The Neck of the Gap

After Operation Cobra shattered the German armies trying to hold back the Normandy invasion, Allied forces raced to envelop and capture enemy troops in the Falaise Pocket. Colonel Harry D. McHugh’s U.S. 318th Infantry Regiment, supported by elements of the …

1944-08-18

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After Operation Cobra shattered the German armies trying to hold back the Normandy invasion, Allied forces raced to envelop and capture enemy troops in the Falaise Pocket. Colonel Harry D. McHugh’s U.S. 318th Infantry Regiment, supported by elements of the independent 702nd Tank Battalion, attempted to capture Hill 213 and the village behind it, which would give the U.S. 80th lnfantry Division the opportunity to seize the town of Argentan to help seal the pocket. As U.S. troops attacked on August 18,1944, the German defenders, included elements of the 728th Infantry Regiment (of the 708th Division), pushed into the Falaise Pocket by U.S. attacks that captured Mayenne, plus the 60th Panzer Grenadier Regiment and Battlegroup Scholz. The German panzergrenadiers and Battlegroup Scholz forces arrived during the battle and counterattacked to restore the situation, moving on to the east.

Mayenne, France

The Falaise Pocket or Battle of the Falaise Pocket was the decisive engagement of the Battle of Normandy in the Second World War. A pocket was formed around Falaise, Calvados, in which the German Army Group B, with the 7th Army and the Fifth Panzer Army were encircled by the Western Allies. The battle is also referred to as the Battle of the Falaise Gap. The battle resulted in the destruction of most of Army Group B west of the Seine, which opened the way to Paris and the Franco-German border for the Allied armies on the Western Front.

Wikipedia: Falaise Pocket

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