84 MAY/JUNE 2019AMERICAN GUNNERS
FIRING AN M3 105-MM LIGHT
HOWITZER NEAR UTAH BEACH
U.S. NATIONAL ARCHIVES
SUPPLY LINE
Landing craft
disgorge tanks and
trucks at Omaha
Beach on June 8,
1944 (above), under
barrage balloons
whose mooring
cables deterred
enemy aircraft.The decision to proceed on the sixth, during
a predicted lull in the storm, caught German
commanders by surprise. But some Allied land-
ing craft and amphibious tanks sank in swells,
and men who stayed afloat were seasick. Nausea
mingled with dread as they disembarked under
fire. “Many were hit in the water and drowned,”
recalled Sgt. Bob Slaughter of the U.S. 29th In-
fantry Regiment. “There were dead men in the
water and live men acting dead, letting the tide
take them in.”
Nearly 3,000 Americans were killed or wound-
ed on Omaha Beach, most of them in the first few
hours. As shellfire from Allied warships began
silencing enemy gunners on the cliffs, however,
soldiers rallied and pushed inland through ravines
toward Colleville-sur-Mer. Americans who land-
ed at Utah Beach faced little resistance, and British
and Canadian troops advanced several miles in-
land from their beaches and withstood a late-day
counterattack by the 21st Panzer Division. When
Rommel returned that night to Normandy—after
celebrating his wife’s birthday during the storm he
thought would preclude an invasion—his worst
fears were realized. He had warned a fellow offi-
cer that their only chance was to stop the enemy
in the water. Now nearly 160,000 Allied troops
had landed.Expanding the Beachhead
Following D-Day, the Allies had to transport
troops and supplies to Normandy in vast
amounts without access to a deepwater port.
Germans assumed that their foes would require
such a port, which lent credence to Allied de-
ceptions portraying the Normandy landings as
a diversion, to be followed by a big push aimed
at a deeper port like Calais.
While the German 15th Army remained
in place around Calais to defend against that
anticipated thrust, the Allies reinforced their
Normandy beachhead by constructing artificial
harbors called mulberries, using components
prefabricated in British ports and towed across
the English Channel.
Mulberry A, completed off Omaha Beach
in mid-June and linked to shore by a pontoon
bridge, was wrecked a few days later by one of
the worst storms to hit the coast that season.
Mulberry B, constructed off Gold Beach near
Arromanches, withstood that storm and helped
boost Allied strength in Normandy to one mil-
lion men by early July.
Reinforcements for the troops who landed
on D-Day were essential because expanding
the beachhead proved even tougher than estab-
lishing it on June 6. Inland from the beaches layU.S. NATIONAL ARCHIVES