Wn35b Meuvaines

Wn35b

The yellow is Wn32 Ver-sur-Mer - La Marefontaine 'Batterie Vera' of four 10cm le.F.H,14/19(f) guns of 6./1716, capable of firing at Le Hamel on the left to Courseulles on the rigt.
On D-Day although bombed prior to H-Hour and the shelled by .
Yellow is Wn35b Maronnes a forward artillery observation position.

D-Day morning.

Starting around 08:00 to 09:30, 47 Commando landed on Jig Green and Jig red beach, they were hit hard by guns not yet silenced. Two guns may have been Wn39 de Sainte-Cômes, 2 x 7.5cm F.K.38. An 8.8cm Pak 43/41 at Wn 37 Asnelles (Le Hamel) and many more smaller calibre guns not yet captured.

Many Commandos were lost as their boats sank by mines or were hit. Floundering in the water, the men also lost a lot of their weapons.

Gradually the Commando assembled around Les Roquettes and did not move of off inland to attack Port-en-Bessin, their target 13km as the Crow flies.
The first contact that the Commandos made with the enemy was 800yds beyond Buhot.
From - D-Day Landing on Gold Beach by Andrew Holborn, states that
"The first contact that the Commandos made with the enemy was 800yds beyond Buhot. X Troop came under fire and a short exchange of shots ensued. B Troop, passing through, surprised and captured a German battery OP group seized a marked up map of their battery a few hundred yards further on".
Although the distances seem a bit short, this OP seems to be the one?

The first bunker I found was a water bunker, a concrete enclosure for a large Wasser tank. The square hole in the roof, is to allow the tank to be filled.

R608 Battalion Regimental Headquarters for the Gren.Rgt.736.
Attached to the back of the bunker is a water reservoir. A standard bunker water tank.

Looking into where the Wasser tank would have been.

The trench system is still in place, this is June and the worse time to first try and find them and also trying to photograph them. But I can say it is a trench, I know as I fell into it.

To continue I had to come out of the woodland and skirt around the outside.

As I walked toe outside, I came upon a depression in the side of the woodland and a trench system running into the wood. This trench lead me directly to the Kommandostand. So this could have been the start of a covered trench/tunnel to the road.

BIGOT overlay of defences on an April 1944 map of the Creully area.

"Tunnel probably contains numerous firing points".

The first photo is taken in 1942 and it looks like nothing is going on in the wood.
1947 and there are remains of a (tunnel from the BIGOT map).
If there was a tunnel, it would have been a trench with boarded sides and a wooden roof covered in earth. Well that is how I think it would be like.

The next item I found was more trenches and the HWB Kommandstand.

Whilst trying to get some good pictures, I noticed this construction, it looked like it was a low wall with a steel frame over the top. A little like the cover of a lorry.

Another view.

Trenches and the HWB Kommandstand.

Vf1b type HWB Wellblech bunker plan.

Entrance along a trench into the Vf HWB.
Vf - Verstärkt feldmäßig/Field-reinforced.
HWB - Wellblech - corrugated iron.

The protected entrance into the bunker, the trench leading forward, ended in a fighting position covering north side of the position.

Inside the Wellblech bunker, a much heavier steel sheet as apposed to the corrugated iron used by the Allies.

The far wall of the Wellblech bunker with a chimney outlet at the top and two air vents at the bottom.

Looking back the way I came in and you can see the trench running on.

Two things here, the first is the drain and the second the recess on the right. (ignore the wood trolley, how that got there?).

Another picture of the entrance to the second Wellblech, but as you can see, its full of water.

Here and it is hard to see, a trench running from the last HWB out to the northern edge of the woodland. This would allow a good viewing/defence position.

This is the view of the rear of the wood and the area covered by this Observation Post. They would have seen the whole of D-Day unfold in front of them.