Beach Patrol - 6th June '44

This story was submitted to the People’s War site by Sylvia Perry from BBC Essex on behalf of Edward ‘Eddie’ Slater with his permission. He fully understands the site’s terms and conditions.

I joined the Royal Navy from the Merchant Navy (coal colliers) in 1942. I saw service in the Med for about five weeks before returning to the UK and other duties.

On the 18th December 1943 I was sent to the United States — Boston, Mass. - to the marine barracks to pick up an American built DS (Destroyer Escort Ship). The ship was of about 3500 tons and armed with 3” guns, one ‘fored’, two aft. We had a 2 pounder fitted on the bow and ‘pom pom’ multi firing cannon 20 mm. The ships were welded and flat bottomed.

The ship was commissioned February ’44 and was K574 designated HMS Thornborough — ‘Captain’ class frigate. We used the ship on patrol between Cherbourg and Le Havre, watching out for any enemy vessels but particularly ‘E’ boats. These were night patrols in conjunction with another ship doing the same patrol in the opposite direction.

There were one or two incidents with the enemy, once picking up survivors which we weren’t supposed to do. We were helped by first class radar and sank one ‘E’ boat. This one incident happened in April.

The patrols continued into the first week of June ’44. The weather was bad, overcast with much sea-fog. On the morning of the 6th June we were informed by the Captain (Captain Lt Commander Brown DSO) that we would not be returning to Portsmouth but were going towards occupied France. We sailed from the Le Havre end of the Channel and soon realized that there was a lot more movement than usual. Normally we didn’t see any other ships during the night but would pick out the light of a cigarette being smoked by the German sentry on the coast as we sailed along.

As it grew light we could see lots of ships of every shape and size. I’d seen a few convoys in my time but never anything like this. We were at ‘action stations’ and were soon in contact with many of our MTB boats. Initially we had a good view of Sword beach and the British invasion. We did not fire on the beach on this occasion but we mustered all the smaller vessels and acted as a control ship. We kept patrolling across the various beaches until we reached Omaha beach. We were so busy that we did not have any proper meals. I was an orlikion gunner with a good view of the beaches. It was about 11 a.m. and from my position I was watching out for enemy planes. I was aware of the flashes of gun fire from the beach and saw the soldiers in the landing craft but otherwise we all had to concentrate on our own jobs.

There are many stories told by veterans of what was happening on ‘the day’ but most of us were so tied up with our own jobs that we didn’t see the big picture at all.

Over the course of the next two or three days we were able to relax a bit and it was then that we saw the carnage on the shore line. We became aware that the first wave of U.S. troops on Omaha had been decimated. The sea area was covered in debris of every kind you could imagine and it became our job to sink anything that was floating on the surface. On occasions this meant sinking landing craft of all different sizes some of which still contained the bodies of men who had been killed.

To sum up the ‘D’ day, it can only be described as awesome — there will never be another day when what I saw and what I heard could be repeated.

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