History in the Margins

Road Trip Through History: Gliders and Pegasus Bridge

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The image of pilgrimage came to mind again as soon as we began to visit key sites related to the Invasion of Normandy, beginning with the museum at Pegasus Bridge.

Pegasus Bridge

Pegasus Bridge, June 1944 (From the collection of the Imperial War Museum

The capture of Pegasus Bridge was a key objective in the first moments of the D-Day invasion on June 6, 1944. Here’s the short version:* Six Horsa gliders carried 181 members of the British airborne infantry, led by Major John Howard, from Dorset to Normandy, with orders to land, capture both Pegasus and the nearby Horsa Bridge,** and hold them until relieved. Pegasus Bridge was captured ninety minutes after the gliders took off from England. The operation’s success played a key role in limiting the effectiveness of the German counterattack.

The museum has the actual bridge, but as far as I was concerned the glider exhibit had the most impact.*** The exhibit juxtaposed an actual section of a glider fuselage from World War II with a full-sized replica of a Horsa glider, built according to the original plans. Just like the little two-man gliders that I enjoyed rides in several decades ago, military gliders were towed aloft by powered airplanes. Once they reached an assigned position and altitude, they were released and flown using rising and falling air currents. Unlike the gliders I knew, they were BIG: they were capable of carrying thirty armed paratroopers, a jeep, or an anti-tank gun. (Obviously I knew this in my head, but there is nothing like seeing things in person to give you a sense of scale.) They were also terrifyingly fragile, made of wood and canvas to conserve metal: in the months after the invasion, desperate French civilians broke up abandoned gliders for firewood and building materials. (And who can blame them?)

One detail in particular caught my imagination: Allied planes and gliders were painted with black and white “invasion stripes” on the fuselage and wings to distinguish them from German planes. Because of the need for secrecy, the order for the paint job, which involved thousands of airplanes, wasn’t issued until two days before the invasion was scheduled to begin. Because of the size of the job, civilians joined ground crews in painting the stripes. Some used brooms rather than standard painterly gear. Even those who had brushes didn’t have time to mask off the stripes. In many cases the paint was still wet when the aircraft took off.

* If you want to know all the details, I hear good things about these accounts of the operation: Stephen Ambrose Pegasus Bridge: June 6, 1944 and John Howard with Penny Bates. The Pegasus Diaries: The Private Papers of Major John Howard. I haven’t read either of them.

**The local names were the Bénouville and Ranville bridges. In honor of the operation, they were renamed Pegasus after the emblem of the British airborne division and Horsa after the gliders that brought the troops in. Similarly, the names by which we know the beaches on which American, British, Canadian and French forces landed–Omaha, Utah, Gold, Juno, and Sword–were their code names during the planning of the operation. I don’t know why this surprised me, but it did.  Perhaps because the accounts I’ve read of the invasion have only used the code names.

***The upside of the tour was that we had an excellent guide narrating the history for us. At some museums, including the museum at Pegasus Bridge, we also had a private lecture/tour/talk by a museum guide/curator/docent. The downside of the tour was that we often didn’t have time to look at museum exhibits in detail. It is quite possible that we learned more from the guides than we would have from the exhibits, but it was a bit frustrating for a hard-core museum fan.

Road Trip Through History: The Destruction and Reconstruction of Caen

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As I’ve mentioned before, you can’t go very far in Normandy without coming up against William the Conqueror and/or D-Day. Even on a tour day devoted to William the Conqueror in Caen, the impact of D-Day on the population of Normandy was an unavoidable part of the story.

The issue first appeared when we stood on the grounds of William’s castle: a site which was forgotten by l’homme in the street in the twentieth century until bombing during the invasion of Normandy destroyed the medieval town that surrounded the fortified walls. The bombardment came up again when we visited William’s abbey, where many citizens of Caen took refuge during the bombardment.

The battle for Caen began on June 6, 1944. The city was “liberated” on July 8, but fighting around the city continued until July 21. The cost of liberation was high. Some three thousand civilians were killed in the battle for Caen. Seventy-three percent of the city was destroyed, leaving two million cubic meters of rubble that had to be removed before the city could begin to rebuild. For more than three years, the residents of Caen lived in temporary housing on the outskirts of the city while German prisoners of war moved rubble.*

Reconstruction finally began in 1948, in many cases using the prized Caen limestone from destroyed buildings.

Moral of the story, at least as far as I am concerned: it is easy, and important, to remember D-Day from the perspective of the soldiers. Both the acts of heroism and the tragic loss of life. But we also need to remember the civilian casualties of war.

*Even decisions that seem obvious Prisoners of war were used because the work was hard and dangerous: the rubble contained unexploded shells. On the other hand, the German prisoners were fed in exchange for their work at a time when many French civilians went hungry.

 

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Road Trip Through History: In Caen with William of Normandy, who was not yet William the Conqueror

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There are two things you can’t avoid if you go to Normandy: D-Day and William the Conqueror (aka William the Bastard and William of Normandy). In fact, the two of them are woven together in the sentiment engraved in Latin on a British D-Day monument: “We who were conquered by William have liberated the homeland of the Conqueror.”

William the ConquerorWhen you visit the site of the Battle of Hastings in England, you hear the story of the Norman Conquest as a foreign invasion by a man with a sketchy claim on the English crown. In Normandy, especially in Caen, William is an embattled Hometown Hero, whose story begins long before his decision to go to England to defend his right to the English crown.* We spent our second day in Normandy in Caen, touring two sites that relate to William’s story as the Duke of Normandy: his castle in Caen and one of the abbeys that he built there.

The two sites are very different. The castle is a ruin, which only became available for excavation as a result of bombing in 1944. The abbey is a splendid example of Romanesque architecture on the cusp of the Gothic–what our guide called Anglo-Norman architecture. Together, they were the landmarks of William’s life pre-1066.

William was originally known as William the Bastard. He was the illegitimate son of Robert I of Normandy and a woman named Herleva.*** Being a bastard might not have mattered if his father had lived until William was old enough to defend his right to the duchy of Normandy. But he didn’t. Robert died while returning from pilgrimage to Jerusalem when William was only seven (or possibly eight). He had named William, who was his only son, as his heir before he left, but the nobles of Normandy were unwilling to accept a duke who was both a minor and a bastard.**** The duchy was torn by open warfare as the barons of Normandy struggled for power. William spent the next ten years running and hiding from assassination attempts. (Including attempts by his paternal relatives, who were rival claimants to the title.)

In 1042, the fifteen-year-old William was knighted and began to play a personal role in the defense of his duchy. He successfully seized power in 1047 at the battle of Val-és-Dunes with the help of King Henry of France. With his victory at Val-és-Dunes, William the Bastard became William of Normandy. William established Caen as his capital, building a city and a castle where only a few villages had existed before.

Being recognized as the Duke of Normandy did not end William’s problems. He faced a series of baronial rebellions, mostly led by his relatives, until 1055. He also involved himself in the broader issues of Europe, which centered on Church reform, and the wars related thereto.*****

It must have felt like déjà vu all over again when Harold Godwinson was crowned as king of England–a position that William believed he had been promised by King Edward the Confessor. William had fought to hold the title of Duke of Normandy. Now he was prepared to fight to be king of England.

“But what about the castle and the abbey?” you ask. Here are a few odd bits that caught my attention:

• William’s castle was one of the largest fortresses in medieval Europe: a twelve-acre complex surrounded by a dry moat.
• Both the castle and the abbey were built from Caen limestone, which is remarkable for its color and purity. The stone is so unusual that the Normans and their successors exported it to England, where it was used to build the Tower of London and other iconic English structures. Shipping big stone blocks in small wooden ships is not an obvious choice as far as I am concerned.
• William was responsible for the construction of two abbeys in Caen as a result of his marriage to Matilda of Flanders, the daughter of one of his political allies in the seemingly unending conflicts of medieval Europe. The marriage made political sense, but William and Matilda were too closely related to marry according to the rules of the Church. (A not uncommon problem in a world in which marriageable daughters were political poker chips.) The couple married anyway, on the theory that it was easier to ask for penance than to wait for permission. The pope required them to build two abbeys, one for women and one for men, as penance.  Presumably everyone was happy.
• As a result of the Battle of Hastings, William became the King of England as well as the Duke of Normandy. Today, Queen Elizabeth II of England still holds the Channel islands as the Duke of Normandy. This was a jaw-dropper as far as I was concerned.

* If you want a thoughtful discussion of the relative rights of the three claimants** to the English throne after the death of Edward the Confessor, I strongly recommend David Howarth’s 1066: The Year of the Conquest.
**Yep, three. Harald III of Norway also claimed a right to the prize. One reason William won at Hastings was that Harold and his men had just defeated Harald and then made a quick march toward William and the Normans.
***A relationship known at the time as a”Danish marriage.”  Normandy at the time was still ruled by Viking law–Normandy  being the country of the Norsemen.  Viking law allowed for more than one marriage.  Church law did not and considered the children of “Danish marriages” to be illegitimate.

****Having a minor as a ruler was a dangerous thing for both the young ruler and the kingdom in eras when the primary duty of a ruler was military leader. In fact, for much of medieval Europe, succession to the throne after a death of a king was not a simple case of primogeniture. Often the most successful claimant to a kingdom was the family member who wielded the bloodiest sword.
*****A complicated story for another day.