D-Day landings

What were the assault divisions and troops that landed in the actual first wave? I'm reading the green books, and I've gotten as far as 3 initial assault divisions and 2 immediate follow-up divisions, but they wanted to change it to 4 initial.

I also know that the five landing areas each had a division, but I thought the US had the 1st, 4th, and 29th divisions, and the British had 2 and the Canadians had 1. That would be six. Also, were there independent tank battalions attached to the US landings, because no armored divisions landed in that first wave. I know the British landed armored brigades or parts of an armored division.

 

Who picked the first divisions? Did they volunteer?

 

Assault forces from East to West
6th British Airborne Division
Force 'S' - 3rd British Division and 1st Special Service Force (Commandos)
Force 'J' - 3rd Canadian Division
Force 'G' - 50th British Division
Force 'O' - 1st U.S. Infantry Division with 29th U.S. Infantry Division (-) under command for the assault phase
Force 'U' - 4th U.S. Infantry Division
101st U.S.Airborne Division
82d U.S. Airborne Division

Follow on forces from East to West
Force 'L' - 7th British Armoured Division and 51st British (Highland) Infantry Division
Force 'B' - 2d U.S. Infantry Division

No British armoured division was landed in the assault waves, the three armoured brigades were all separate and assigned to infantry divisions. Force 'S' had 27th British Armoured Brigade, Force 'J' had 2nd Canadian Armoured Brigade, and Force 'G' had 8th British Armoured Brigade. The U.S. equivalent landed in the assault were armored groups: Force 'U' had 6th Armored Group with two battalions, Force 'O' had 3d Armored Group with three battalions.

 

Try here List of Allied forces in the Normandy Campaign - Wikipedia

Rich has listed the main formations. It is a little more complicated - and there are a lot opf formations which supplied a few troops to the assult waves. The British War Office had an officvial list of units that landed on D Day that extends over several pages.

As well as the 1st Special Services (SS) Brigade of Army Commandos as part of Force S, the 4th SS Brigade of Royal Marine Commandos landed as part of Force J. Force G also contained the 56th (Independent) Infantry Brigade under 50th Div Command. Two US Army Ranger battalions landed with Force O)
The 79th Armoured Division supplied specialist armoured engineering vehicles for all of the 2nd Army beaches. US Engineer brigades carried out similar obstacle clearance function.
1st Royal Marines Armoured Support Group provided 100 tanks used as a disposable assult gun brigade.

Besides the assault divisions, troops also landed with the D Day assault with a responsibility of securing the beachs themselves for future operations. These included the Beach Groups, based on infantry battalions and AAA Assault groups providing AA and Anti-tank defence. These were 80th and 76th AA Brigades on Gold and Sword and Juno respectively. There were US AAA Brigades with a similar role.

 

The 1st Special Service Brigade Free French under British command - were all volunteers for the first wave and were granted this request.

On June 6th, 177 men of the 1er Bataillon de Fusiliers Marins Commandos disembarked from landing craft at 0731 hours on Sword beach with Colleville-Montgomery forces in the east of the allied landing.[10] They were the first to be unloaded in this sector with the craft of the No.4 British commandos having to let them pass to the lead as initially planned. Their specific objective was to achieve a breach within 500 meters to the west of Riva Bella supporting the 3rd Infantry Division.[11]

In spite of significant losses, the commandos seized the 50mm anti-tank gun encuvée[12] that disabled LCI 523 (1Re Troop), then took the former Casino de Riva-Bella before advancing between Colleville and Saint-Aubin-d'Arquenay to meet the British paratroopers of the 6th Airborne Division at the Pegasus Bridge (Bénouville) where they arrived towards 1630 hours. There the commandos occupied the perimeter of the lime pit towards 2000 hours. By the evening of June 6, the 1er BFMC had lost almost 25% of its personnel with 27 killed in combat in Normandy, with their commander Kieffer wounded twice in the course of the day.

1er Bataillon de Fusiliers Marins Commandos - Wikipedia

 

So as the planning stages went on, they added more troops to the first wave assault. In "Cross-Channel Attack" the first strategy was 2 British Divisions and 1 American, with 2 follow-up. Then it was 2 and 2 with the 2 follow-up. Airborne was always in the planning stages too.

 

In 'Assault Division' by Norman Scarfe the divisional history of the British 3rd Infantry Division, says they had been training for amphibious operations to be used in the Sicilian Landings in 1943 . The Canadians kicked up a fuss about being left out so the Canadian 1st Infantry Division took their place in the Sicliy campaign.
That left the highly trained 3rd Division back in UK .
Right unit, right place, right time for Overlord.
Monty had commanded 3rd Div in the 1940 campaign, though I doubt if that would have been a factor.
Monty wanted 50th Div & 51st Div with him as they'd fought well since Alamein for him.

 

"Monty had commanded 3rd Div in the 1940 campaign, though I doubt if that would have been a factor."

I think it might have been having just finished reading "Monty's Ironsides" - 3rd Division from Normandy to Bremen

TD

 

When they say divisions in the assaults, do they just mean the actual ground combat regiments of those divisions? So separate US armored units were part of the assault as well?

 

British & Commonwealth Forces used on D Day
D-Day : Commonwealth's forces in action

American Forces used on D Day
D-Day : American forces in action

TD

 

I would be careful of those. they got a bit scrambled in translation.

 

Assault Division is a technical term defined by Combined Operations as a formation organised and equipped to launch the initial assault to explot no more than five miles inland. They were reinforced with tanks and engineers to mount brigade group / RCT landings and equipped with specialist equipment to operate on the beaches. Any personnel and vehicles not needed for the initial assault would follow on in a separate echelon.

 

What are you trying to ask for? Ground combat forces "only" have ground combat army groups, armies, corps, divisions, brigades, regiments, battalions, squadrons, companies, batteries, troops, platoons, sections, squads, and detachments. Which include the U.S. Army armored units you were already given. So what are you looking for?

Do you want the tactical organization and command structure of the assault forces? That is rather a complicated subject depending on the level of detail you want. My schematic order of battle for the Allied ground forces runs 74 pages. The Allied naval order of battle is 45 pages. I can't post that here.

 

Yes it is complicated, isn't it?

BTW, I keep forgetting to ask you, since you are the Sheldrake after all, to fill in a couple of the holes I have on the British side of my 74-page opus.

In 106th AA Brigade: 108th Heavy Antiaircraft Regiment RA included 338th, 382d and XXXX Battery?
In 76th AA Brigade - 99th Heavy Antiaircraft Regiment RA included 302d, 303d and XXXX Battery?
In 50th Infantry Division - 74th (Northumbrian) Field Regiment RA (25-pdr towed) included 296th (4th Durham), 298th (1st Durham) and XXXX Battery?
And - 124th (Northumbrian) Field Regiment RA (25-pdr towed) included 287th (3d Northumbrian), 288th (4th Northumbrian) and XXXX Battery

Any and all help greatly appreciated.

Cheers!

 

These are the Normandy organisations sourced from war diaires

Hope this helps

 

Marvy-pooh! Thanks!

 

So what happened to the 298th and 285th Battery in the 74th and 124th Regiments? That is one thing I could never quite follow from the sources I had available,

 

Rich, I guess I'll try to be more clear. When the actual assault troops hit the beaches, but they are named in divisions such as the 1st, 4th, 29th, British 50th, etc., are those troops the infantry regiments of those divisions, or do they include infantry, artillery, AA, etc. And there were also separate tank regiments as someone stated.

 

The initial landing was by an infantry and tank team covering the combined Army-Navy beach obstacle demolition units. They were followed by infantry and armor combat elements, engineers to develop the beaches, artillery, and support elements. Also, liaison teams from units landed later were landed earlier in order to facilitate getting those units onto and then off the beaches.

Here is an example for one battalion landing team from the 4th U.S. Infantry Division

UTAH TARE GREEN Timing:

H: Co B and C, 8th Inf – 10 LCA, Co B, 70th Tk Bn (16 DD tanks) – 4 LCT

H+2: Beach Obstacle Demolition Party (BODP) NCDU #25, 26, 127, and 136 – 4 LCM and 4 LCVP, Det, 237th Eng – 2 LCVP

H+5: Co A, 8th Inf – 5 LCA, Co D, 8th Inf – 4 LCVP, ? – 1 LCVP

H+15: ½ Co C, 70th Tk Bn (8 tanks and 4 tankdozers) – 4 LCT (A and HE)

H+17: Reserve NCDU #134 and 139 – 2 LCV, Elms, 237th Eng Bn – 4 LCM

H+30: Co D, 8th Inf – 4 LCA, Elms, Co C, 237th Eng – 2 LCVP

H+75: 3rd, 22nd Inf - ? LCVP

H+110: Co D and F, 531st Eng Shore Rgt – 2 LCT

H+145: 29th FA Bn – 4 LCT, A-1, 746th Tk Bn (5 tanks) –1 LCT

H+175: 238th Eng Bn (-) – 5 LCT, Elms, 4th Med Bn – 1 LCT

H+200: 44th FA Bn – 5 LCT

H+225: Elms, 29th FA Bn – 1 LCT, Elms, 44th FA Bn – 1 LCT, Bty A and B, 474th AAA Bn (AW) – 4 LCT, Elms, 1st ESB – 2 LCT, Amphib Trk Co – 1 LCT