D-Day_ The Battle for Normandy - Antony Beevor [39]
British gliders, which were larger, carried the field guns of the 320th Glider Field Artillery Battalion. They were even more dangerous than the Waco gliders. On a hard landing the front wheel structure would smash up through the plywood floor, causing considerable injury. A lot of the crashes were caused by confusion and too many planes coming in at the same time. A number were shot down by ground fire from nearby German positions. ‘The troop-carrying gliders came like a swarm of ravens,’ wrote the Obergefreiter from the 91st Luftlande-Division, ‘and then the war really got started.’ Among the casualties was Brigadier General Pratt, the assistant divisional commander of the 101st Airborne. He too was killed by a Jeep smashing through the front of the aircraft when it came to an abrupt halt on hitting a tree. Within twenty minutes, enough glider troops had landed to allow them to start caring for their own injured. Medics were working frantically, administering morphine, sulfa pills and whatever bandages they had.
A number of the gliders missed the landing zone altogether. One came down on a landmine and blew up. Some came in on the flooded areas, which at least softened the landing. Pilots had to remember to take off their heavy flak jackets before cutting their way out through the side panels. The water could be deep in places.
Glider infantrymen were extremely vulnerable at this moment if within range of German positions. ‘Upon landing,’ wrote one pilot, ‘we discovered the source of the ground fire which nearly got me. It turned out to be a bunker containing about a dozen conscripted Polish soldiers with one German in charge. After the glider infantrymen from several gliders, including ours, directed a hail of rifle-fire at the bunker, the resistance ceased. There was silence in the bunker, and then a single shot. Then there were shouts and laughter, and these Poles emerged with their hands held high. They weren’t about to fight the Americans so they simply shot the Kraut sergeant.’
Reactions among the French civilian population could also be unpredictable. While many made omelettes or crêpes for the paratroopers and offered them swigs of Calvados, others were frightened that this operation might just be a raid, and that the Germans would return afterwards to take revenge. But such fears did not stop farmers’ wives from rushing out into the fields and grabbing as many parachutes as possible for their silk. Not surprisingly, the rather stolid Norman farmers, who seldom travelled far from their own villages, were confused by this extraordinary intrusion. A trooper in the 101st recounted that when they stopped to talk to three Frenchmen, one of the farmers said to his companion, pointing to the blackened face of a paratrooper, ‘You’ve now seen an American negro.’
Despite the intensely vicious skirmishes, the fighting had hardly started. As dawn approached, the paratroopers knew that the Germans would launch counter-attacks in strength. Their prime concern was the possible failure of the main invasion. If the 4th Infantry Division did not secure Utah beach and break through across the causeways to join them, then they would be abandoned to their fate.
After seeing the 101st Airborne take off from Greenham Common, General Eisenhower had returned to his nickel-plated trailer at 01.15 hours. He had sat there in silence for a while smoking. His aide, Harry Butcher, did not know then that the supreme commander had already written a statement assuming all responsibility if Overlord turned out to be a disaster.
A few hours later, Air Chief Marshal Leigh-Mallory, the very man who had warned of catastrophe on the Cotentin airborne operation, telephoned through a preliminary report. Butcher immediately went to Eisenhower. Unable to sleep, the supreme commander was reading a western in bed and still smoking. Only twenty-one of the 850 transports carrying the American airborne troops had been destroyed. British losses were even lighter, with just