WestKent78
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Report continued:
Progress of the Operations
59. The British Forces proceeding towards the French coast met, at 0400 hours, a German convoy about 20 kilometres off Dieppe. A violent action took place between the two formations, which, though short, gave the alarm to all the coastal defences. While enquiries were still being made as to whether they were our own or enemy ships off Dieppe, heavy air-attack with the dropping of bombs and firing on Dieppe itself and the sides of the town was taking place. While this air attack was going on, evidently with the object or neutralizing the coast defences, groups of landing-craft in waves of 40 to 50 emerged from the clouds of artificial smoke made by the aircraft, and under cover of the British Naval gunfire, proceeded towards the shore. Natural fog, as well as the artificial smoke and the dim light of dawn, prevented our artillery from scattering the landing craft already very close in, so that the fire of the guns and heavy weapons had to be concentrated on them when they were practically on the beach. On the beach itself there was so much fog and smoke as to make observation very difficult.
60. To the east of Dieppe the enemy had landed at the opening of the valley near Berneval, presumably in the strength of a Commando of 250 men, with orders to take and to destroy the battery in position there. They had succeeded in scaling the sides of the cliffs with the help of ladders, ropes and other gear, and attacked the battery. The latter was situated in a blockhouse, and consisted of a machine-gun squad under the command of an officer of the Berneval sector. The battery was able to repel, partly with direct gunfire at close range and partly with machine-gun fire, the fierce enemy attacks. A position situated near the battery with a personnel of 100 men was also attacked, but all the attacks were repelled, mostly by counter-attacks.
61. 302nd Infantry Division had, on hearing of the attack on Berneval, ordered a counter-attack to he made by the 302nd Anti-tank Group under Major von Blucher, together with the Cyclist Squadron stationed at St. Nicholas and the 3rd Pioneer Company stationed at Argues-la-Bataille. Major von Blucher also assumed the command of the 3rd Company of the 572nd Infantry Regiment which came out from St. Martin. The Berneval battery repelled the enemy attack. Major von Blucher succeeded in wiping out the eneny forces at Berneval and captured 2 officers and 80 men.
62. A similar action to that described above was taking place to the west of Dieppe against the battery near Varengeville by a special Commando of 300 men. Protected by smoke, this Commando landed on the coast on both sides of Varengeville, whilst another Group attempted to land opposite the Quiberville blockhouse where a platoon of the 3rd Company of the 571st Infantry Regiment was stationed. The attempt was frustrated by the concentrated fire of the Company.1 On the other hand some Commandos were able to get ashore at various points in the area around Varengeville, where small wooded cliffs run down to the sea and where it was possible to clamber up
This enemy force, about 300 men, attacked the battery from two sides with hand grenades, machine guns, and revolvers and mortars, while air bombardment neutralised the defence of the battery with continuous diving raids. Tracer bullets ignited the cartridges which which were stored in the battery. The battery defended itself bravely right up to the end as is proved by the 28 dead and 29 wounded, including the Commanding Officer who directed the fire and did his best to hold out. When at last the battery passed into British hands practically all the guns had.been rendered unserviceable by the ignition of the ammunition.
It was probably 0800 hours when the British Commandos re-embarked, taking with them 4 prisoners, and there were many dead and wounded of their own.
Evidently both the actions at Berneval and Varengeville Acre carried out with the object of wiping out the two heavy coastal batteries in order to facilitate later landings and subsequent re-embarkations at Dieppe.
The two coastal batteries were outside the main sector of Dieppe and through lack of personnel were not able to be defended sufficiently by infantry. The critical position of 813 was known, and its inclusion in the Dieppe defences proper should have been made earlier.
The Principal Attack against Dieppe
63. This took place on a wide front with three principal centres, at Puits, Dieppe itself and Pourville
The attack at Puits was broken up by the concentrated fire of the heavy artillery with serious losses to the enemy. No British troops were able to force a passage through the defences. The enemy was literally wiped out by flanking fire in front of the barriers, on the high walls running along the beach and on the beach itself. Besides numerous prisoners taken, there were 150 dead at this point alone.
The battalion which was landed immediately to the west of Dieppe Harbour, up to the Rue Duquesne, was dispersed and destroyed together with the tanks which had been landed. The gunboat Locust, which had come up to the entrance of the harbour at 0600, found herself under the fire of the anti-landing guns and was hit several times; she tried to back out under a smoke screen and was probably sunk, as during an interval of good visibility the stern of a large sinking ship with 200 or 300 men on board was clearly seen.
The two battalions which with tanks had landed on the two sides of the Casino suffered the same fate. They were dispersed during the landing operation on the beach and on the promenade, and with the exception of some patrols did not succeed in entering the town. All the tanks landed there were destroyed.
64. The 6th Battalion, however, succeeded in entering the western part of Pourville with the aid of darkness and smoke screens and overcame the weak garrison (1 platoon of infantry and men of the Todt Organisation). The battalion then tried to reach the objectives assigned to them. Two companies setting out from Pourville westwards overcame all the positions along the coastal road in the valley of the Scie and got as far as the anti-tank positions, where they put the gun out of use. Practically all the personnel serving the gun were killed. A part of the British were able to get over the Scie and arrive at the northern side of the Quatre Vents farm. Here they were destroyed.
The two companies did not succeed in breaking through the line of the principal defences of Dieppe. This line began only at the anti-tank positions, whilst Pourville had an advanced post only weakly defended.
The other two companies presumably reached their first objective, occupying the south side of Pourville and the machine gun positions on the heights towards the west forming with it a bridgehead.
65. The 7th Battalion, which had orders to land behind the 6th Battalion and to advance along the west bank of the Scie as far as the airport of St. Aubin, arrived in the zone of Hautot by going through the woods on the heights to the west of the river; they then came under the flanking fire from Quatre Vents Farm and met the Cyclist Platoon pushed forward by the 571st Infantry Regiment and other patrols from the same regiment. The intentions of this Canadian Battalion are not clear; they had met only slight resistance as there were only few German troops in the locality but they found it impossible to carry out orders to advance in the direction of the airport of St. Aubin. Probably they were held up by an order from the British Command as the frontal attack against Dieppe and Puits had not succeeded.
From the British orders it appears that the troops landed ought to have reached their fixed objectives before 1130 hours and that the retirement and re-embarkation ought to have started at that time. This operation had to be finished by 1430 hours. Numerous other vessels approached the beach at Dieppe up to midday. On account of the smoke it was not possible to see whether these vessels landed other troops or if they were taking on board those who had previously landed.
Measures adopted by Army Command
66. When shortly after 0500 hours the width of the attaching front was known and it was seen that there were no attacks at Le Treport, at the mouth of the Somme, and in the sector of the 332 Infantry Dwisien, the latter had, as already mentioned, sent from Argues-la-Bataille to Berneval the Cyclist Squadron and 3rd Pioneer Company under the orders of Major von Blucher to help the Berneval Battery.
At 0610 hours the 571st infantry Regiment stationed at Dieppe ordered its first battalion at Ouville to be prepared to attack in the Pourville direction.
The G.O.C. 81st Corps, who at 0540 hours gave the Alarm II to all divisions and reserves, put the 3rd Battalion of the 570th Infantry Regiment at the disposal of the 302nd Infantry Division and ordered it forward to Offranville, while the remainder of the reserves were given orders to advance to Bacqueville (14 kilometres southwards of Dieppe). The 1st Battalion of the 571st Infantry Regiment was ready at 0900 hours in the Hautot area for the attack against Pourville. At 1030 hours the battalion began the attack against Pourville cleared the enemy from the heights to the west and took about 200 prisoners.
The position at Dieppe itself was cleared up by 1100 with the employment of five companies of the 571st Infantry Regiment, with some of the 302nd Pioneer Company. The counter-attack by this force caused the surrender of the British troops landed, who were completely demoralised. About 100 prisoners were taken.
What was the Cause of the Failure of the British Operation?
67. It was an absolutely mistaken estimate of the extent of the German defence which decided the enemy to take the bull by the horns and to land the main forces of his troops and tanks frontally at Dieppe, even though as appears from his charts he had a clear knowledge of the organisation of the coastal defences, the cement fortifications, the anti-tank walls, the machine gun positions, and the anti-landing guns. It is also hard to understand why no tank support was given to the patrols landed at Pourville. Probably the attack by tanks coming from Pourville against the heights west of Dieppe and the Quatre Vents Farm would have been successful even if getting through the anti-tank walls and over the Scie would have been a formidable obstacle.
Against all expectations, neither airborne troops nor parachutists were employed by the British. If Puits had been attacked from the east by airborne troops and at the same time from the sea, the position of the defence in the area would have been very critical, especially at first.
The enemy certainly thought that his air attack would have a demoralising effect on the coastal defences and hoped, therefore, to be able to overcome the German lines fairly easily with his battalions. Probably the precision and the efficiency of the British air attacks was considerably influenced by the smoke cover over Dieppe.
68.. The enemy landed both light and heavy mortars, but in all his orders only one light battery and one light A.S. Squadron is mentioned, which was to be landed near Puits. As the landing, therefore, failed these guns were not employed. Probably some light assault artillery would have been of greater service initially than tanks.
69. Since the large naval vessels were not able to see the result of their gunfire on account of the artificial smoke, there was a want of any artillery support for the enemy forces.
The British under-estimate of our defences is as surprising, in view of their air reconnaissance, as is the brief lapse of time in which they believed they could carry out the whole operation.
Their operational orders extending over 100 pages gave the fullest details of the task of each unit and detachment. Their detail gave rise in itself to the germ of failure in case unforeseen difficulties presented themselves.
70. The British attack against Dieppe completely failed with very great losses to the enemy, thanks to the valiant defence of all our Armed Forces. The enemy left 95 officers and 2,122 men prisoners in our hands. Up to the 24th August, his dead are estimated at 475. More corpses are continually being washed up by the sea. A large percentage of losses which cannot be estimated was caused afloat by our gunfire, our air bombmg, and the sinking of landing vessels, lighters and destroyers. The enemy losses must amount to 60 or 70 per cent of the landing force.
German Losses
302nd Infantry Division:- 5 officers; 14 non-commissioned officers, 68 men dead
1 non-commissioned officer, 9 men missing 5 officers, 27 non-commissioned officers, 124 men wounded
Total Losses: (Army, Navy, Air Force, Todt Organisation)
6 officers, 144 non-commissioned officers and men dead
15 non-commissioned officers and men missing
5 officers, 270 non-commissioned officers and men wounded
Booty
28 tanks 60 machine pistols
7 motor lorries 42 anti-tank rifles
1 petrol waggon 70 light mortars
1,300 rifles 60 heavy mortars
170 machine guns
In addition, a quantity of ammunition, hand grenades, explosives and equipment.
Good luck. I look forward to playing the end product.
Matthew
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