Chapter 7
Operation Dragoon succeeded far beyond the wildest dreams of its advocates. The landings were conducted by American infantry divisions backed up by tank and tank destroyer battalions. The French units then conducted a vigorous assault on the port cities of Marseilles and Toulon. The Wehrmacht's Army Group G in southern and central France, weakened by diversions of its meager forces to Italy and Normandy, was quickly overwhelmed by the
amphibious landings and forced to withdraw Instead of the bitter attrition battles of Normandy, Dragoon quickly turned into a headlong retreat by German forces up the Rhone Valley with American and French troops in hot pursuit. In the process of retreat, Army Group G lost more than half its forces-over 150,000 troops-as well as most of its heavy equipment. Besides clearing southern France, this rapid defeat forced the Wehrmacht to abandon central and western France except for a handful of Atlantic ports that Hitler ordered held "to the last man."
In the space of less than four weeks, the majority of France was liberated at very modest cost to Allied forces. The U.S. Army in southern France did not deploy any armored divisions until later in the autumn. The main maneuver force for the 6th Army Group was two French armored divisions, the le DB and 5e DB (1st and 5th Armored Divisions). The German army in southern France had shed most of its panzer divisions to reinforce the Normandy front earlier in the summer, but the 11th Panzer Division played a central role in the retreat ofArmy Group G up the Rhone Valley, frequently acting as a rearguard for the less mobile infantry divisions.
The tanks and other armored vehicles participating in Operation Dragoon were fitted with the 5AITC style of wading stacks, as is seen in this view of U.S. Seventh Army M4 tanks in Italy waiting to board the landing craft.
A pair of M4 tanks and M10 3-inch gun motor carriages along a dock in southern Italy prior to boarding ships on 31 July for Dragoon. The deep-wading trunks are the locally manufactured 5AITC type, which had a noticeable center stiffener on the stacks.
The 6638th Engineer Mine Clearing Company is seen here practicing with specialized equipment intended for the Dragoon landings. The locally built mine scarifier on the front of the M4A4 tank was improvised using an M1 dozer and was based on the T5 mine scarifier design. To the left is a Churchill with small box girder bridge, one of three used by the Gapping Team of Alpha Force in support of the 3rd Infantry Division during the landings. The piping near the M4A4 is M2 demolition snake. This was the only combat use of the British Churchill tank by U.S. troops in the war, though British-manned Churchills were sometimes used to support American formations, especially Churchill flamethrower tanks.
One of the most common defenses on the Var coast was the Panzerturm, which consisted of the turret from an obsolete tank, such as this Pz.Kpfw. II, mounted on a concrete foundation.
One of the most formidable defenses on the approach to Toulon was the Mauvannes battery of 3./MAA.627 (3rd Battery, 627th Naval Artillery Regiment), which was overwhelmed in a "mad assault" by the French Commandos d'Afrique on 18 August with about fifty of its gun crew killed and a hundred captured. The battery consisted of four turreted 150mm TbKC/36 naval guns in M272 casemates.
The Wehrmacht did not have the resources to fortify the Mediterranean coast as extensively as Normandy, and many gun positions were improvised. This is a captured French 75mm mle. 36 antiaircraft gun set up for beach defense on Cavalaire Bay/Beach Alpha Red.
The Vieux Port area of Marseilles had been heavily fortified for centuries, with the defenses deepened by the Wehrmacht. This is a Bauform 237 Panzerturm bunker using a Pz.Kpfw. II tank turret built at the foot of Fort SaintNicolas near the entrance of the harbor.
The Wehrmacht fortified the major ports along the Mediterranean coast, and a typical type of beach defense work was the use of obsolete tank turrets mounted on underground concrete bunkers. This example of a Bauform 235 Panzerstellung near the Marseilles dock uses an APX-R turret of the type used on French Renault R-35 and Hotchkiss H-39 tanks.
This is another example of a German Bauform 237 Panzerstellung tank bunker in Marseilles, this time using the turret from a Pz.Kpfw. II tank.
The larger SOMUA S35 tank turret was also used in the Marseilles defenses. This turret was armed with a 47mm gun. This photo was taken after the fighting in the city, and the commander's vision cupola has been blown off.
A total of thirty-six M4A1 duplex-drive tanks were used during Dragoon, with the 191st, 753rd, and 756th Tank Battalions. Here, on Alpha Beach near St. Tropez, is an M4A1 DD tank of the 756th Tank Battalion, which was supporting the 3rd Infantry Division. The DD Shermans were used with mixed results at Normandy because of rough sea conditions but had fewer problems in the Mediterranean's calm summer waters.
Another example of Panzerturm defense in southern France, this time using a surplus Pz.Kpfw. 38(t) turret.
A pair of M4A1 duplex-drive tanks on the beach in front of an LST during the invasion of southern France on 15 August. This amphibious operation is less well known than the D-Day landings at Normandy as it was not as violently contested by the Germans, who were quite weak on the southern French Mediterranean coast between Toulon and Cannes.
An M4A1 DD tank of the 753rd Tank Battalion, which landed with Camel Force in support of the 36th Division near St. Raphael during Operation Anvil, the landings in southern France, on 1 August.
This is an M4 tank of Company B, 756th Tank Battalion, a veteran of the Italian campaign, seen in La Lavandou shortly after the 15 August landings.
One of the M4A1 DD amphibious tanks of the 756th Tank Battalion was disabled by a mine on Alpha Yellow after having swum ashore. Troops of the 15th Infantry wait nearby for orders to move forward.
An M7 105mm howitzer motor carriage of the U.S. Seventh Army comes ashore in southern France as part of Dragoon. The units of this invasion force came out of Italy and so tended to have older equipment than comparable units of Bradley's First Army in northern France.
An M10 3-inch gun motor carriage of Company C, 601st Tank Destroyer Battalion, covers the beaches on 15 August 1944. This battalion had earlier fought in North Africa, Sicily, and Italy, first equipped with M3 75mm gun motor carriages.
An M103-inch gun motor carriage (named Babs) of the 636th Tank Destroyer Battalion with a full set of wading trunks comes ashore on the narrow and rock-strewn Green Beach with LST-49 in the background. This beach was dubbed "Quarry Beach" by the 36th Division because of the nearby quarry.
This is an M2 half-track car supporting the 141st Infantry, 36th Infantry Division, on Camel Green Beach near San Raphael on the right flank of the landings in the Frejus Gulf. It is fitted with an improvised mine rack to carry additional mines and is towing a 57mm antitank gun. Many of these units used in Anvil were drawn out of Italy and often had Italian-theater markings and camouflage.
An M15 antiaircraft half-track of the 441st Anti-Aircraft Automatic Weapons Battalion in a defensive position on Alpha Red Beach.
A T28E1 combination gun motor carriage of the 443rd Anti-Aircraft Artillery Battalion guards St. Raphael air base on 17 August after the landings in the 36th Infantry Division's sector. This old vehicle, the ancestor of the later M15 combination gun motor carriage series, had been in combat in North Africa, Sicily, and Italy before being deployed again in southern France.
An M15 combination gun motor carriage is landed from an LCT at Alpha Red Beach along Cavalaire Bay on 15 August in support of the 3rd Infantry Division. In front of it is an M8 armored car. The antiaircraft vehicles were put to immediate use, as the beach was later attacked by German Ju 88 bombers.
Columns of the 45th Division were motorized by using available trucks as well as attached tank and tank-destroyer battalions. Here, the 45th Division's troops are seen pushing inland on 18 August on the M10 3-inch gun motor carriages of the 645th Tank Destroyer Battalion.
The 117th Cavalry Reconnaissance Squadron was in the vanguard of Task Force Butler and sent north toward Grenoble. Its jeeps and M8 armored cars are seen crossing the Maire River south of Moustiers-Ste-Marie in the Alpes-Maritimes on 18 August.
One of the last remaining T19105mm howitzer motor carriages in U.S. Army service is seen herein southern France providing fire support for the Seventh Army in late August 1944. By this stage, units in Normandy had completely reequipped with the M7 105mm howitzer motor carriage, and the old T19 was only in service in the Italian theater in dwindling numbers.
A pair of M10 3-inch gun motor carriages of the 601st Tank Destroyer Battalion move over the Durance River near Mirabeau on 20 August while supporting the advance of the 45th Division.
French civilians gawk at an M10 3-inch gun motor carriage knocked out during the fighting in Hyeres in mid-August.
An M4A1 crosses a pontoon bridge over the Durance River in southern France on 25 August as the Dragoon forces spread out from the beachhead. This is an early-production M4A1 as is evident from the M3-style bogies. The forces employed in southern France drew on units from the Mediterranean theater, where the tanks were more dated than reserves in Britain used during the Normandy invasion.
An M4A1 from the 756th Tank Battalion, supporting the 3rd Infantry Division, advances past the burned wreckage of a retreating German column during the advance through the "Corridor of Death" near Montelimar toward the Rhone Valley.
This Marder I I I of the 11th Panzer Division was knocked out during the fighting with the U.S. Seventh Army following the landings on the Riviera coast.
Another view of an M4A1 tank of the 756th Tank Battalion during the push up the Rhone Valley after the Dragoon landings. The camouflage and markings of the Seventh Army units reflected Italian campaign practices, such as the large Allied stars on the turrets.
A GI looks into the burnt hulk of an M4A1 tank of the 753rd Tank Battalion knocked out in the fighting with the 11th Panzer Division near Grane on 28 August. This is an older Sherman, typical of the veterans of the Italian campaign like the 753rd Tank Battalion.
An M10 3-inch gun motor carriage of the 601st Tank Destroyer Battalion passes through Montelimar on 30 August, along with other elements of the 3rd Division that had been hounding the German retreat. The town is littered with burnedout German trucks, dead horses, and other war debris.
An M8 75mm howitzer motor carriage passes by a burned-out German column in the "Corridor of Death" on the outskirts of Montelimar.
A German StuG I I I assault gun destroyed in L'Homme d'Armes in southern France.
Past a wrecked Luftwaffe truck, a French M5 half-track moves west from the landing beaches near Ste. Maxime on 20 August.
The French First Army was equipped and trained by the U.S. Army. This is St. Quentin, an M4A4 tank of the 2e Cuirassiers, le Division Blindee, part of Sudre's CC1, which took part in the liberation of Marseilles.
Tours, an M4A4 of the 4/2e Cuirassiers, le Division Blindee, leaving an ordnance area in Ste. Maxime on 16 August after having its waterproofing and wading trunks removed. It saw combat the next day, destroying a German 88mm gun that had destroyed the tank Tonnere near Luc.
Vesoul, an M4A2 tank of 2/5e RCA of Sudre's CC1 of the French 1 e Division Blindee, fires toward German positions in the Vieux Port area from the plaza in front of the St. Vincent-de-Paul church in Marseilles on 25 August.
An M3A3 light tank of the 1 e Division Blindee after the liberation of the port of Toulon in August.
The French First Army took part in the landings in southern France in mid-August, and here, an M8 75mm howitzer motor carriage of the 9 DMI is seen in front of the Palais de Justice in Toulon on 26 August. Behind it are some M3A1 scout cars, a type that had been retired from U.S. Army service but was still widely used in the French units at the time.
The French First Army celebrates liberation day in Marseilles on 29 August with a parade by the 3rd Algerian Division. This overhead view provides good detail of a pair of intermediateproduction M7 105mm howitzer motor carriages which are carrying a full load of ammunition in the usual fiberboard tubes.
Following the liberation of the ports, the French divisions began pushing up Route 7 toward Lyon. This is Belfort, an M8 75mm assault gun of the le Division Blindee, moving through Avignon on 30 August with a column of FFI alongside.
A French M5A1 light tank of the 1 e Division Blindee moves through the town of Orgon on 30 August during the pursuit up the Rhone Valley.
In the wake of the fighting, a wrecker truck of the 734th Ordnance Battalion recovers a Pz.Kpfw. I I I tank from the fields north of Crest. Over a dozen of these obsolete tanks were in use by the 11th Panzer Division as command and forward observer vehicles in the headquarters company and artillery battalion. Kampfgruppe Thiele (Battle Group Thiele) used some in their skirmishes with the 117th Cavalry in the northern sector of the Montelimar Battle Square.
A pair of M4 tanks of Company B, 756th Tank Battalion, veterans of the Italian campaign, knocked out during the fighting near Vesovi on 12 September as the U.S. Third and Seventh Armies were attempting to link up.
The 11th Panzer Division attempted to brush back the pursuing U.S. 45th Division, staging a counterattack into the streets of Meximieux in the first days of September. This Panther is one of nine panzers lost in the street fighting.
A crew of an M4A1 of the 753rd Tank Battalion enjoys the jubilation of the French crowds as the Seventh Army moves through St. Marie on 16 September. This tank is a veteran of the Italian campaign and carries the characteristic Mediterranean-style shipping code on its bow.
A column of French tanks from the 2e Cuirassiers, le Division Blindee, halt in Dijon on 11 September during the race up the Rhone Valley in pursuit of German Army Group G. The last tank in the column is an M4A4 named St. Raphael of the 4e Escadron, 2e Cuirassiers.
The symbolic conclusion of Operation Dragoon occurred on 10-12 September when patrols from Patton's Third Army met patrols from the Seventh, marking the link-up of Allied forces from the North Sea to the Mediterranean. To commemorate the event, this photo was staged for the Stars and Stripes newspaper in front of the Autun town hall on 13 September, with the crew of a French M20 armored utility car of the 2e Dragons shaking hands with the crew of an M8 light armored car of CCB, 6th Armored Division.
