Charlie's Church

Hi Stephen,

The Archive is not quite as difficult to search as I first thought. I forgot about Dale's link to the finding aid on the LMHA site. The Air Photo Finding Aid is here.

Look in any boxes which reference the Falaise/Trun/Chambois areas.

Thanks,

Pat

 

Lets get organised...

Here are the 13 entries found when I searched on the word 'Trun':



Anyone wishing to help; please let us know what box you are searching in order to avoid duplication of effort.

I note sortie 400/650 did not register in the above search result, but even so the 13 hits above are a good starting point.

Thanks,

Pat

 

I am searching the last entry above...

Box 0327 / Sortie 400/656.

Regards,

Pat

 

Thanks Ellen,

It was always going to be a long shot in any case.

Just need a glance at that gable; be it from a ground shot or a suitable oblique aerial.

Regards,

Pat

 

Hi All,

No luck yet with the railway embankment.

However, the YESTERDAY TV channel is running that brilliant series The World at War at the moment and I was watching Episode 17 - Morning June-August 1944 the other night with my feet up on the coffee table when suddenly I saw a flash of footage showing a Cromwell passing between a very familiar looking fountain and a World War I monument. It was only a few seconds of footage, so I went searching for this episode online and found a copy here.

Below are two stills from the footage:

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The fountain, together with the monument can only mean this is Boissey and the tanks, which are most likely Canadian, are coming into the village on the D4 from the west and passing between the two landmarks, having turned north east onto the D154.

Not directly related to the thread, but at least there is a possible Canadian link albeit an armoured one

Regards,

Pat

 

Hi Niels,

I thought the mark on the right front of the hull might be a TAC sign, but looking at other photos of Cromwells in Normandy, I think it's only the loop of the wire rope tow line.

Regards,

Pat

 

Hi All,

Niels and Sean; thanks guys for the correction.

I was working on the map on page 82/83 of 'Ruckmarsch! The German Retreat from Normandy' by Jean Paul Pallud which indicates Boissey was in the First Canadian Army sector...and of course the Polish 1st Armoured Division was one of the attached units.

Allan,

Yes, a great series and well worth a re-run every so often.

Regards,

Pat

 

A small step forward...

The attack on the curved railway embankment remains elusive, so I am trying a different tack to see if we can plot other pilots' locations for the afternoon patrol on the 17th July.

Readers will recall that Ellen interceded on our behalf with the Imperial War Museum in order for a copy of the gun camera footage to be released into our care for research purposes - under strict usage T&Cs. Now that I have a week off work for the Christmas holidays, I pushed Lady Luck for all she was worth last night/this morning for a solid four hours of searching, seeking this location from the gun camera footage of Flying Officer Ireland:

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The attack appears to be aimed at at least one vehicle, possible a lone saloon car, which is stopped on the grass margin under a tall hedge at centre top of the above still from the footage. There is a very distinctive dwelling house (H) at lower right with a long lean-to attached to the near side gable. Note the curved track leading down to what I first took to be an S bend on a main road.

Lady Luck finally yielded this morning at 2:30am when both my PC screens came together about 4 miles north of Lisieux on what is today a re-aligned D579:

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All that remains today at the location is the house (H) and even that has gone through a major change with the removal of the lean-to and the addition of a new L shaped annex in its place:

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The road re-alignment appears to have commenced in 1955 and was substantially completed a year later:

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One more map pin for the 1600 hrs patrol on the 17th July

Regards,

Pat

 

Hi Ellen,

Delighted to hear your Mum is doing well and following our exploits; please pass on my good wishes to her.

All the title boards in the film pertaining to the 1600 patrol of 411 Squadron on the 17th July show the same time of 1630 hrs and there is only one title board per pilot regardless of how many different scenes are shown for him. Below are two screenshots from my Faststone folder where I have extracted 933 still frames for that one patrol:

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In the second screenshot above, the frame I used for my last post is shown highlighted in blue and directly above it is the title board for F/O Ireland. Note he also has a second attack in his footage showing a straight road with a large house and formal garden at top left of the frame. The the target(s) appear to be road traffic rather than the house itself.

I am going after that location next.

As to the time on the title boards; I think its just a generic time one half hour after wheels up and can, in my view at least, be ignored.

I would be very interested to know however how a typical squadron sortie operated at this time in Normandy...did they all stay together or did they break up into sections or pairs? The Form 541 of the ORB indicates wheels down as follows:

• 2 aircraft @ 16:45
• 4 aircraft @ 17:00
• 6 aircraft @ 17:10

Anyone able to shed any light on this?

Thanks,

Pat

 

Appreciate the unit identification Michael,

I wish there was a preview option on the IWM for this footage...wouldn't mind having a look at the St Pierre-sur-Dives - Livarot road from the ground during this period.

Regards,

Pat