World leaders gathered on the Normandy coast on June 6 to mark the 80th anniversary of D-Day.
The successful landing by air and sea of tens of thousands of Allied troops on June 6, 1944 would prove to be a turning point in the Second World War. But while D-Day, was a success it was only the start of the vital Battle of Normandy.
Lose the battle, and the Allies could be pushed back into the sea. The battle would rage across the fields of Normandy until the end of August, and it was there the Poles entered the fray and play a decisive role in the eventual victory.
The Polish 1st Armored Division, led by General Stanisław Maczek, had arrived in France on August 1. Attached to the First Canadian Army it was soon in the thick of savage fighting, with the ‘bocage’ country of Normandy proving to be deadly terrain for Allied armor.
The bocage were thick hedgerows, sometimes five meters tall, that crisscrossed the fields, and provided countless hiding places for the Germans to ambush the Allies. It was ideal for a defending army, and a nightmare for advancing armor, which, hemmed in by thick bocage, could not maneuver or even see the enemy.
Despite the terrain the Poles and their Allies slowly pushed the Germans back with the American forces eventually swinging east from the south, while the British, Canadians and Poles bore down on them from the north.
The German divisions were now in danger of being encircled near the town of Falaise, and were desperate to escape eastwards to the River Seine.
The task of cutting off their escape route—to be the “cork in the bottle” —fell to the 1st Polish Armored Division. The Battle of the Falaise Pocket was about to enter Polish lore.
Formed in Scotland, the division, some 15,000 strong, had been in training and waiting for years to go into battle. The heart of the division consisted of soldiers who had managed to escape Poland in 1939, and were now eager to take the fight to the enemy and get revenge for the horrors the Germans had inflicted on their homeland.
On August 19, the Poles seized Hill 262, a vital piece of high-ground that commanded the surrounding countryside, and around which the Germans had to make their way to escape the ever-tightening Allied noose.
The Poles called it ‘Maczuga,’ or mace, because of its shape, and could use it as a vantagepoint to call down artillery fire that devastated German forces trying to get out of the pocket.
Desperate to dislodge the Poles in order open up an escape route for their forces trapped in the pocket, SS General Paul Hausser, the commander of the German 7th Army, called for the Polish positions to be “eliminated”.
The Germans launched a number of bloody attacks, but the Poles held despite almost running out of ammunition.
By the evening of August 21, advancing Canadian forces had moved into relieve the Poles and the pocket was finally closed.
The battle ended in a decisive victory for the Allies but it exacted a bitter price. General Dwight Eisenhower, the supreme Allied commander, viewed the aftermath and would later write “it was literally possible to walk for hundreds of yards at a time, stepping on nothing but dead and decaying flesh.”
The Poles lost around 325 killed, 1,002 wounded and 114 missing in the Battle of the Falaise Pocket. The fighting for Hill 262 and its surroundings cost the Germans an estimated 500 dead, and scores of tanks and artillery pieces. Over 1,000 men also became POWs.
The 1st Armored Division would go on to help liberate Holland, and finished the war in the German port of Wilhelmshaven.
After the war, many of its soldiers, wary of returning to a Poland caught in the ever-tightening communist grip, elected to stay in the UK.
General Maczek, who had proved himself to be one of the Allies’ best commanders of armor, settled in Scotland and became Edinburgh’s highest ranking barman by working in one of the city’s hotels.
Former comrades who visited the hotel would snap to attention before ordering their gin and tonics from the man who had led them at Falaise.
Lose the battle, and the Allies could be pushed back into the sea. The battle would rage across the fields of Normandy until the end of August, and it was there the Poles entered the fray and play a decisive role in the eventual victory.
The Polish 1st Armored Division, led by General Stanisław Maczek, had arrived in France on August 1. Attached to the First Canadian Army it was soon in the thick of savage fighting, with the ‘bocage’ country of Normandy proving to be deadly terrain for Allied armor.
The bocage were thick hedgerows, sometimes five meters tall, that crisscrossed the fields, and provided countless hiding places for the Germans to ambush the Allies. It was ideal for a defending army, and a nightmare for advancing armor, which, hemmed in by thick bocage, could not maneuver or even see the enemy.
Despite the terrain the Poles and their Allies slowly pushed the Germans back with the American forces eventually swinging east from the south, while the British, Canadians and Poles bore down on them from the north.
The German divisions were now in danger of being encircled near the town of Falaise, and were desperate to escape eastwards to the River Seine.
The task of cutting off their escape route—to be the “cork in the bottle” —fell to the 1st Polish Armored Division. The Battle of the Falaise Pocket was about to enter Polish lore.
Formed in Scotland, the division, some 15,000 strong, had been in training and waiting for years to go into battle. The heart of the division consisted of soldiers who had managed to escape Poland in 1939, and were now eager to take the fight to the enemy and get revenge for the horrors the Germans had inflicted on their homeland.
On August 19, the Poles seized Hill 262, a vital piece of high-ground that commanded the surrounding countryside, and around which the Germans had to make their way to escape the ever-tightening Allied noose.
The Poles called it ‘Maczuga,’ or mace, because of its shape, and could use it as a vantagepoint to call down artillery fire that devastated German forces trying to get out of the pocket.
Desperate to dislodge the Poles in order open up an escape route for their forces trapped in the pocket, SS General Paul Hausser, the commander of the German 7th Army, called for the Polish positions to be “eliminated”.
The Germans launched a number of bloody attacks, but the Poles held despite almost running out of ammunition.
By the evening of August 21, advancing Canadian forces had moved into relieve the Poles and the pocket was finally closed.
The battle ended in a decisive victory for the Allies but it exacted a bitter price. General Dwight Eisenhower, the supreme Allied commander, viewed the aftermath and would later write “it was literally possible to walk for hundreds of yards at a time, stepping on nothing but dead and decaying flesh.”
The Poles lost around 325 killed, 1,002 wounded and 114 missing in the Battle of the Falaise Pocket. The fighting for Hill 262 and its surroundings cost the Germans an estimated 500 dead, and scores of tanks and artillery pieces. Over 1,000 men also became POWs.
The 1st Armored Division would go on to help liberate Holland, and finished the war in the German port of Wilhelmshaven.
After the war, many of its soldiers, wary of returning to a Poland caught in the ever-tightening communist grip, elected to stay in the UK.
General Maczek, who had proved himself to be one of the Allies’ best commanders of armor, settled in Scotland and became Edinburgh’s highest ranking barman by working in one of the city’s hotels.
Former comrades who visited the hotel would snap to attention before ordering their gin and tonics from the man who had led them at Falaise.
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