Falaise: The Flawed Victory - The Destruction of Panzergruppe West, August 1944

While the 21st and 12th SS Panzer Divisions fought almost immediately to contain the Allied bridgehead, it was a week before they received any other armoured reinforcements. Panzergrenadiers of the 2nd Panzer Division first went into action on 13 June, but its tanks did not join the fighting until 27 June. The 2nd Panzer Division was a well-equipped and powerful formation by the time of D-Day. It was involved in the desperate attempts to contain the American breakout before being caught in the chaos of the Falaise salient.

Combat experience

As its designation implies, 2nd Panzer was one of Hitler’s very first armoured divisions. Raised in October 1935 at Wurzburg, it was deployed to Vienna three years later following the Anschluss with Austria, where it remained until the invasion of Poland. After its role in the Polish campaign under General Rudolf Veiel, 2nd Panzer was sent to the Eifel area in readiness for the attack on France. It also supplied Panzer Regiment 4 to help form 13th Panzer Division on 28 September 1940 and was once again sent to Poland, this time for occupation duty.

The 2nd Panzer then saw action under Veiel’s leadership in the Balkans during the invasion of Greece and Yugoslavia. After a brief deployment to France the division was sent to the central sector of the Eastern Front, where it was involved in the fighting at Moscow, Smolensk, Orel and Kiev. It subsequently fought at Kursk and the Dneiper, suffering heavy losses, and was sent to France under General Franz Westhoven for much needed refitting in 1944.

The division made the most of its well-earned rest and by late May/early June 1944 Panzer Regiment 3 had ninety-eight Panzer IVs and seventy-nine Panthers, of which only eight tanks were in the workshop undergoing maintenance. Panzerjäger Abteilung 38 also had about twenty powerful Jagdpanzer IV tank destroyers. These had been designed as a replacement for the Sturmgeschütz III/IV assault gun and had only started being issued to the tank hunter detachments of the panzer divisions in March 1944. Although also issued to the Panzerjäger abteilung of the 9th, 12th SS, 116th and Panzer Lehr Panzer Divisions, it was quite a rare armoured fighting vehicle in Normandy, where only about sixty were deployed.

Panzer Schwere Infanteriegeschütz Abteilung 38 was equipped with the Grille 15cm self-propelled gun on a Czech tank chassis. In addition, 2nd Panzer’s Artillery Regiment 74 had six Hummel and twelve Wespe self-propelled guns, mounted on Panzer IV and II chassis respectively, and the panzergrenadiers had 476 armoured personnel carriers or armoured half-tracks. Manpower stood at 16,762, but this probably included 1,085 men belonging to the subordinated Panzer Abteilung 301 (Funklenk), although only the IV Kompanie of the latter unit accompanied 2nd Panzer to Normandy. On 5 June the battalion was sent back to Russia, leaving behind the IV Kompanie, which was supposed to form a cadre for the Panzer Abteilung 302 (Funklenk) that was just forming. The Kompanie consisted of two Panzer IIIs, six Sturmgeschütz and thirty-six Ladungsträger B IV remote-controlled demolition vehicles, totalling at the most 250 men. Panzer Abteilung 301 returned from the Eastern Front to be equipped with thirty Tigers, which were to be used as control vehicles for the Ladungsträgers.

Into action

On D-Day, the division, under General der Panzertruppen Heinrich Freiherr von Lüttwitz, who had reassumed command on 27 May, was deployed in the Amiens area. It was three crucial days before the division was instructed to move toward Normandy. Lütwittz received word in the early hours on the 9th, as he recalls:

Because the Allied air forces had destroyed all bridges over the Seine from Paris to the coast, 2nd Panzer was obliged to make a longer journey when it moved from Amiens to Normandy. Instead of travelling via Rouen it had to take the detour via Paris, increasing the distance by more than 100 miles (150km). Moving mainly by road and by using the cover of darkness and periods of poor weather, the division managed to cover about 265 miles (400km) in two days, an impressive performance.

On the morning of the 10th von Lüttwitz arrived at the Panzer Corps HQ at Gallion. He was informed that it was intended that his division, along with Panzer Lehr Panzer Division, 17th SS Panzergrenadier Division and the 3rd Fallschfirmjäger Division were to recapture Bayeux. Three days later, at 1700, 2nd Panzer was ordered to move to the Aunay-sur-Odon area on the left wing of Panzergruppe West to co-ordinate its efforts with Panzer Lehr and the 3rd Fallschfirmjäger Division. For the attack on the 13th the division committed two kampfgruppen, one in the Jurques area and the other in the northern sector of the Bois de Homme. Some ground was taken but the lack of tanks greatly hampered operations.

Although elements of 2nd Panzer had been blooded, it was another six days before all of the division arrived in-theatre. Frustratingly, the Panther abteilung with fifty-two operational tanks did not arrive until the 19th; twenty were damaged in transit. Similarly the Panzer IV abteilung arrived with 75 per cent of its tanks operational and only two thirds of the Hummels and Wespes were combat ready.

The left battle group of 2nd Panzer advanced on Caumont and by nightfall on the 13th they had driven the British off Hill 174, near Cahagnes, and almost cut the road between Caumont and Amaye-sur-Orne.

Oberfeldwebel Hans Erich Braun, a senior NCO with Panzerjäger Abteilung 38, was with III Kompanie, equipped with nine 7.5cm anti-tank guns pulled by half-tracks. In total the division had twenty-five Pak 40 7.5cm towed antitank guns, while Abteilung 38’s I and II Kompanies were equipped with the Jagdpanzer IVs. Braun was involved in the fighting southeast of Caumont and on 14 June noted that the British artillery ceased firing at around 0530. He was also grateful that it was too early for the enemy fighter-bombers, but an enemy artillery spotter plane was already up and about. He felt that the division was horribly exposed and recalled:

Braun and his men were hardened Eastern Front veterans and emplacing and hiding their guns was second nature. They had a steady nerve and allowed enemy patrols, tanks or armoured cars to get so close that their surprise fire was inevitably overwhelming and devastating. They were not afraid of hand-to-hand fighting either, but found their British counterparts were shy of such close-quarter combat. Braun adds:

At 0603 the British shelling resumed for fifteen minutes and Braun was stunned by the weight of the bombardment:

Then came the British Typhoons, followed by more artillery fire. Despite this deluge, the right-hand battle group of 2nd Panzer attacked on 15 June and, although suffering heavy losses, took Launay and St Germain d’Ectot. Two days later the left battle group reached le Quesnay.

Erich Braun was with the left-hand kampfgruppe that attacked under a covering barrage from its Hummel and Wespe self-propelled artillery:

Braun and his guns, taking up position behind a stone wall, were soon engaging advancing British tanks:

To Braun’s left the panzergrenadiers claimed another Cromwell using panzer-fausts. Reaching le Quesnay it took them an hour, fighting house-to-house and cellar-by-cellar, to drive the British out, though they clung on in the northern part of the town and in the neighbouring orchards. Braun’s guns were used to fire explosives at point-blank range to crumble the buildings.

Following an artillery bombardment of southern le Quesnay, 2nd Panzer was counterattacked by British tanks and infantry. For a moment disaster loomed, but as Braun recalls quick thinking and discipline saved the day:

Driven back, Lüttwitz’s 2nd Panzer attacked again the following day, seizing le Quesnay once more and pushing through to Briquessard at considerable cost. However, all the abandoned tanks and weapons which they had lost on the 17th were recaptured and found to be in good order; ultimately, though, what had 2nd Panzer gained? – a little ground for irreplaceable manpower. It was a war of attrition the division could ill-afford.

On 14 June in the Villers-Bocage area, an American artillery ‘serenade’ broke up an attack by 2nd Panzer, knocking out eleven panzers, though the tanks of the British 7th Armoured Division were still in serious danger of being cut off. The 2nd Panzer’s divisional reconnaissance group, on entering Villers-Bocage, found an almost intact Sherman, its turret was removed and the vehicle pressed into service as a much-needed recovery vehicle.

For the rest of June the division fought in the Caumont area, although the Panthers were despatched to resist the British Epsom offensive. When the British broke through east of Tilly-sur-Seulles on the front held by Panzer Lehr on 25 and 26 June, the 12th SS, supported by the I Abteilung Panzer Regiment 3, counterattacked on the right. On the 28th the Panthers destroyed fifty-three British tanks and fifteen anti-tank guns. By 1 July they had claimed eighty-nine enemy tanks, thirteen Bren carriers and nineteen anti-tank guns for the loss of twenty panzers.

The division, like many other German units in Normandy, did not escape the attention of the Allied air forces, especially the bombers. Air Marshal Arthur Harris, in charge of RAF Bomber Command, wrote:

Cobra strikes

By early July the division still had eighty-five Panzer IVs in the field with another eleven in the shop, and twenty-one operational Panthers and thirty-eight undergoing maintenance. In addition it still had its twenty Jagdpanzer IVs. On the 2nd, IV Kompanie Panzer Abteilung 301 (Funklenk) was given sanction to remain with 2nd Panzer and Panzer Kompanie 316 (Funklenk) was earmarked for Panzer Abteilung 302 (Funklenk). The latter, stationed near Vouziers, was not destined to see action in Normandy and instead was sent to Warsaw in mid-August.

On 15 July the British launched Operation Greenline, a subsidiary of Goodwood, tying down the 2nd, 9th SS and 10th SS Panzer Divisions west of Caen, along the Epsom Salient, and forcing the 1st SS to hold the Orne. Goodwood was launched east of Caen three days later.

Elements of the 326th Infantry Division, deployed in the Pas de Calais area with 15th Army, crossed the Seine and remained in the Caumont area. Lüttwitz and his men were pulled out of the line on 21 July after the 326th Infantry relieved them. Although the Panzerjäger Battalion of the 326th included Marder self-propelled guns and Sturmgeschütz IIIs, the Panzer IVs of the I Abteilung Panzer Regiment 3 remained in welcome support for a week.

By 28 July the Germans realised that Operation Cobra represented the Allies’ main effort to break the deadlock in Normandy. The Germans could not get 9th Panzer to the disintegrating American front for at least ten days, so von Kluge summoned the 2nd and 116th Panzer Divisions from the British front. Belatedly, General Krüger’s LVIII Panzer Corps began to move northwards from Toulouse to free up General der Panzertruppen Hans Funck’s XLVII Panzer Corps, which shifted from the British sector taking 2nd and 116th Panzer to confront the Americans at Avranches.

By the end of the month 2nd Panzer was pushing westward to link up with Panzer Lehr and the 2nd SS. Field Marshal von Kluge attempted to prevent the Americans spilling over the Vire by sending 2nd Panzer to Tessy-sur-Vire southeast of St Lô. The lead elements of 2nd Panzer went into action near the town on the 28th when they counterattacked.

Further to the west a 2nd Panzer kampfgruppe, including twenty panzers, reached the cross roads at la Denisiére, on the road between St Lפ and Villebaudon to the south. On the 30th they found themselves under attack not only from the north, but also on their southern flank near Denisiére as the Americans attempted to surround them. Although cut off, the kampfgruppe knocked out twenty-five American tanks before it was overwhelmed. Just seven panzers managed to fight their way east to Moyon.

Hitler instructed Operation Lüttich (Liège) to close the developing American breach and von Funck’s XLVII Panzer Corps was given the job of overseeing the Avranches counterattack. This meant it needed it to disengage. To the southeast of St Lô, II Parachute Corps also began to withdraw and on the 31st the Americans entered Torigni-sur-Vire northeast of Tessy. In the meantime the Americans seized Troisgots, just 4.5 miles (7km) north of Tessy-sur-Vire, where 2nd Panzer and remnants of the 352nd Infantry Division resisted to the end. The town fell to elements of the US 2nd Armored Division on 2 August, just as XLVII Panzer Corps was withdrawing through Pont-Farcy to the south.

Mortain counterattack

The Avranches counterattack was to be launched by2nd, 116th, Panzer Lehr, 1st SS, 2nd SS and 17th SS, supported by two infantry divisions. In total the panzers were down from 1,400 tanks to 800, of which just 120–185 were allotted to Operation Lüttich. According to German sources the attack force involved no more than seventy-five Panzer IVs, seventy Panthers and thirty-two StuGs. The Americans were tipped off by the highly secret ULTRA intelligence intercepts and prepared to repel the Germans.

On the night of 6/7 August the 2nd Panzer, with about 80 tanks, was the first to strike west, between the La Sée sector and the St-Barthélemy-Juvigny road. Specifically, the panzer forces consisted of sixty Panzer IVs and Panthers as well as fifteen Jagdpanzer IVs. Then, supported by a panzer battalion from the 1st SS, the division was to force the Juvigny–Avranches road with an attack via St-Bathélemy, with the rest of the 1st SS following up.

Reinforced by Panzergrenadier Regiment 304, the right attack group of 2nd Panzer moved on Le Mesnil-Adelée via Mesnil-Tôve against weak American forces. Unfortunately, the right lank of 2nd Panzer was exposed when the 116th called a halt to its contribution to the operation. The left kampfgruppe, with Panzergrenadier Regiment 2, took Bellefontaine, but the Americans were not so easily ejected from St-Barthélemy and it took two attacks before they captured the area along with a hundred American prisoners.

Then, in the face of Allied air power, a crucial factor throughout the entire campaign, the German counterattack died out. Tantalisingly for Hitler, the attack got to within nine miles (14km) of Avranches; had they reached the coast they could have cut off twelve American divisions way to the south.

Although they took Mortain, the 2nd SS were unable to dislodge American troops of the US 30th Division from Point 317. Some seventy panzers penetrated US VII Corps front, but fifty were lost and the attack was not renewed on the 11th as instructed by OKW. Following the Mortain attack, once the Americans had gathered their wits, American Lightning, Mustang and Thunderbolt fighter-bombers, as well as British Typhoons, set about Lüttwitz’s division at Le Coudray, halfway to Avranches. The 1st SS and 2nd SS were also caught in this rain of fire. In one RAF Typhoon strike the 2nd Panzer Division reportedly lost sixty tanks and 200 vehicles. This was a deadly taste of things to come. In total eighty-one panzers were knocked out, fifty-four were damaged and twenty-six abandoned. Hundreds of armoured cars, trucks, Volkswagens and guns were also lost.

However, Allied fighter-bomber claims during the Mortain counterattack are greatly exaggerated and were often the result of double counting or simply misinterpretation of a target. Between 7 and 10 August the British 2nd Tactical Air Force claimed a total of 140 panzers, whilst the US 9th Air Force bagged another 112. The problem with this is immediately evident: it was more than the Germans actually deployed for Operation Lüttich.

The Allies’ operational research teams who scoured the battlefield afterwards only found forty-six panzers and self-propelled guns and only nine of those had clearly been knocked out by air attack. Similarly, another thirty-two combat vehicles had been lost, but only twelve of these had been hit from the air.

By 9 August, Krüger’s newly-committed LVIII Panzer Corps had taken over command of the 2nd and 10th SS Panzer Divisions. A penetration on its right wing was eliminated when 2nd Panzer counterattacked west of Le Neufbourg, the division then repelled enemy attacks in the area of Mesnil-Tôve. All this activity had to be carried out in the face of heavy artillery fire and constant fighter-bomber attack.

The 2nd Panzer Division then found itself counterattacked frontally and on its flanks by the American 4th Infantry division. When Le Mesnil-Tôve was recaptured, the 2nd Panzer kampfgruppe was cut off around Le Mesnil-Adelée. With its main body annihilated, the division was forced onto the defensive. It was, though, able to repulse successfully all attacks directed against its frontline on 10 August.

Final days

By this date Panzergrenadier Regiment 2 could still muster 820 combat effectives; Panzergrenadier Regiment 304 some 760 men; Panzeraufklarüngs Abetilung 2 some 360 and the Panzer Pioneer Battalion 38 just 280. Lüttwitz found that his division could field about 4,000 troops, twenty-five to thirty still-functioning panzers, 800-900 vehicles and forty guns.

For the attack on Alençon, XLVII Panzer Corps was to assemble the 1st SS, 2nd SS, 2nd and 116th Panzer Divisions in the Forêt d’Ecouves to strike the US 5th Armored and French 2nd Armoured and push on to Mayenne and further southwest. General Eberbach, demoted to command Panzergruppe Eberbach for a renewed effort against the Americans, by the afternoon of 13 August had gathered the remains of 2nd Panzer, 116th Panzer and the 1st SS; but with just seventy panzers they were no match for the US XV Corps’ 5th Armored Division and the French 2nd Armoured Division.

The attack had to be abandoned after the enemy thrust through Alençon and reached south of Argentan, and Panzergruppe Eberbach was forced onto the defensive. The 2nd Panzer had not even reached the assembly area when it was given orders to gather east of Carrouges. Losing communication with the 9th Panzer Division, 2nd Panzer, under air attack, moved in two columns, reaching Domfort-Flers on the 13th. Only the reconnaissance battalion reached south of Carrouges and 300 men from the division were captured. Losing contact with General Eberbach, 2nd Panzer was placed under XLVII Panzer Corps.

The 2nd Panzer and 1st SS were encircled at Falaise, along with elements of the 10th SS. On 17 August the division was ordered to withdraw from the pocket via St Lambert-sur-Dives. The following day, the remaining tanks of Panzer Regiment 3 and men of Panzergrenadier Regiment 2 reached the town in good order. During the fierce fighting in an around St Lambert, some Officers and men of the division were forced to surrender to the Canadians. By the end of the month 2nd Panzer had lost up to 7,000 men in Normandy; its role in the war, though, was far from over.