INFANTRYMEN FIRING FROM A HEDGEROW. The man in the foreground is shown about to fire a fragmentation grenade using a U. S. rifle .30-calibre M1 with a grenade launcher M7 (top). Grenade has just been fired (bottom). The terrain through which the Allied troops fought was favorable to the defense. In the close bocage countryside, dotted with woods and orchards and with fields divided by tree-topped embankments where armor could not well be employed, the infantry had to wage a grim struggle from hedgerow to hedgerow and from bank to bank, harassed by snipers and machine gun posts. On 24 July the troops of the U. S. First Army were waiting for the weather to clear sufficiently for an air attack before they attempted to break out of Normandy in the area of the Périers-Lessay-Saint-Lô road.
NORTHERN FRANCE CAMPAIGN
NORTHERN FRANCE
The Allied Advance during the Northern France Campaign 25 July 1944 to 14 September 1944
SECTION III
Northern France Campaign[2]
On 25 July 1944 the Allied forces fighting in Normandy were able to begin the offensive to break out of Normandy and carry to the German frontier. Preceding the ground attack planes of the Allied air forces dropped more than 3,390 tons of bombs on enemy positions on a narrow front in the vicinity of Saint-Lô. The air attack’s crushing power and its paralyzing effect on the German forces opened the way for a rapid and powerful drive by Allied armored and infantry units. Cities were captured in quick succession and the enemy troops were forced to flee in a disorderly retreat.
The armored spearheads led the way out the Brittany Peninsula which was quickly occupied, with the exception of the fortresses of the port cities which were to continue to fight until after the German borders had been reached. While part of the U. S. forces were overrunning the Brittany Peninsula, the major portion turned toward the east in the direction of Paris, and British and Canadian troops moved southward from Caen along the road to Falaise. The battle of the Falaise-Argentan pocket was a disastrous defeat for the German forces who were trying to prevent the Allies from moving eastward. During the fighting in this area elements of two German armies were so disorganized and destroyed that their effectiveness was greatly impaired.
Paris surrendered on 25 August and by the 27th all enemy resistance ceased there. The advance continued toward the eastern borders of France, where the Allies stopped their rapid drive, and though a few further advances were made, 14 September 1944 found them consolidating their positions along the Moselle River and northward in Belgium and Holland. The major port cities of Le Havre and Antwerp, which were badly needed by the Allies as ports of entry for men and materials, were captured.