Battlebus Tours - Travel & Normandy WWII History Forum

[Pat Curran]

Hi List,

In my research on the web, I quite often come across images taken from the air during the Normandy campaign. I always try to locate where they were taken on GE and have decided to share some of my efforts with the forum on this thread.

The first image is from the Wikimedia Commons site here and shows what appears to be a B-26 Marauder strike on the railway at Domfront, France.

The Caption reads:

[Jiggersfromsphilly]

Pat, They are 9th AF A-20 Havocs.

Here is a link to another in action shot of the Havoc on D-Day.


http://www.nationalmuseum.af.mil/shared/media/photodb/photos/051118-F-1234P-073.jpg

The nose markings on the Havoc on the left look a lot like the one in the link on the left.

.

[Pat Curran]

Jiggersfromsphilly & List,

Thanks for the corrected ID - these two images could well be from the same mission - do you know anything about the image in your link?

Thanks,

Pat
_________________
www.whitebeamimages.ie
info@whitebeamimages.ie

[Jiggersfromsphilly]

Here is the link to he photo.

http://www.nationalmuseum.af.mil/factsheets/factsheet_media.asp?fsID=2957


Here is the pertinent intel on the Wing.


97th Bomber Wing
409th Bomber Group (Col Preston Pender)
640th Squadron, A-20 WS
641st Squadron, A-20 7F
642nd Squadron, A-20 E2
643rd Squadron, A-20 5L
410th Bomber Group (Col Ralph Raudy)
644th Squadron, A-20 5D
645th Squadron, A-20 7X
646th Squadron, A-20 8U
647th Squadron, A-20 6Q
416th Bomber Group (Col Harold Mace)
668th Squadron, A-20 5H
669th Squadron (Maj Campbell) A-20 2A
670th Squadron, A-20 F6
671st Squadron, A-20 5C


I will look for some more on the particular picture and unit.

[Pat Curran]

List,

I just got this email from Andrew Boehly, Marauder Archivist at the Arizona Aerospace Foundation (copied here with permission):

[Jiggersfromsphilly]

From the following links contaning the unit history of the 671st BS.

The first one is a complete unit history and the second highlights the specific action on 6-6-44.


http://ancientcoins.ac/416/671.pdf

http://ancientcoins.ac/416/671.html


"Shortly after June 1st the white markings of allied aircraft was painted on all the ships. There was some speculation as to the purpose of the markings but since our aircraft had been marked and remarked so many times previously, no one thought seriously that this was the final preparation for the invasion. On June 6 however, the combat crews assembled for an early morning mission were given the entire plan by Coloned H. L. Mace. Our part in the first phase of the attack was to destroy lines of transportation immediately behind the beachhead. On the morning of the first day we attacked road junctions and marshalling yards at Argentan and Ecouche, attacking for the first time from an altitude of 3000 feet. Later in the day crews of the squadron attacked the heavily defended Marshalling Yards at _ergveux. Both missions were successful, although the aircraft flown by Lt. R.A. Wipperman was lost due to enemy flak. S/Sgt. H. Ahrans and S/Sgt. L.C. Mazza were also missing."

.

[Pat Curran]

Jiggersfromsphilly & List,

Thanks for the 671st links, however, I could find no reference to any missions to Domfront.

What I did find however was this page on the local church which makes note of damage to the church during a raid in 1944.

Again, this site makes more detailed reference to what appears to have been one particular raid.

A collection of images here (including the one above) are captioned 'Domfront'. From looking at these it would appear that the town suffered extensive damage with great loss of life on more than one raid.

Regards,

Pat
_________________
www.whitebeamimages.ie
info@whitebeamimages.ie

[Jiggersfromsphilly]

Pat,


In Kenneth C Rust's History of the 9th Air Force in WW2, (AERO PUBLISHERS 1967) he mentions on page 86 ,

" To accentuate the enemy's shortages, fuel and ammuniton dumps were attacked by bombers and fighters.

THREE DUMPS BOMBED BY MEDIUMS LAY IN THE DOMFRONT-ALENCON AREA - DOMFRONT HIT ON THE 13th AND 15 JUNE"





.

[Pat Curran]

Jiggers & List,

Yes, it looks like the photo was taken on one of the raids during the period 13th-15th June inclusive. I found a reference to the Church in Domfront being damaged on the 14th - see here.


Even more interesting, is this page, which appears to credit the photo to the 416th Bomb Group mission #78 on the 15th June. The page is part of a web site dedicated to the 416th Bomb Group, owned by Wayne G. Sayles. I have emailed Wayne to see if he can put some more light on the photograph - his site's index page is here: http://wgs.cc/416/index.html

I have also emailed the Tourist Office in Domfront to see if they can confirm the date the rail yard (as opposed to the town) was hit.

Last night I had a closer look at some of the images I linked to in my last post - see here again. The two images of the open 'bocage' countryside caught my eye - see them full size here (1) and here (2). There appears to be a lot of activity in the form of vehicle tracks on the ground in both images, far more than would be expected from farming activity in the month of June. I think they were taken to confirm the location of an ammunition and/or fuel dump. This would tie in with what Jiggers found in his last post:

[Jiggersfromsphilly]

Great Work Pat.

It makes sense that the fuel and armaments depots would be next to a rail line. Especially one with such a large rail yard.

Hang Tough!


Tony

[Pat Curran]

Thanks Tony,

I appreciate the help.

Best,

Pat
_________________
www.whitebeamimages.ie
info@whitebeamimages.ie

[Battlebus]

Brilliant stuff
_________________
Battlebus Tours - Paul Woodadge
Website and Forum Administrator