Royal Navy manpower shortages D-day

I found this on another forum that according to a book on the RN was that the RN when it "expanded Overlord from the original three-divsions to its final size, the RN was so strapped for manpower they had to lay up four of the older battleships in order to find crews for the additional minesweepers, escorts and landing craft that would be needed."

Is this true and any more information perhaps?

 

Not only the Royal Navy, but the entire Great Britain was so drained on human resources, both military and industrial, that the british war machine was almost grinding to a halt.

Had the war lastet much longer, the whole system would have caved in.

Regards
RAM

 

Without the escape of Dunkirk and the valuable help of Commonwealth and foreign troops this would have been worse. Every man (and woman) had to contribute, the slightest thing could be important . Homeguard, Reserved jobs, factory workers and of course soldiers, all were needed, especially aircrews which were costly to train and difficult to replace.

 

I do have to say though that with the Kriegsmarine as it was the RN did have the option to do so.

 

There are a lot of oddities regarding British manpower in the final half of the war. I've read that British manpower peaked in 1942 and declined thereafter (not sure how true that is). There were also more than a couple of battalions on constant duty in places like N Ireland, Malta, Gilbraltar, Egypt, Transjordan, and other "Empire locations".

In his work on Normandy, Carlos D'Este asserted his belief that some British manpower was deliberately held back from the campaign in NW Europe by Churchill. IIRC, D'Este thought Churchill was wanted to retain a reserve of some kind in case the campaign failed, to possibly participate in the invasion of Japan, and for use in keeping the Empire together postwar. D'Este attempted to research WO records but said the records boxes were missing and that the British archivists did not know where they were.

What is fact is that two British infantry divisions and also some some brigades had to be disbanded to provide enough infantry replacements ("reinforcements" in British English) for the 21st Army Group. Apparently, Montgomery had been told by Churchill that he was not going to receive adequate replacements for any stiff losses and that Montgomery would have to find the manpower from among existing units. In the last part of the campaign, regiments in the Royal Artillery and Royal Marines were used to form a few infantry brigades that were mostly used behind the lines to occupy ground and provide security.

British infantry replacement efforts were also complicated by the regimental system of local recruiting, for example, the Durham Light Infantry Regiment normally if not always provided replacements to any DLI battalions assigned to brigades in the field. I don't know how it worked if one regiment had a surplus of recruits while another was short -- if the men could be easily moved around or not -- but from some reading I've done, it was neither simple nor done very often.

Although the Canadians initially underestimated the infantry losses their forces would take in 1944-45, they were able to master the situation and provide more realistic quantities of infantry replacements as the campaign wore on. While the British no doubt realized their infantry casualty estimates had also been low, they were apparently not in a position to 'make good' the losses suffered in Normandy. The U.S. made the same mistake and had to shake out rear area units to provide more men to serve as infantry replacements, although the replacement rates were adjusted upward to account for the realities of losses in NW Europe.

One thing I find puzzling is the apparent lack of enough young British adult males maturing in 1944 - 45 -- was there some sort of fall in the birthrates during the last half of the 1920's, or was it a consequence of First World War losses ?

Cheers

BW

 

This is a much more difficult question to answer than I initially surmised. The short answer is "yes, there was a decline in natural population growth in the UK" during the period in question. Indeed there was a general decline in birthrate, except for a brief spike at the end of WWI, and this continued on. The question is more complicated because of emigration/immigration issues, improved infant mortality rates, etc. We would not only be talking about males who were born in the mid to late 1920s but also, those that lived to see 1944-45, as well as those who immigrated to the UK or emigrated out. Here is some supportive data to my brief answer, but I acknowledge it is an incomplete reference to the bigger question. I don't know as I'm going to have the time to research this further in the near future but if this thread hangs on, I'll try to get back to it.

Mannheimer Zentrum für Europäische Sozialforschung: Newsletter

http://www.parliament.uk/commons/lib/research/rp99/rp99-111.pdf​

 

Here are some of D'Este's comments on the manpower shortage and how it affected the 21st Army Group. He devotes an entire chapter to this topic in his work Decision in Normandy.

These are strong comments to make; in effect, D'Este is implying that by either withholding or making poor use of available infantry assets, the British Army in effect shifted some of its share of the casualty-bearing burden onto the other Allies operating in NW Europe. Any "burden shifting" that may have occurred, though, did not necessarily extend beyond the area of operations of the 21st Army Group. One may note, that after the heavy fighting in Normandy, that there was a period of infantry-casualty-intense fighting borne by the Canadian First Army -- the reduction of coastal fortresses and the clearing of the Scheldt Estuary.

One may also look at the relative casualty figures, although this is problematic for many reasons, one of which I'll point out later. Anyway, the first figure is total of army troops present in the campaign on 30 April 1945 and the second figure are the army casualties. The third figure is the percentage of the second figure of the sum of the first and second figures:

Great Britain: 835,208 : 141,646 : 14.5%
Canada: 183,421 : 43,892 : 19.3%
Other Allies in 21st AG: 34,518 : 6,893 : 16.6%

For comparison:

United States: 2,618,023 : 523,117 : 16.7%
France: 413,144 : 66,826 : 13.9%

Source for all figures is Appendix VII, Volume 2, Victory in the West. One issue with the Canadian figures is that the 30 April total of army manpower includes the recently arrived I Canadian Corps which had transferred from Italy but did not arrive until March 1945 or so. The bulk of the Canadian casualties shown likely occurred in Canadian II Corps which was present in NW Europe for the great majority of the campaign.

Not sure what it means, if anything -- but Canada's overall casualty percentage is higher than that of the other nations depicted. This may simply be a reflection of a differing distribution of troops among infantry, armour, and artillery units in any given national force. On edit -- looking at totals of infantry, armour, artillery, AA, antitank, and recce battalion-sized units in the Canadian and British forces in 21st Army Group at the war's end -- infantry battalions make up 40.6% of the Canadian total and 37.9% of the British total. In terms of support units, the biggest discrepancy is that Great Britain fielded more than four times as many engineer companies than Canada in the campaign even though it had only twice as many army corps in theatre on 8 May 1945. That Great Britain provided the bulk of theatre logisitics and specialized support meant that more of the British force was engaged in these relatively safer military duties, and thus less likely to become casualties -- this could also be influencing the slightly lower British casualty percentage.

Doc, thanks for the insight on the population decline in Great Britain.

Cheers

BW

 

[SIZE=-1]Found this here (and further material quoted from Cinderella Army that is not on the web page). If these assertions are true, they lend weight to the notion of burden-shifting:

Unfortunately, I have been unable to find citations of Canadian losses by division. I was able to locate these quotes for losses in these British units for the 1944-45 campaign.

11,772 15th Scottish Division
*9,051 51st Highland Division
*9,820 11th Armoured Division
*2,000 8th Armoured Brigade
32,643 Total of the above

I chose two infantry divisions, one armoured division, and one armoured brigade because that was the major combat formation make-up of the 2nd Canadian Corps.

Canadian losses quoted in Victory in the West were 43,892. The Canadian official history, Vol. II, notes Canadian losses after 24 March 1945 were 6,298. There were two Canadian corps in NW Europe in April 1945, 1st and 2nd. The 1st, recently relocated from Italy, was used to clear the western Netherlands to the Grebbe Line in what was its only combat operation in NW Europe. The post 24 March losses appear to have primarily impacted the 2nd Corps (this page states the losses of the sole Canadian infantry division in 1st Corps were 506 for the April operations in the western Netherlands. The other Canadian division in 1st Corps was the 5th Armoured Division.) I'll assume 1st Corps losses in April were no more than 1,000. This still leaves some 43,000 casualties that were taken by the 2nd Corps, or about 24% more than the British units selected at random that were mentioned above. Allowing for some Canadian losses among corps and army-echelon units (artillery, engineers, etc.), this figure compares favorably with the 20% mentioned in Cinderella Army.

It would be interesting to actually get casualty figures for all of the 21st Army Group divisions during 1944-45 but it looks like one would have to purchase a lot of expensive books to find this or spend time in the archives of Great Britain and Canada.

Cheers

BW


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This link is not going to answer your question. Its social impacts though are highlighted because if you are to compare manpower in action theatres. You then must consider what is going on, on the home front. Canada is a good example. Without belittling them and without them we would have been in the mud...But Canada was not bombed to the same extent we were, did not have total war policy in every corner of its homelife and man and women power on the home front. Had not exhausted her reserves to the extent Britian seems to have. There will be reasons for that exhaustion.

I do have links with regards to casualties, I'm trying to find a good one in the morass of unindexed ones I've made over the years.

One thing about numbers though in 44...I keep pointing to it, its not an obsession, but I have many books, but find myself returning for a first person view on the matters on most things...And I return to Churchills minutes...open to all to view. He has many things to say on manpower..be it at divisional level, sqn level, theatre level, and his own unease at the disparagy in teeth to support ratios and such.

YouTube - The British Paras: Thinking Man's Infantry

Many will find it boring but its in context to any views on manpower etc.

 

HyperWar: British War Economy [Chapter XIX]

Helps if you post the right link...

Could have been worse, I could have been The British home secretaries husband....

 

BW if your ever looking for a brief but I admit messy order of battle of The Brits. The linked site is usefull, but requires work.

I have selected the Black watch in this example, but you just go to arrow and drop down menu. Messy but gives some good info on some of the units....Some is just no more than parent corps, but I've found it uselful over the years.

Corps Unit Index for 1 Duke of York's Own

 

First go at a graph of British killed in the Second World War « Trench Fever

Again, I dont know how accurate this is, the author explains his sources. once more it doesn't directly say anything about the RN and D Day numbers, but shows to some extent the manpower of the whole country at various stages...this was in fact a Total war as far as Britons were concerned. No one in any occupation or life path was not involved in some way with the war effort.

Churchill had immense problems with his service chiefs througout the whole war with mannng numbers...If you were to peruse the history of the RAF Regiment you will see one reason why.

 

I used to have a link to something some on here may recognise...the Evet scales...which may have given you your comparisons...Unfortunately, gone...Tried to fnd the information once more and no luck, maybe someone out there has a link for this that will at the very least give you an outline of casualties vis a vis British and Canadians after Normandy.

 

Since I've posted a fair amount of material about manpower and losses in the 21st Army Group, I should post my conclusions on this topic.

* Britain's manpower was obviously over-subscribed by 1944-45 -- meaning that it was assigned against too many requirements, whether military or industrial.

* The British went into NW Europe fully expecting to have to disband at least two divisions of infantry to make good losses because they understood the infantry reinforcement situation for 21st Army Group was rather less than satisfactory. In fact, two divisions and a couple of brigades were disbanded.

* The British refused to strip any more personnel out of the British Isles than they had previously planned to make good losses in 21st Army Group. D'Este mentions an episode in which Churchill was furious when he learned a second division was to be disbanded, to which Alan Brooke coldly reacted and reminded him that such measures had been anticipated. Yet, if D'Este is correct about the 100,000+ available infantry in the Isles, one has to assume either that the British Army was incompetent in personnel management and did not know which assets they had (very unlikely IMO), or that the British Army deliberately withheld assets from Montgomery for reasons unknown.

* The disbandment of two divisions was of course not without its consequences for other Allied units, particularly those in 21st Army Group. That much more of the front line had to be manned by the units still existing and it meant that much more time on the front line for the other units as opposed to being off the line as part of the reserves.

* If the assertions in Cinderella Army are accurate, the Canadian units saw more combat time and experienced more casualties than their British counterparts in 21st Army Group. In effect, they were required to shoulder a heavier burden than like British units. This had to occur as a result of deliberate decisions by Montgomery and/or his staff.

* Montgomery's decisions make operational sense. As unfair as it might seem for the Canadian divisions to have been committed more often than their British counterparts, the situation for Montgomery was that he had a devil of a time getting reinforcements for British losses while at the same time the Canadian government perceived that they had predicted too low a rate of losses among their infantry and were able to eventually get the flow of individual Canadian reinforcements to a level that matched losses on the battlefield. In effect, Canada was able to produce the needed reinforcements while the high command of the British Army had apparently decided they were only going to commit so many reinforcements to NW Europe and that Montgomery would have to adjust his operations to account for that limitation.

* The written history of the British manpower issues and the effects it had on 21st Army Group has not really done justice to the Canadians. It appears that Terry Copp (author of Cinderella Army) is the first author to comprehensively analyze the operations of the Canadian First Army since the official history was produced in the late 1950's - early 1960's. While Montgomery's decisions on how often the Canadians were to be employed can be understood in light of the difficulties he faced with British manpower limitations, there is apparently very little written history that describes the situation plainly and states, that measured in terms of divisional effort and losses, the Canadian Army did more than its share in NW Europe.

Cheers

BW

 

Urqh, I take your point about the home front. I can also understand how the manpower base became oversubscribed . . . after all, war is anything but an orderly affair. I wasn't even aware of Copp's work when I began posting in this thread, but from the fragmentary information I've assembled so far, it looks like the Canadian divisions took on more of a load during 1944-45 than their British counterparts. This is all, however, quite relative. It is of course clear that British losses in the 1944-45 campaign were substantially higher than those of Canada and in all fairness one should point out that the first Canadian division didn't see combat until Dieppe (and after that, not until Sicily in mid 1943), years after the first British divisions fought the Germans. I suppose my thought about all this is that we have come a few decades since the official histories were written in the 1950's, but this aspect of the Canadian contribution is still mostly unknown. Perhaps Copp's works will go some way to casting some deserved light on their operations.

Thank you for the links, I will enjoy looking them over. Years ago, when I first began looking at manpower issues, I thought the topic would be drier than dirt. Was I ever wrong!

Cheers

BW

 

No, your findings certainly make for uncomfortable reading especially if you are British. But as you say, its something I have looked at around the edges in the past. Hastings' Overlord for instance if scattered with references to manpower problems and the effect of the thinking of husbanding manpower even before the breakout, was having great effect on the British military leadership, particularly on Monty who as you say, realises he's not going to be reinforced greatly in any way, in fact is going to reach the peak and start reducing from his present base even before the breakout. This seems to have affected thinking that may not have been the priority if this one though had not been at the back of his and others minds. Goodwood may be an example of this. Liddel Harts quotation rings true in what you say though..maybe in fact ...there has been to much glorification of the campaign and too little objective investigation...his words not mine...

The mission the Canadians found themselves with...suffereng in equal numbers I would think per nation...UK-Canada ...in the invasion itself and before breakout...roughly a third in size and taking roughly a third in casualties of all types...if we believe Max Hastings work...are not the problem...After the breakout though..No one can envy the task given to the Canadians...Clearing the coastal ports etc...culminating in what many see as the donkey work...And a strategic error in some view on Monty's part..He's allowed some...as if we are to believe the story of ww2 by some, he was the only commander to ever make an error...but maybe the priority in his mind for the single thrust as his own personal priority left the Canadians the unenviable task laid on their doorstep because of this...Clearing the Sheldt esturary etc, should maybe have been the first priortiy.

Reading Lord Carvers Britains Army raised similar points. So I'm far from castigating your findings.....but I'm all for more understanding of the reasons...they certainly were not black and white in a country that not just in words, but was exhausted. The manpower problem needs to be looked at further, as indeed as far as Monty was concerned there were no more troops heading his way, he was at the end of his expansion. and even says so after D day on talking about the strengh of second army. so he certainly beleives he is at the end of the numbers game and that it can only go down...therefore all his future planning even before breakout has now to have this plonked firmly at the top of his concerns when planning any future action...

 

But to get back to Jc's original question. Do you have any more info. I know that the Royal Sovereign BB was laid up early in the year, but for operational reasons not or not that I would think was ti di primarily with shortages or replacement crews just for D Day. Theres one ships crew available for remuster. Off hand I dont know of others..Only the Sovereign because it was my uncles ship at one time.

 

Just checked in navy net and following other 2 bb Resolutin and Revenge are maked down as becoming training ships with reduced crewslate 43 early 44...Perhaps this is what the writer refers to, but this was done so for operational reasons. Unless he knows otherwise...?

 

shells save lives,is often touted in books,cheers.

 

True as is metal before flesh...