Westward Ho!

Captain Ben Schwarzwalder was elated to find Cauquigny already in friendly hands. Now there was no need to fight for possession of the Cauquigny bridge head, which seemed firmly held, he felt he had completed the task given him by …

1944-06-06

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Captain Ben Schwarzwalder was elated to find Cauquigny already in friendly hands. Now there was no need to fight for possession of the Cauquigny bridge head, which seemed firmly held, he felt he had completed the task given him by Colonel Lindquist. He prepared to move on. Schwarzwalder sent Lieutenant Marr forward on point, assuming that his direction should be westwards, towards his original objective of Amfreville. Only as Schwarzwalder was about to take his leave did Lt. Levy mention to him the presence nearby of Timmes’ force. This news led Schwarzwalder to reconsider, and soon after he decided to lead his force northwards, seeking Timmes. This scenario investigates the possibility of Schwarzwalder taking the road to the west, directly into the path of the German assault. Schwarzwalder moved out, leaving Levy and Kormylo with a handful of men to maintain their watch over the western side of the Merderet bridgehead. Mere minutes later, the German armored column was heard approaching. While the Germans moved into Cauquigny, Schwarzwalder and his followers threw in their lot with Timmes in the orchards around Les Heutes. What impact a meeting engagement between Schwarzwalder and the German column might have had on the events of the day is open to conjecture. That it would have been a bloody and hotly contested affair seems certain.

Cauquigny, France

Mission Boston was a parachute combat assault at night by Major General Matthew Ridgway's U.S. 82nd "All American" Airborne Division on June 6, 1944, part of the American airborne landings in Normandy during World War II. Boston was a component element of Operation Neptune, the assault portion of the Allied invasion of Normandy, codenamed Operation Overlord. 6,420 paratroopers jumped from nearly 370 C-47 Skytrain troop carrier aircraft into an intended objective area of roughly 10 square miles (26 km2) located on either side of the Merderet river on the Cotentin Peninsula of France, five hours ahead of the D-Day landings. The drops were scattered by bad weather and German anti-aircraft fire over an area three to four times as large as that planned. Two inexperienced units of the 82nd, the 507th and 508th Parachute Infantry Regiments (PIR), were given the mission of blocking approaches west of the Merderet River, but most of their paratroops missed their drop zones entirely. The veteran 505th PIR jumped accurately and captured its objective, the town of Sainte-Mère-Église, which proved essential to the success of the division.

Wikipedia: Mission Boston

German

American