat demolition units and naval artillery bombardment. On the base are the names of the American ships involved in D-Day.
Built over a German blockhouse, is the monument of the 1st Engineer Special Brigade, officially dedicated jointly with the French authorities on June 6, 1945. On the wall of the blockhouse, a memorial plaque is dedicated to the American servicemen who died during Exercise Tiger, the ill-fated rehearsal of the D-Day landings which ended in disaster as the Allied convoy carrying the soldiers preparing for the mock landing was attacked by German E-boats, killing around 800 American servicemen.
Behind the Roosevelt Café is the first milestone (or borne) of the Liberty Road (La voie de la Liberté
in French) marking the landing of the Allies. Erected in 1947, the
1,147 milestones follow the route of the Allied forces and end in
Bastogne, Belgium.
Our little group had many miles to go before our day would be completed.
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