[Jims5543]

From my Great Uncles Recollection of my Grandfather, Georga Adams life, remember this began 6 months of intense fighting. 6 Months.

Finally, the invasion came. It was June 6, 1944. The Americans landed at Omaha Beach and Utah Beach, in Normandy, and the English landed at the other beaches in the Normandy area.
It was the largest amphibious invasion in the history of the world.
George landed at Utah, which was “bad”, but not quite as bad as Omaha. From Utah Beach, the 9th fought it way West to the Cherbourg Peninsula, and ultimately took Cherbourg, which was a major deep water sea port.
George remembers that in Cherbourg, some of the German units fought quite frantically and had to be driven out of the city house by house. Now the beachhead was secure from Cherbourg to Caen, but the English, under Montgomery, could not tak e Caen, which was the main park of the allied battle plan.
Along the whole beachhead front, the Germans had dug in behind 100 year old growths of Hedge Rows and the fighting was fierce, with the 9th, again, taking many casualties. George lost several close friends here.
There was a fear that the allies were bogged down and would be stuck in North Western France for a long time. By September of 1944, Patton convinced Eisenhower to allow him to return to the Front and head the 9th again.
In September, the 9th under Patton broke the German lines and went down the South Coast of France. “The Great Breakout” was under way, and the 9th (and George) liberated many French towns. He sent my mother a scarf with the 9th insignia and a list of all the towns liberated (Vendome, Nantes, and many others). George’s unit visited the Great Cathedral at Nantes, which was totally bombed out on the inside, but the outside structure remained. I visited the Cathedral in the 1980’s and it was still heavily damaged even then. George remembers going to mass in the bombed-out cathedral when he was there.
The 9th then turned East and headed across France to Paris. The 9th started toward Caen from its rear and Montgomery finally broke out of the Caen line, took the city and headed North toward the low countries, Belgium, Netherlands, etc., where the English got bogged down again. (A good book about this in Cornelius Ryans “A Bridge To Far”)
The German Casualties were enormous, especially at the Battle of Falaise Gap, Northwest France.
Finally the allied armies were at the gates of Paris.
Eisenhower decided to let the “Free French” under Charles DeGaule, liberate Paris. This angered George and many of the Americans, because the French hadn’t done any of the fighting for France, but were given the honor of taking Paris, which the Germans surrendered rather that having it destroyed. The French “underground”, which fought all through the war against the Germans, were in fact helpful to the allied cause, but General DeGaule and French army had little to do with that.
George visited Paris once and went to the Folleys-Breagere. The price of admission was a pack of cigarettes.