Uncovering Wales’ critical D-Day role, 76 years ago
SATURDAY marked the 76th anniversary of D-Day and a new book has been published by a Carmarthenshire author looking at the role South Wales played alongside American forces before and during the Normandy Landings.
The book, Oxwich to Omaha: America GIs in South Wales, by Phil Howells, details the true extent of the South Wales contribution and prepartions for what was the largest seaborne invasion in history during the Second World War.
Mr Howells’ detailed, well researched narrative looks at the invasion of northern France from the South Wales perspective.
It looks at how it all came together – where did they come from, where did they then go?
For the first time in one volume, the book looks at three key operations spanning US forces’ D-Day prepartions from June 7, 1943 to June 6, 1944:
Operation Bolero - code name of the US military troop build-up in the UK in preparation for the initial cross-channel invasion; Operation Neptune – code name for the D-Day landings; and Operation Overlord which was the code name for the Battle of Normandy.
Mr Howells, who lives in Llansadwrn, explains: “For exactly 12 months leading up to D-Day on June 6, 143,870 American GIs and US naval construstion battalions landed in South Wales during Operation Bolero.
“Army and Navy engineers built camps, hospitals, depots and maintenance bases, others trained on beaches and ranges for the invasion.
“Many would often debark their troopships and travel on trains to their camps in the UK.
“Huge amounts of cargo – 4.5m tons of tanks, guns, ammunition, boxed vehicles and gliders, stores and locomotives – were unloaded at ports at
Swansea, Barry, Cardiff, Newport and Avonmouth.
“Finally 42,000 GIs would depart those Welsh ports, leaving behind a memory or friendship, sometimes even a bride.”
Indeed many in Carmarthen remember the American GI nissen huts at the site which would become Glangwili Hospital.
It was a massive plan, months in the making which saw the Bristol Channel amass a frontline force bound for Normandy.
Mr Howells added: “The three Operations quite naturally flowed one into another, Bolero being the build-up, Overlord being the key strategy that