I'm taking a stab in the dark regarding the YouTube footage but I think the Horsas filmed around the 6:30 onwards are located around the vicinity of the d115 & d913 crossroads. The chalk markings look identical in style to the E3 and R15 Horsas at the crossroads. If so, I believe they are 437th TCG gliders and possibly from mission Galveston.
Hi Charles, Appreciate you taking a look at this frame. Are you referring to the striped object arrowed in the extract below? Image Credit: RCAHMS/www.ncap.org.uk If so, I agree the scale is such that I would doubt its attached to a hidden glider. The object may well be a loose part from a glider but it rests between two apple trees on the other side of the field hedgerow and is probably showing close to its full size. I am also convinced that there is no Waco glider in this field as would appear to be required in order to comply with the notes on the Randolph photo. For readers wondering, the round features curving about the starboard side wing are individual fox holes. Regards, Pat
Please do Dave; let me know how you want it water marked because once its published here, its loose forevermore. Regards, Pat
I would bet my bottom dollar on it Neil They are not far away from that area. Have you checked the high resolution cover in the Resource Files section? Regards, Pat
Pat and Neil, I do see the similarity of the trees in the background, so the D115 / D 913 is a good possibility. I might even go as far to say that the two Horsas in the video at the 6:43 - 6:53 mark might be Niels. Looking at US30/4108 frame 1002, my best guess is that Lt Thomas Moore's group as described by Tipton Randolph could be on either side of the La Londe drive with the Horsa's that crashed through the hedgerow being one of the gliders on either side of the Hoatson Glider... Unfortunately there is just not enough aerial that covers the entire field. John
The Eisenhower Library catalog shows microfilmed overlays for the 325GIR and the 80th AA Bn. Perhaps those show glider landing spots (though they could just be position maps). They got this microfilm from main NARA. Who knows, maybe NARA has additional 82AB overlays. Assuming these are indeed glider landing overlays, they might be color coded and, thus, more info would be contained in the originals at College Park. Might be worth a shot.
Hi Dave Thank you for the kind words in your recent post. It has been quite an interesting journey researching my father's glider mission, and has has been going on for almost three years now. I note that your father-in-law was apparently in the same TCG. The help I have received along the way from the administrators and researchers on this forum has been absolutely invaluable and greatly appreciated. You are in good hands here. In regards to your search I looked back through a copy of the Historical Record 319th Glider FA BN for June, and July of 1944 which I had set aside a while ago. At the outset of that document the landing coordinates are shown as 36.5-97.7, which for Lambert would be 365977. Converting that to lat. & long. we find the landing area to be in the La Londe Farm front yard, at the lower left of the image below. The report goes on to show the next coordinates for the assembly of the 319th to have been as John noted, 371974. That places the assembly area as indicated by the yellow pin in the same image. I don't know that these coordinates are precise, but should show general areas of interest. Below is a copy of a map prepared by a Capt. Tony J. Raibl, HQ Bty, 82 AB Div arty, covering airborne landings near SME for the period 6-8 June, 1944. This info. was provided to me by Don some time ago and I have found it to be useful in my research: You will see in the upper right hand quarter of the map, the area described as the assembly area for the 319th is circled.
Don, Thank you for the map per your email a few days back. I am currently scanning a colour version as shown on page 319 of Robert P. Anzuoni's 'I'm the 82nd Airborne Division!'. My map though is from a different source. I would have had up it here in this post only I went off on a different tangent tonight Dave, the photo of the Horsa wreckage with the parachute in the overhead tree is a known Signal Corps photo, but as far as I can recall, I have not see the uncropped left side before showing the gap in the hedgerow and what looks to be another glider wing resting on the ground in the next field. Your version has lost a bit on the right, so I merged the two below to get the best of both worlds: The gap at left appears to have been created by an impact - kind of suggests the scenario we are looking for in Kevin McCarthy's ' MSG John McCarthy’s Road to Lecaudey Farm (Part II)' thread :idea: Now the reason why I haven't got my homework from Don done :blush: Neil has been working to link Horsas marked with a white dot under the chalk number to the 436th TCG, so I am going to place this find here in Dave's thread. I was looking through the collection of Tonelli Auction photos tonight which Niels sent me a while back and I noticed one of them shows another 'dot' Horsa, not yet accounted for in our searches: Checking our collection of aerial cover, I think we might have a good candidate in a LZ 'O' field, NW of Sainte Mere Eglise, and showing in NCAP_ACIU_US30_4108_1058 flown on the 8th June. The candidate is circled in yellow below: Image Credit: RCAHMS/www.ncap.org.uk The finder chart for frame 1058 is shown below: Here is a zoomed view from the high resolution version of frame 1058: Image Credit: RCAHMS/www.ncap.org.uk A lot depends on whether the ground shot is showing the tail section on the port or starboard side of the fuselage. Looking at the zoomed version below, I think its on the port (near) side and therefore ties, in that respect at least, with the Tonelli photo: What do you guys think of this candidate location? Thanks, Pat
Pat, As random as glider wrecks can be, too much matches and I think it is a definite match ! Well Done
Thanks John, I think you can just about make out the three tracks running towards the glider at slightly right of bottom centre in the ground photo. They are quite evident in the aerial cover running towards the glider and suggest it spun to port before coming to rest. Regards, Pat
Pat, I'm sold! This to me adds credence to my theory. I believe the initial 436th gliders cut loose on a fligth path just north west of St Mere Eglise. Draw an approximate straight line from where Pat has located Chalk #8 back to the northen end of Utah Beach where the serial probably went feet dry and La Londe is directly on the flight path.
Hi Neil, These 'dot' Horsas are elusive; not many Normandy ground photos show them and, as far as I know, we have no photos or footage showing them on airfields in England. Regards, Pat
Very elusive with the majority around La Londe. I haven't seen a single photograph of Serial 32 at Membury so cannot confirm my theory that the dot Horsas are 436th.
Hi Dave Thank you for the kind words in your recent post. It has been quite an interesting journey researching my father's glider mission, and has been going on for almost three years now. I note that your father-in-law was apparently in the same TCG. The help I have received along the way from the administrators and researchers on this forum has been absolutely invaluable and greatly appreciated. You are in good hands here. In regards to your search I looked back through a copy of the Historical Record 319th Glider FA BN for June, and July of 1944 which I had set aside a while ago. At the outset of that document the landing coordinates are shown as 36.5-97.7, which for Lambert would be 365977. Converting that to lat. & long. we find the landing area to be in the La Londe Farm front yard, at the lower left of the image below. The report goes on to show the next coordinates for the assembly of the 319th to have been as John noted, 371974. That places the assembly area as indicated by the yellow pin in the same image. I don't know that these coordinates are precise, but should show general areas of interest. Below is a copy of a map prepared by a Capt. Tony J. Raibl, HQ Bty, 82 AB Div arty, covering airborne landings near SME for the period 6-8 June, 1944. This info. was provided to me by Don some time ago and I have found it to be useful in my research: You will see in the upper right hand quarter of the map, the area described as the assembly area for the 319th is circled. Below is an overlay I did a while back of the Raibl map over a GE image of the same area: The map seems to be pretty consistent with the locations identified by the coordinates mentioned above regarding the general landing and assembly areas. Looking at the June 1944 History for the 80th TCS, it reads similarly to the other such reports of the squadrons in the 436th TCG. That is, the glider pilots experienced intense enemy fire very quickly, trees were much taller than expected and landing fields were smaller than anticipated. Nevertheless, the squadron reported few casualties among the passengers. Unfortunately, this history did not include any reports from glider pilots identifying specifically where they landed or the
Hi All, Here is the colour version of the 82nd glider landing location map: I have uploaded a high resolution version to the ADrive cloud here (66.8MB TIFF). The link will expire in a day or so. Thereafter, if any members require a copy, just send me a PM. Regards, Pat
From the 82AB Operations Report on Elmira: Capt. Tony Raibl, Div Arty HQ landed in a Horsa about 1/2 mile west of Baudienville (map coord not legible). Also mentioned are Capts. Hufford and Noyse. This detachment essentially stayed put. Later, another Horsa group met up with them. Major Hart and LTC Smiley are mentioned on this second glider. A 319 GFAB Horsa crashed at 350984. The narrative says the pilot was mortally wounded by enemy fire. At 0330 on June 7, the report notes that glider pilot Tom Atkinson died, so I take this to be the same person. A Waco carrying LTC Bertsch landed at 365976 (La Londe front yard). From Serial 30: Lt. Millington landed at 346952.
Hi Dave, Thank you for the kind words in your recent posts. It has been quite an interesting journey researching my father's glider mission, and has been going on for almost three years now. I note that your father-in-law was apparently in the same TCG. The help I have received along the way from the administrators and researchers on this forum has been absolutely invaluable and greatly appreciated. You are in good hands here. Looking at the June 1944 History for the 80th TCS, it reads similarly to the other such reports of the squadrons in the 436th TCG. That is, the glider pilots experienced intense enemy fire very quickly, trees were much taller than expected and landing fields were smaller than anticipated. Nevertheless, the 80th TCS reported few casualties among the passengers. Unfortunately, this history did not include any reports from glider pilots identifying specifically where they landed or the nature of their landings. However, we do have the landing chart for Serial 32, that does provide some information of this nature. I have no idea as to whether that listing places the gliders in the order of their chalk numbers. I do note, however, that the 12th Horsa glider on the listing shows that it carried 14 men, which is what is stated in the glider pilot report for the Hoatson glider of the 82nd TCS. Also, that glider pilot report states that Hoatson and Boyer landed 1 1/4 miles NE of SME. If you go on Google Earth and draw a line from SME to the Hoatson crash site, the distance is 1 1/4 miles. Now, if the two CG-4A gliders were numbered 1 and 2, rather than 49 and 50, then the Hoatson glider would not occupy 12th place of Horsas on the landing chart. The 80th TCS history does contain some photos of glider pilots, which is not the case for the other three Squadrons in the 436th TCG. See below with a caption preceding the pilot images: Pat, yes the object I noticed on the far side of the top hedgerow was as you showed above. I agree that it is likely no more than a small piece of wreckage at best, and possibly not even that. Also, nice find with respect to the #8 dot Horsa. Charles
Hi Charles, Is it possible to re-scan the Ensor/Gilreath photo page and lighten the shadows? I am interested to see the detail in the background hedge/wall. Does anyone recognise the stone plinth and wrought iron piece mounted thereon? Thanks, Pat
Hello Charles, Thank you for the information. Interesting to see the photograph of Kenneth "Ray" Ensor and Joe Gilreath. According to Mr. Randolph's description of their landings, Ford, Moore, Ellington, Gilreath, Bowers, Ensor, Bickett and Randolph were within the same field. As I posted earlier, there is several photographs with Ensor, Gilreath and Ellington together. The GP missing is Bowers, the GP noted as being injured in the landings "Please note the photograph of Ken Ensor and the other GPs. The names of these GPs are (top) F/O Charles B Ellington ("Smoky") middle F/O Joe Gilreath and closest to camera F/O Kenneth Ensor. All these GPs are from the 436th 80th. All these men were referenced in the image of Mr. Randolph. http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=143620574 On another note: These same GPs are shown in the book D-Day Gliders by Philippe Esvelin. They are on page 131, bottom photograph. I am curious of the origin of these phographs and if there are more..?" I'll take a look at GE as you suggest. Be Well Dave
Hi Pat, I re-scanned the Ensor/Gilreath photo as it appeared when I posted it. Then lightened it to the full extent possible on Photobucket. Then I lightened that image. The two are below. They are somewhat better, but maybe not what you are looking for. If you have any suggestions as to how to improve the image, I will be glad to try. Charles