The Falaise Pocket

 

We spent Memorial Day weekend visiting the war museum and memorial in Montormel.  After the June 6th invasion, D-Day, the allies drove the Germans back and in an attempt to surround them they fought their way to Falaise on the north and Chambois on the south. One hundred and fifty thousand German soldiers would be trapped if the Allies could capture and hold the hill of Mont-Ormel, known as Hill 262 on the Allied maps.

The Polish 1st Armored Division was given the assignment of attacking and holding the high ground on Hill 262. They captured the hill and held it despite two heavy counter attacks by German paratroopers and an SS Panzer Division. At one point in the fighting when the Polish troops had run out of ammunition an eyewitness reported seeing Polish soldiers fighting in hand to hand combat using only glass bottles. On the third day the Polish troops were reinforced by a division of Canadian troops and the gap was closed. One hundred thousand German troops were forced to surrender. It marked the end of the war in Normandy and a major turning point in the war in Europe.

American soldier equipment found in the valley summer of 2012.

War materials, equipment and even bodies are still found each year in this area. The area is still known as the Corridor of Death today.

1944