H.M.S. Orion shelling own troops on D-Day

Discussion in 'NW Europe' started by Totalise, Nov 29, 2019.

  1. Totalise

    Totalise Junior Member

    Hi all,


    I am trying to discover what I can about the accidental shelling of 7 Green Howards and A Sqn, 4/7 Royal Dragoon Guards south of Creully by H.M.S. Orion on D-Day. There appears to be little mention of it in the war diaries of the units caught under the shellfire - 7 Green Howards only mention “Naval shelling hindered Bn advance”. The Report by the Naval Commander Force G Annexure I to Appendix C - Narrative of Bombardment states:-

    18:40 F.O.B. 56 requested tanks moving north from Rucqueville may be engaged.
    18:47 Orion ordered to engage tanks as requested 1840.
    18:56 Orion reported no spotting aircraft.
    19:40 Orion reported engaging tanks as ordered 1847.
    20:05 S.O.B reported H.Q. 86 Fd. Regt. R.A. reported naval gunfire falling amongst own troops.
    20:12 Orion ordered to cease fire on tanks.
    Orion reported 3 tanks destroyed, remainder scattered. Engaging 2 x 6” guns at 870753.


    J.M. Brereton, in his History of the 4th/7th Royal Dragoon Guards writes:-

    Dismounted, Goldsmid [CO A Sqn] consulted with his two forward Troop Leaders, Aizlewood and Pillman, when there was a scream of shells and the whole area erupted with bursting HE. Goldsmid managed to reach cover in his tank, but Lieut Charles Pillman was killed outright, while Lieut Peter Aizlewood was badly wounded ... The shelling ceased as suddenly as it began, but not before the 7th Green Howards had lost three officers and thirty other ranks. What puzzled everyone was the fact that the fire had come from not from the enemy front, but from well in rear, and it was only later that the tragic error came to light. An inquiry revealed that a Naval forward bombardment officer had called for fire on what he took to be enemy armour. The request was passed to the cruiser Orion off Gold Beach, who obliged with salvos from all eight of her 6in guns. Her log ended triumphantly “Enemy tanks destroyed. Well done”.

    -----​

    Would the inquiry have been a naval, army or cross-service inquiry? Where would the record of the inquiry be held? There are Ship's Logs for Orion in ADM 53 at TNA but not covering June 1944. I'm no expert on naval records, but would Ship's Logs also be kept anywhere else other than Kew or indeed would a log of the bombardment not be recorded in the Ship's Log in the first place?

    One final question, the Narrative of Bombardment also says that “During 6th June, 53 situation reports were received in the H.Q. ships from F.O.B.s, either direct or retransmitted by their attached ships.” Does anyone know if these reports still exist?

    Any help with these questions or other information on this incident - like exactly where it took place - would be greatly appreciated.


    Philip
     
    Juha, timuk, kopite and 2 others like this.
  2. Tricky Dicky

    Tricky Dicky Don'tre member

    HMS Orion, British light cruiser, WW2
    Seems on the 10th June she returned to UK to have worn out barrels replaced, so assume the incident you mention was between the 6th & 9th June 1944

    TD
     
  3. Sheldrake

    Sheldrake All over the place....

    re 1. I think you have the basic data. The history of Hertfordshire Yeomanry may cover the even from their point of view. R J Kiln in D Day to Arnhem with the Hertfordshire Gunners says he was the officer who passed the message. He was on a HQ ship for the landings and in communication with his According to his account Orion denied being the source of the shells, but stopped shooting at which point shells stopped landing on the 4/7th. I have mentioned the incident in Gunners in Normandy, but IRRC did not name the ship.

    re 2. Not sure what is meant by "inquiry" in the 4/7th History. It may have simply refered to a briefing from 86nd (Hertfordshire Yeomanry) Field or it may refer to a more formal board or inquiry, if ever convened. I am not sure how many boards of inquiry were convened for friendly fire incidents. There was a war on. Stuff happened and people carried on except except when, say, a hundred bombers hit friendly rather than enemy troops.

    re 3. Just north of Cruelly, about the same place where thre 4/7 were engaged by 88mm guns.

    I have not tracked down who FOB 56 was or who he was attached to. However, the incident illustrates an important function of the network of direct support artillery liaison officers that supported the British Army. BCs and the CO's party monitored the activity on the regimental net and should stop an FOO from engaging an unsafe target. An FOO did not have a licence to engage targets on a whim outside their supported arm's area of responsibility. Sure, there were cases when there was better observation from terrain ina neighbouring area, and the control of artillery of the division making the attack was passed to an OP of a neighbour. Here inexperienced observers on their first day on Op Overlord managed to misidentify British form German tanks and were allowed to engage them.
     
    timuk and Tricky Dicky like this.
  4. DannyM

    DannyM Member

    Hi,
    FOB 56 was attached to 7th Green Howards . Ship Initially allocated was ORP Krakowiak. FOB 56 was to land at H + 50.

    Regards

    Danny
     
  5. Tullybrone

    Tullybrone Senior Member

    FYI

    List of friendly fire incidents - Wikipedia

    Off topic but mentioned purely to flag up court of enquiry - I recall 263 Squadron RAF 1944 friendly fire attack on British ships off the coast of France was subject of a court of enquiry.

    Steve
     
    timuk likes this.
  6. Totalise

    Totalise Junior Member

    Thanks for the replies.



    Tricky Dicky, it happened late afternoon on 6 June.


    Sheldrake, is Gunners in Normandy already published? Must add it to my Christmas wish list immediately! Thanks for reminding me of D-Day to Arnhem, I have a copy at home and will dig it out when I get back tonight.

    I have to admit my working assumption is that the initial sighting of enemy tanks was a genuine one by F.O.B. 56 and it was him spotting the StuG III’s of Sturmgeschütz-Abteilung 1352 which arrived in the area at about that time (see my post “D-Day StuG III”). The tanks are reported travelling north from Rucqueville at 18:40 which was south of the position of the leading British armoured forces at the time. Orion then seems to have waited for a spotting aircraft to arrive which meant the shoot didn’t happen until an hour after the initial report. It seems likely to me that by then the StuGs were out of sight but the Shermans of A Sqn, 4/7 Royal Dragoon Guards weren’t (recovering from the 88mm engagement but surely SOUTH of Creully?) and that the spotting aircraft made the mistake.

    Like I say, this is me making assumptions which I could possibly prove or disprove if I could find Orion’s log mentioned by Brereton. As for the Inquiry, if it was an official one, where would it likely be archived, if at all?


    Sheldrake and Danny M, My info (O.N.E.A.S.T./G5 Part IIIB dated 20 May 1944) is that F.O.B. 56 was indeed attached to 7 Green Howards, but landed at H + 45 and was initially attached to H.M.S. Ulster with H.M.S. Belfast on listening watch - though this could well have changed in the days before D-Day. I also have a name, Capt G J Cork RA (frustratingly I didn’t note the source). My guess is he was either 86 Fd Regt RA or 124 Fd Regt RA (who, as I understand it, as an all-towed artillery unit in 50 Div provided forward observers to 86 Fd Regt for the initial part of the invasion). I have not had the opportunity to confirm his identity or unit though.

    Philip
     
    timuk and Juha like this.
  7. Totalise

    Totalise Junior Member

    Sheldrake, forgive the ignorance but does IRRC stand for the Red Cross here?
     
  8. Steve Mac

    Steve Mac Very Senior Member

    From the regimental history: The Story of The Green Howards 1939-1945 (Synge), page 298:
    Words in square brackets added by me to aid understanding!
     
    timuk likes this.
  9. DannyM

    DannyM Member


    “F.O.B. 56 was indeed attached to 7 Green Howards, but landed at H + 45 and was initially attached to H.M.S. Ulster with H.M.S. Belfast on listening watch - though this could well have changed in the days before D-Day”


    Philip,
    The orders you have are a later date than the orders that I took the information from and you are correct for 6th June.

    Captain J.S. Corke was from No 1 Combined Operation Bombardment Unit.

    Regards

    Danny
     
    Juha likes this.
  10. Sheldrake

    Sheldrake All over the place....

    Re 1. Sadly the publication date for Gunners in Normandy has slipped to mid Jan 2020`.

    Re 2 This sounds the most plausible explanation. It also consistent with BRA 2nd Army H J Parham's championship of the benefits of Air OPs flown by Gunners more aware of the local tactical situation compared to spotters flown by the FAA or RAF.

    Re 3. There is a list of Board of Inquiry findings held in the National Archive. These are all post 2000. If it wasn't a WD annex it probably did not take place.

    5. 1 COBU was formed from volunteers from across the artillery and trained by Combined Ops to spot for ships. They were retained in this role as long as the battlefront was in range of ships. FOOs from 124 Field were simply additional FOOs to compensate for the limited number of FOOs to support the heavily reinforced 50 Div. There were a few FOBs recruited from D Day assault units, but these were members of 1 COBU attached back to the unit and not "double hatted." as an FOB occupying an FOO appointment. Corke was a Hertfordshire Yeoman and was killed in action as BC 341 Battery on 3 Sep 1944, buried in a first world war battlefield cemetery on the Somme.


    Rev 4 and 6 What is in a name?

    The nominal roll of B Troop 1 COBU contains 64451 Captain J G Corke.
     

    Attached Files:

    Last edited: Dec 2, 2019
    Juha likes this.
  11. KevinBattle

    KevinBattle Senior Member

    Totally fresh to this and with no foreknowledge, but would Allied tanks have reached the Creully area on D Day itself?
    That seems quite a penetration when I though D Day was trying to connect all the Beach heads and for tanks to have reached so far inland in 12 hours or so seems rapid (in terms of how much longer it took to reach Caen.
    Just asking, as perhaps this incident happened on 7th or 8th June?

    Totalise: Haven't you now enough?
    You've established that it was HMS Orion, which seems to have been recorded as having fired the first shots on D Day, and where those shells landed; that there were German tanks in the area but that the bombardment was erroneously targeted on friendly tanks by the Forward Observers and spotters giving the incorrect co ordinates for German armour?

    You can hardly blame gunners for giving the requested supporting fire on the co-ordinates given by an observer?
    Why focus on Orion - she did what was asked, on the co-ordinates given....
    - or an I missing the question?
     
  12. Totalise

    Totalise Junior Member

    Thank you for that. Interesting that it states the F.O.B. was no longer with them. Wish I could find a copy of Synge's book for a reasonable price, would love to read it - particularly the whole account of D-Day.

    I hadn't come across this unit before, going to have to do some digging. Sheldrake, what file is the nominal roll from? Is it held at Kew?

    Not too long to wait.

    Creully was reached in the early afternoon of D-Day by a mobile column made up of C Coy and Carriers of 7 Green Howards and A Sqn, 4/7 Royal Dragoon Guards. The DD tanks of B Sqn 4/7 RDG got further south to the ground between Brecy and Rucqueville, before pulling back slightly for the night.

    I don't think I'll ever know enough! :cool:

    Not trying to find anyone to blame, I am just wanting to understand what actually happened plus where and why it went tragically wrong.
     
  13. Sheldrake

    Sheldrake All over the place....

    The incident happened on D Day. It is worth reading up on the narrative before posting.

    This is an interesting incident because it offers an insight into the problems of applying the massive naval firepower of the allies. Sometimes friendly fire was inevitable e.g. when applying an inaccurate weapon system such as strategic bombers or when taking a risk to close with the enemy under a barrage. But this isn't wasn't. It was an avoidable screw-up.

    Totalise has done a good job putting together a plausible explanation of what happened. The FOB ordered a mission at a valid target. But the target was not engaged owing to no spotter aircraft available. An aircraft became available and HMS Orion engaged a now unsafe target, with fatal results. There were procedures in place with men who should have taken actions to prevent this incident.

    Naval techniques are different to those of the army, and this may have played a part in what happened.

    The observer who initiated the call for fire had a duty to tell the Orion that the mission was no longer required or that the target was unsafe. However, having seen his request for fire turned down Captain Corke may not have thought that he needed to take any further action. A gun battery which has been given a target but was unable to fulfill because it is engaged on another target or out of range will not fire on the ordered mission without a further call for fire.

    However, a naval spotter isn't in command of the fire of the ship, and this case the FOB was not going to act as the spotter.

    Given that the target was "tanks on the move" in the middle of a mobile battle, and the 50 minutes that elapsed delay between the request for fire and Orion ready to shoot, the Bombardment Liaison Officer on Orion should have checked the tactical situation before allowing the shoot to continue.

    There is also the question of what briefing was given to the spotter aircraft. It is difficult to map read at 240 knots. If an aircraft was ordered to engage a target with cannon, rockets or bombs, the pilot was given a forward line of own troops and even an indication such as red or white smoke or talked in by a forward air controller. So why was this different when the aircraft was spotting for a warship? What aids did the pilot have to find the right target? The naval bombardment part of the D Day did use spotter aircraft, but to engage well defined artillery coastal artillery emplacements batteries with little scope for misidentifying the target.

    It isn't clear why the FOB Corke did not act as the spotter, or use the infantry to relay reports of the fall of shot. He could not have done a worse job that the spotter pilot, 50 minutes after the fire was needed.

    If a board of inquiry was formed to investigate the incident it would have called on the various signals logs as evidence for what had taken place. Artillery (and naval) fire orders are all logged by the army signaler or naval telegrapher. This a level of detail you are unlikely to find in any surviving paperwork.
     
    Last edited: Dec 4, 2019
    Juha, timuk, Totalise and 1 other person like this.
  14. KevinBattle

    KevinBattle Senior Member

    Not really necessary to be so snappy - genuine question even though it was stated it was the afternoon of D Day....
    I can't see the point of questioning a single event 75 years afterwards.
    It wasn't the only incident in a long war, and for Orion, it had been in action for most of the day, hence needing to withdraw for gun barrels to be relined shortly after.
    If you want to make personal comments, do so by Private Message.
     
    Last edited: Dec 4, 2019
    Roy Martin and Tricky Dicky like this.
  15. Sheldrake

    Sheldrake All over the place....

    Belated apologies for grumpiness. World a happier place after book finally published....

    I have also included this story in a new battlefield guide that should appear this year on artillery on the D Day beaches and landing grounds.
     

Share This Page