General Otto Richter’s 198th Infantry Division, plus a rearguard engineer detachment to the south, remained at Montélimar. On the night of 27/28 August Richter led his remaining two regiments and other survivors in a bid to escape. They ran straight into the US 36th Division’s push on the town; the general and some 700 of his men were captured, but not before the Americans had suffered around 100 casualties.
On the 29th the 143rd Regiment shattered the German forces around Loriol, taking over a thousand prisoners in the final mop-up. On the same day the 142nd Regiment seized Livron but straggling groups of Germans continued to resist strongly until the 30th. Then elements of the 3rd Division, pressing the Germans from the south, contacted the 141st Regimental Combat Team near Clary.
Despite the terrible destruction wrought on the 19th Army, even on the last day of battle Colonel Paul Adams, commanding the 143rd, reported to headquarters, ‘I’m expecting a hell of a fight.’ At 0600 the last German counter-attack had formed in the vicinity of La Coucourde, but in an hour the drive had been repulsed and the attackers destroyed or captured. It was the American artillery at Montélimar that counted most and turned the tide of battle. During the eight days of fighting the 36th Infantry’s 131st, 132nd, 133rd and 155th field artillery battalions fired well over 37,000 rounds at the confined and retreating German troops. Supporting fire from attached battalions, the 41st, 977th and 93rd Armored, brought the total number of rounds expended to considerably more than 75,000.
The US VI Corps’ newspaper The Beachhead News reported triumphantly:
Under the 36th Division command … such a great force of artillery was directed on the Germans that more than four thousand vehicles, one 380mm and five other railroad guns were destroyed, and the main escape gap for the fleeing German army was under constant fire and attack … the Division moved in and finished off the kill.
By the time the battle of Montélimar ended on 28 August the US VI Corps had suffered 1,575 casualties, having inflicted five times that number on the Germans. The highway for 18 kilometres north and south of the town was a smoking double-column of knocked-out vehicles, dead horses and dead men. There was no stretch of the road that did not display some sort of destruction. In total, the Germans suffered 11,000 casualties and lost 1,500 horses. The Americans took some 5,000 prisoners at Montélimar and wrecked more than 4,000 vehicles, as well as destroying the 189th and 338th Divisions. A number of captured 280mm and 380mm railway guns provided the French with considerable volumes of scrap iron. To date, the 19th Army had lost 57,000 PoWs.
The Allies had now secured the region between Nice and Avignon as far north as Briançon via Grenoble to Montélimar, effectively destroying General Wiese’s 19th Army mainly through artillery and air strikes as it sought to flee. As a result, the Germans were unable to draw up a defensive line until the Americans had crossed the Moselle river.
In Italy Operation Olive had commenced on 25 August and the Gothic Line was penetrated by both the 8th Army and the 5th Army, but there was no decisive advance. Churchill had hoped that a breakthrough in the autumn of 1944 would open the way for the Allied armies to advance north-eastwards through the Ljubljana Gap to Vienna and Hungary to prevent the Red Army advancing into eastern Europe.
Allied link-up
The battered remains of Wiese’s command streamed north to join Chevallerie’s 1st Army, which was evacuating south-western France and heading for the strategic Belfort Gap – the gateway to Germany just north of the Swiss border. The 11th Panzer Division conducted a fighting retreat to Alsace to defend it. Alsace forms the pass between the French Jura and Vosges mountains and the Germans knew that if they lost control of it, Strasbourg and all of Württemberg to the east would be exposed.
Meanwhile the retreating Germans conducted various delaying actions, notably in the Autun and Dijon regions, but ultimately they were now being driven from the whole of France. The IV Luftwaffe Field Corps reached Lyons on 30 August, to find that the city’s antiaircraft defences had been fending off French troops to the west. The Corps was then transferred to the east bank of the Rhône, where it joined elements of the 11th Panzer Division. At the same time elements of IV Corps straggling behind were marshalled on the west bank to cover the LXXXV Corps.
On 2 September 1944 Truscott was promoted to lieutenant-general. In Lyons the 36th Infantry Division found the Maquis and the Milice, the Vichy police whom the French hated as much as the Germans, battling it out. The factories on the city’s outskirts were ablaze and all the bridges had been destroyed except one. While the fighting in the industrial area was on-going, across the river liaison patrols were greeted by great cheering crowds of civilians. The jeeps were surrounded by masses of men and women who just wanted to shake an American hand or stare curiously at their liberators. Pretty girls threw flowers, while children climbed on the vehicles and sat there.
The US 7th Army liberated Lyons on the 3rd and another 2,000 Germans were captured; enemy forces were driven out of Besançon four days later. There were two days of celebrations in Lyons and all sorts of parties in honour of the Americans, not least drinking bouts in which the French and their guests vied with one another in paying extravagant compliments. Every private home threw open its doors to the liberators.
On the eastern flank the German 148th Reserve Division delayed the Americans once they were over the Var river. Their task was greatly assisted by the Maritime Alps, which run northwards to the Cottian and Graian Alps south of Geneva. The Germans had established defensive positions along the Menton–Sospel–Breil road, the Nice–Ventimiglia highway and the Turini Pass. The division was eventually incorporated into the new LXXV Corps tasked with defending north-west Italy and preventing the Allies turning the Italian front. By 8 September the Americans had pushed west of Nice and reached Menton and the Italian border. The advance then came to a halt as there was some concern that the US 5th and British 8th Armies might drive the Germans out of Italy via the Franco-Italian border. On 12 September a German Kamptverbande naval unit, operating out of San Remo, amassed up to forty one-man submarines to attack Allied warships providing fire support. In the event, only ten were launched and no Allied ships were damaged.
The victorious Allied forces in southern and northern France linked up at Châtillon-sur-Seine on 12 September when de Lattre’s troops made contact with Leclerc’s French 2nd Armoured Division, which formed part of Lieutenant-General George S. Patton’s US 3rd Army. The French II Corps, now formally under the French 1st Army, along with the US 7th Army became part of Lieutenant-General Jacob Devers’ recently activated US 6th Army Group.
Blaskowitz’s losses were considerable. It has been estimated that he sustained up to 7,000 dead in southern France and about 21,000 wounded, but in total he lost perhaps half of his 250,000 troops. Some 31,000 German prisoners were taken at St Tropez, Toulon and Marseilles, and another 2,500 round Montélimar, while 12,000 surrendered during the Allied drive north from Lyons and another 20,000 were cut off west of Dijon. He lost an additional 10,000 men to Patton’s US 3rd Army and another 25,000 were left trapped in the Atlantic garrisons. In contrast, the Americans suffered about 4,500 casualties and the French slightly more. In comparison, in northern France the Germans suffered a total loss of 450,000 men (240,000 casualties and 210,000 prisoners), as well as losing most of their equipment, including 1,500 tanks, 3,500 pieces of artillery and 20,000 vehicles. Crucially, though, both Army Group G and the 19th Army escaped as coherent formations.
Unfortunately the French 2nd Armoured Division’s actions in liberating Paris unwittingly helped to prolong the war, for the delay round the city also enabled the greater part of Army Group G’s 1st Army to escape intact over the Rhine. Luckily for Blaskowitz, Patton’s US 3rd Army was starved of gasoline in favour of supplying Montgomery’s men. Patton’s men came to a halt at Verdun and for five days waited there just 110 km from the Rhine.
Howard Katzander, a staff correspondent with Yank, recalled how the French celebrated the evicti
on of Army Group G: ‘They called it the “Champagne Campaign”, this war in the Maritime Alps, because of the way the champagne flowed in the celebrations of the liberated people at Antibes and Cannes and Nice during the pursuit of the Germans.’
Chapter Nine
De Gaulle Stakes his Claim – the Liberation of Paris
In early August 1944 another massive diplomatic row erupted among the Allied High Command over how and when German-occupied Paris should be liberated. Naturally both General de Gaulle and General Leclerc had very set ideas on the matter. In the meantime the Communist-led Parisians had risen against the German garrison. In the wake of D-Day the liberation of the French capital was always going to be controversial, and in the event the American Army, Free French forces and the French Resistance were all to be involved. However, it was de Gaulle and Leclerc who marched triumphantly down the Champs Elysees claiming the credit as the saviours of France.
Leclerc’s Shermans
In preparing for the Normandy invasion the Allies tried to spare Paris, but its rail marshalling yards and nearby factories made it a prime target. On 21 April 1944 Gare de la Chappelle was bombed and 640 civilians were killed. Following D-Day the Resistance also went to work, disrupting German communications in Normandy and Brittany. Paris itself remained quiet until the end of June, when Pétain’s propaganda secretary was shot dead at his official residence. Throughout July the city became increasingly restless, though the Germans largely left it to Joseph Darnand’s Milice Française to keep order. On 20 July the city’s garrison became briefly embroiled in the plot to kill Hitler. Count von Stauffenberg, who planted the bomb at Rastenburg, assumed Hitler was dead and called Lieutenant-Colonel Caeser von Hofacker, Chief of Staff to General Heinrich von Stülpnagel, the German military governor of France. Field Marshals Erwin Rommel and Günther von Kluge were also aware of the intention to kill Hitler. While the plotters attempted to seize control of Berlin, supporters also attempted to do the same in Paris. On the orders of Stülpnagel and under the cover of an exercise the German garrison briefly arrested Police Leader for France SS-Gruppenführer Karl Oberg and 1,200 members of the Nazi security apparatus until it became apparent that Hitler had survived. Both Stülpnagel and von Hofacker were later hanged.
There is no evidence that General Blaskowitz or any of his staff at Army Group G were involved. To make sure there was no question over their loyalty, both Blaskowitz and his Chief of Staff, General Heinz von Gyldenfeldt, rang C-in-C West’s headquarters to express their disbelief that such an outrage had been attempted. Blaskowitz then sent the obligatory telegram repledging his allegiance to the Führer. As word began to spread about what had happened at Hitler’s Rastenburg headquarters, it cannot have helped the morale of those troops stationed far away in the south of France.
Leclerc’s armour did not come ashore on Utah Beach until 1 August; along with three American divisions, it then formed the US Army’s XV Corps under General Wade H. Haislip. The initial advance, covering 110 km in four days as far as Le Mans, was fairly uneventful. Then the US 3rd Army swung north to help trap the retreating German Army in the Falaise Pocket. Unfortunately, near Argentan Leclerc let his enthusiasm run away with him and his tanks clogged a road that had been earmarked for petrol supplies. The ensuing chaos gave the Germans a much-needed breathing space. Tantalisingly, Leclerc and his men were just over 160 km from the French capital.
After the loss of some tanks, Leclerc’s division successfully established a bridgehead over the river Orne and was then placed under the command of Lieutenant-General Courtney H. Hodges’ US 1st Army’s V Corps, and Leclerc became answerable to Major-General Gerow. The two men instantly took a dislike to each other. De Gaulle was concerned that the French Communists would liberate Paris and gained an undertaking that Leclerc could enter the city. However, at this stage Eisenhower felt it best to by-pass Paris altogether, and of course once the river Seine was crossed the city would lose all strategic importance.
General Dietrich von Choltitz, the new garrison commander in Paris, was under strict instructions to deny the city to the Allies, even if it meant razing it to the ground. Hitler told Choltitz the city ‘must not fall into the hands of the enemy; if it does, he must find there nothing but a field of ruins’. The weak garrison consisted of the 325th Wach Paris (Paris Alert Security) Division under Generalmajor Brehmer, a company of light tanks, and six batteries of 88mm anti-aircraft guns from the Luftwaffe’s 1 Flak Brigade under Oberst Egon Bauer with inexperienced teenage crews, supported by sixty aircraft. This amounted to just 5,000 men, supported by perhaps 20 mostly elderly French tanks and 256 flak guns of various calibre. Such a force was just about adequate to contain any insurrection, but nothing else. Hitler had promised two skeleton panzer divisions from Denmark, but they had not materialised. The German armed forces were in no position to assist; between 6 June and 19 August 1944 they lost all their panzers in the Battle for Normandy.
Hitler wanted any insurrection in Paris crushed, just as the Warsaw rising had been crushed. The Warsaw rising, or ‘Burza’, had begun when Polish Resistance forces launched a national uprising to coincide with the arrival of Soviet forces from the east in the summer of 1944 after the spectacular success of Operation Bagration. Unfortunately Soviet help did not reach the city and the Warsaw rising was brutally put down by the Waffen-SS. The Polish Home Army had secured most of Warsaw by 4 August 1944, although its lack of heavy weapons and ammunition meant it was unable to consolidate its three main defensive enclaves within the city. The Germans counter-attacked on 10 August and four days later the Home Army had been divided into six enclaves. The desperate Poles held out for two months before surrendering on 5 October. Fortunately Choltitz was a cultured man, who had no intention of going down in history as the man who torched Paris.
Parisian insurrection
Since early August Parisians had made the city ungovernable, though the Resistance forces were under instructions from de Gaulle not to rise up until the arrival of Leclerc and his 2nd French Armoured Division. Between 10 and 12 August the city was paralysed by a rail strike, then on 15 August some 20,000 police went on strike, supported by the Communist-dominated FFI. Two days later, as shooting broke out, Vichy supporters began to flee Paris. Pétain and Darnand fled to Germany. The Germans then began disarming the troublesome French police.
Inside Paris Choltitz could muster at most 20,000 troops by the third week of August. About 5,000 were attached to the Security Division, giving it a total strength of 10,000. Brehmer’s division had four regiments but two had been sent to Chartres. Bauer’s 1 Flak Brigade comprised three regiments with about two dozen flak battalions; there were also seven railroad flak battalions, twelve semi-mobile battalions and four fixed battalions, all of which could be used in a ground-support role. The Fallschirmjäger Flak Regiment 11 also had three battalions protecting the air bases at Brétigny, Villacoublay and Villaroche in the southern suburbs. Choltitz could not rely on any Luftwaffe support except from some of the flak units. Luftflotte 3 had decamped from Paris to Reims and all the airfields in the Paris area had been destroyed by the withdrawing Luftwaffe on the 17th.
De Gaulle was determined the city would not escape his control, and when Koenig’s military delegate General Chaban-Delmas arrived on the scene he was followed closely by the Gaullist Charles Luizet, who was to take command of the police. On the 19th almost 2,000 police staged a general rising, but Colonel Rol, leading some 600 Communist-dominated Free French forces, was annoyed that they had acted without his orders and stolen his leadership’s thunder. The Germans made a half-hearted counter-attack with a few tanks against the Police Prefecture building located on the île de la Cité near Notre Dame, but fortunately they withdrew before things turned really ugly for the French. The Free French forces also liberated the Palais de Justice and Hotel de Ville, and almost 400 barricades were erected throughout the capital.
When it was suggested to Choltitz that the Free French revolt was directed at Vichy rath
er than his garrison, he remarked: ‘Perhaps. But it’s my soldiers they are shooting at!’ A truce was agreed but Rol’s Communists did not observe it, accusing General Chaban-Delmas of being a coward. His faulty intelligence indicated that the Germans had 150 Tiger tanks to hand and he did not wish to see the lightly armed Free French slaughtered or the city’s historic buildings damaged. In fact, all the Germans could actually muster were some old French light tanks and a dozen Panther tanks at most.
In the meantime, at 1030 on 20 August an eager Leclerc presented himself at Hodges’ US 1st Army headquarters near Falaise. ‘His arguments, which he presented incessantly,’ recalled Hodges irritably, ‘were to the effect that, roads and traffic and our plans notwithstanding, his division should run for Paris at once. He said he needed no maintenance, no equipment, and that he was up to strength – and then, a few minutes later, admitted that he needed all three.’
General Omar N. Bradley, commander of the US 12th Army Group (US 1st and 3rd Armies), also found himself under siege by the international press demanding to know when the French capital would be liberated. He explained that the plan was to pinch off the city so that it would fall without a shot having to be fired and that the plan was for Paris not to be entered until 1 September. When asked which division would be given the honour of liberating the city, Bradley quipped: ‘You’ve got enough correspondents here to do it.’
Ignoring his orders, Leclerc sent a reconnaissance group, consisting of 10 tanks and 10 armoured cars, towards Paris on 21 August. A furious Gerow ordered him to recall them, but Leclerc refused. Bradley prevailed on Eisenhower that they had little choice but to act or cause a diplomatic incident. Bradley then signalled Hodges, who recorded:
Paris since Sunday noon, he said, had been under control of the [Gaullist] Free French Forces of the Interior, which, after seizing the principal buildings of the city, had made a temporary armistice with the Germans, which was to expire Wednesday noon. General Bradley said that higher headquarters had decided that Paris could be avoided no longer, that entry of our forces was necessary in order to prevent possible heavy bloodshed among the civilian population, and he inquired what General Hodges could dispatch at once.
Operation Dragoon Page 17